Ulysses/Odysseus. Odysseus, also known by the Latin variant Ulysses, is a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homer's Iliad and other works in that same epic cycle. Son of Laërtes and Anticlea, husband of Penelope, and father of Telemachus and Acusilaus. Odysseus is renowned for his intellectual brilliance, guile, and versatility, and is thus known by the epithet Odysseus the Cunning. He is most famous for his nostos, or homecoming, which took him ten eventful years after the decade-long Trojan War. In Greek the name was used in various versions. Vase inscriptions have the two groups of Olyseus, Olysseus or ÅŒlysseus, and Olyteus or Olytteus. Probably from an early source from Magna Graecia dates the form Oulixes, while a later grammarian has Oulixeus. In Latin the figure was known as Ulixes or Ulysses. Some have supposed that there may originally have been two separate figures, one called something like Odysseus, the other something like Ulixes, who were combined into one complex personality. However, the change between d and l is common also in some Indo-European and Greek names, and the Latin form is supposed to be derived from the Etruscan Uthuze, which perhaps accounts for some of the phonetic innovations. The etymology of the name is unknown. Ancient authors linked the name to the Greek verbs odussomai to be wroth against, to hate, to oduromai to lament, bewail, or even to ollumi to perish, to be lost. Homer relates it to various forms of this verb in references and puns. In Book 19 of the Odyssey, where Odysseus' early childhood is recounted, Euryclea asks the boy's grandfather Autolycus to name him. Euryclea seems to suggest a name like Polyaretos, for he has much been prayed for but Autolycusapparently in a sardonic mood decided to give the child another name commemorative of his own experience in life: Since I have been angered with many, both men and women, let the name of the child be Odysseus. Odysseus often receives the patronymic epithet Laertiades, son of Laërtes. In the Iliad and Odyssey there are several further epithets used to describe Odysseus. It has also been suggested that the name is of non-Greek origin, possibly not even Indo-European, with an unknown etymology. Robert S. P. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin. In Etruscan religion the name of Odysseus were adopted under the name Uthuze, which has been interpreted as a parallel borrowing from a preceding Minoan form of the name; this theory is supposed to explain also the insecurity of the phonologies, since the affricate /tÍ¡/, unknown to the Greek of that time, gave rise to different counterparts. Relatively little is given of Odysseus' background other than that according to Pseudo-Apollodorus, his paternal grandfather or step-grandfather is Arcesius, son of Cephalus and grandson of Aeolus, while his maternal grandfather is the thief Autolycus, son of Hermes and Chione. Hence, Odysseus was the great-grandson of the Olympian god Hermes. According to the Iliad and Odyssey, his father is Laertes and his mother Anticlea, although there was a non-Homeric tradition that Sisyphus was his true father. The rumour went that Laërtes bought Odysseus from the conniving king. Odysseus is said to have a younger sister, Ctimene, who went to Same to be married and is mentioned by the swineherd Eumaeus, whom she grew up alongside, in book 15 of the Odyssey. The majority of sources for Odysseus' pre-war exploits, principally the mythographers Pseudo-Apollodorus and Hyginus, postdate Homer by many centuries. Two stories in particular are well known: When Helen is abducted, Menelaus calls upon the other suitors to honour their oaths and help him to retrieve her, an attempt that leads to the Trojan War. Odysseus tries to avoid it by feigning lunacy, as an oracle had prophesied a long-delayed return home for him if he went. He hooks a donkey and an ox to his plow and starts sowing his fields with salt. Palamedes, at the behest of Menelaus' brother Agamemnon, seeks to disprove Odysseus' madness and places Telemachus, Odysseus' infant son, in front of the plow. Odysseus veers the plow away from his son, thus exposing his stratagem. Odysseus holds a grudge against Palamedes during the war for dragging him away from his home. Odysseus and other envoys of Agamemnon travel to Scyros to recruit Achilles because of a prophecy that Troy could not be taken without him.