In
Greek mythology,
Tithonos (latinised
Tithonus, pronounced [tɪˈθoʊnəs] or [taɪ-]; ) was the lover of
Eos,
Titan of the dawn, who was known in Roman mythology as
Aurora. Tithonus was a
Trojan by birth, the son of King
Laomedon of Troy by a
water nymph named Strymo (Στρυμώ). The mythology reflected by the fifth-century vase-painters of Athens envisaged Tithonus as a
rhapsode, as the lyre in his hand, on an
oinochoe (wine jug) of the
Achilles Painter, ca. 470 BC–460 BCE (
illustration) attests. Competitive singing, as in the
Contest of Homer and Hesiod, is also depicted vividly in the
Homeric Hymn to Apollo and mentioned in the two
Hymns to Aphrodite.