CALCHAS

in Greek mythology, the son of Thestor (a priest of Apollo) and the most famous soothsayer among the Greeks at the time of the Trojan War. He foretold the duration of the siege of Troy, demanded the sacrifice of Iphigeneia, daughter of Agamemnon (king of Mycenae), and advised the construction of the wooden horse with which the Greeks finally took Troy. It had been predicted that he should die when he met his superior in divination; the prophecy was fulfilled when Calchas met Mopsus after the war, at Claros or at Siris in Italy. Beaten in a trial of soothsaying, Calchas died of chagrin or committed suicide. a Trojan priest who has gone over to the Greeks in Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida. Calchas, who has been invaluable to the Greeks as a soothsayer, requests that the captured Trojan general Antenor be exchanged for his daughter Cressida, who is still in Troy. This exchange leads directly to the betrayal of Troilus by Cressida.