Abstract
The paper examines the literary motif of Helenes-apaitesis, the epic episode in which the Greeks demand that Helen be returned at the beginning of the Trojan war. This episode, after Homer and the Cypria, was developed by lyric and tragedy: Bacchylides depends on the Iliadic version; Sophocles, by contrast, is close to the version of the Cypria. Both Bacchylides and Sophocles, however, like Anthenor in the Homeric Teikhoskopia, emphasize the crucial importance of logos in the episode.
