From its inception the dynasty of Atreus was cursed with pride and violence. The grandfather of Atreus was Tantalus, a son of Zeus who had the good fortune to banquet with the gods, dining on nectar and ambrosia. His first act of ingratitude was to take these divine foods and feed them to his mortal friends. The second was to steal the golden hound of Zeus and lie about it. But his third deed was an atrocity: he served up his own son, Pelops, as a feast for the gods, who recognized what was set before them and recoiled in horror. For these crimes Tantalus was sentenced to eternal torment in the netherworld. Famished and thirsty, he was set in a pool from which he could not drink and had a bough of fruits hung over him that he could not grasp.
Tantalus had a daughter, Niobe, who married Amphion, the King of Thebes, and bore him six handsome sons and six beautiful daughters. Extremely proud of her offspring, Niobe criticized Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis, for only having had two children. And when the women of Thebes offered incense to Leto to ward off punishment Niobe flew into a rage, declaring that she herself was more worthy of such offerings. The goddess Leto then sent Apollo to shoot down Niobe's sons and Artemis to shoot down her daughters. In anguish Niobe wept for her slain children, and Zeus changed her into a weeping statue.
After Tantalus had butchered his son Pelops to serve the gods, Zeus restored Pelops to life. But since his shoulder was missing, having been eaten by Demeter, Demeter gave him an ivory shoulder to replace it. Pelops became a favorite with Poseidon, although few human communities wanted him. In his wanderings Pelops came to Arcadia, which was ruled by King Oenomaus, who had a beautiful daughter, Hippodamia. When suitors came to woo her, Oenomaus would challenge them to a chariot race in which the loser would die. And because Oenomaus had the fastest horses in Greece Hippodamia's suitors had very short lives. However, she fell in love with Pelops and bribed her father's charioteer to sabotage Oenomaus' chariot. And Pelops received a pair of incredibly swift horses from Poseidon. Needless to say, Pelops won the race, killed Oenomaus, and married Hippodamia. But when the charioteer claimed his reward for undoing Oenomaus, Pelops killed him, and as the charioteer died he pronounced a curse on Pelops and his descendants. Nevertheless, Pelops had a very successful reign. He conquered the whole Peloponnesus, which was named after him, had many children, and celebrated the Olympian games in honor of Zeus.
Of his many sons Pelops loved the bastard Chrysippus the most, which made Hippodamia fear that her own children would lose the throne. When Chrysippus was murdered by Hippodamia two of her sons were implicated, so Atreus and Thyestes fled to Mycenae. Atreus acquired a golden fleece there, which would have established his right to rule. But Thyestes made love to Atreus' wife, Aerope, and obtained the fleece from her. Having been made king, Thyestes agreed that if the sun should move backward in its course Atreus could take over the throne. Zeus sent the sun backward across the sky, and Atreus acquired the kingdom of Mycenae. He had two sons by Aerope, Agamemnon and Menelaus. When Atreus learned that Thyestes had cuckolded him he invited Thyestes to a banquet and served his brother Thyestes' own sons, who had been butchered and boiled. Nauseated, Thyestes laid a curse on Atreus and his sons.
