The heroes of the Trojan War, as Ridgeway has pointed out, were newcomers to the land.[359] In most cases their grandfathers are mentioned, seldom a great-grandfather, unless it is to state that he was a god. Sometimes even the grandfather was a deity, as in the case of Polypoites, but usually when this is so we have reason for believing that the hero, like Nestor, the grandson of Poseidon, was an old man. The earliest ancestor was sometimes Zeus, but usually the pedigree is not actually traced to the divine forefather. In a large number of cases, especially of the minor heroes, they are said to be of the stock of Ares. Dr. Hall has suggested that Ares and his mistress Hera were the chief deities of these northern invaders.[360] We hear very little in the Iliad of these first human ancestors of the “Achæans,” nor has later Greek legend much more to say about most of them. We have, however, various stories of heroes, arriving alone like Theseus, Perseus, Herakles, and Peleus, or perhaps accompanied by one friend like Amphitryon, at some Greek city. The hero is well received by the king of the city, and often relieves him of some difficulty, whether it be the repulse of a hostile attack, as in the case of Theseus and the Pallantids, or Amphitryon and the Telebœans, the punishment of robbers, such as Periphates, Sinis, Sciron, Cercyon or Damastes, or the slaying of wild beasts like the Cromyon sow, the Marathon bull, the Cadmeian fox, or the various monsters slain by Herakles. The king honours the visitor, the princess, like Ariadne, Comœtho or Polymela, falls in love with him, then some unfortunate accident occurs, as was the case with Ægeus, Acrisius, and Eurytion, and the king is slain. The hero then ascends the throne, marries the princess, and, as the fairy tales say, they lived happily ever after. Such is the almost universal burden of Greek legend, as it is of the _märchen_, which grew up in the northern forests. It has been usual to interpret the stories of these heroes as referring to invading peoples, and to believe that the name of the chief only has survived, whereas the memory of the people has perished. That such was often the case is likely, but when dealing with the first “Achæan” intruders we must guard ourselves against taking this for granted. Dr. Wace’s arguments are all against the arrival of a fresh people at this time, for there is no introduction of new styles of pottery; on the other hand, there is nothing in his evidence antagonistic to the view that a few northern heroes, coming unaccompanied by men-at-arms, succeeded in making themselves masters of the cities of pre-Hellenic Greece. It is possible that in this case, as in many others, nineteenth century scholarship has been too clever and too critical, and that the legends as they have come down to us are nearer to the truth than the amendments which have been suggested.[361]