Athena petitions Zeus to set Odysseus's return in motion while Poseidon is away visiting the Ethiopians.

Telemachus calls the first public assembly since Odysseus left for Troy and demands the suitors leave his palace.

Odysseus supplicates Queen Arete at the Phaeacian palace, and King Alcinous promises to help him return home.

Odysseus reveals his true identity to the Phaeacians and begins narrating the full story of his wanderings from Troy.

Polyphemus the Cyclops eats six of Odysseus's men and traps the survivors inside his cave with an enormous boulder.

Odysseus drives a sharpened stake into Polyphemus's eye, then escapes the cave hidden beneath the Cyclops's favorite ram.

Despite repeated divine warnings, Odysseus's men slaughter the Sun God Helius's sacred cattle on the island of Thrinacia.

Zeus destroys Odysseus's ship with a thunderbolt, drowning every remaining crew member and leaving Odysseus the sole survivor.

The Phaeacians sail sleeping Odysseus home to Ithaca and leave him on the beach with his treasure.

Athena disguises Odysseus as an aged beggar and directs him to seek shelter with the loyal swineherd Eumaeus.

Odysseus reveals his true identity to Telemachus, and father and son plan together how to destroy the suitors.

Penelope announces a contest: whoever strings Odysseus's bow and shoots an arrow through 12 axes will marry her.

Odysseus strings the great bow with ease and shoots an arrow cleanly through all 12 axes, signaling the attack.

Odysseus, Telemachus, Eumaeus, and Philoetius, aided by Athena, slaughter every suitor feasting in the great hall.

Penelope tricks Odysseus into revealing the secret of their immovable marriage bed, confirming his identity, and they reunite.

The Odyssey begins with Athena persuading Zeus to allow Odysseus to finally return home after 20 years away, setting the entire story in motion. After Telemachus fails to expel the suitors through a public assembly, Odysseus narrates his wanderings to the Phaeacians, including his blinding of the Cyclops Polyphemus and his men's fatal decision to slaughter the Sun God's sacred cattle. The Phaeacians deliver Odysseus to Ithaca, where Athena disguises him as a beggar so he can move through the palace unseen and test who remains loyal. Father and son reunite in secret and lay their plan, culminating in Penelope's bow contest that places Odysseus's own weapon back in his hands. He slaughters every suitor in the hall, then faces the final test when Penelope forces him to reveal the secret of their marriage bed before she accepts him as her husband.

The headline events of Odysseus's epic journey home.

Athena visits Ithaca disguised as the family friend Mentes and urges Telemachus to seek news of his father.

Athena disguised as Mentor secretly arranges a ship and crew, and Telemachus slips away from Ithaca by night.

Telemachus visits the old king Nestor in Pylos and hears tales of the Greek warriors' troubled homecomings after Troy.

Menelaus tells Telemachus that the sea god Proteus revealed Odysseus is alive but trapped on Calypso's island.

The messenger god Hermes visits Calypso's island and delivers Zeus's command that she must release Odysseus immediately.

Poseidon sends a massive storm to destroy Odysseus's raft just as he nears the island of the Phaeacians.

The princess Nausicaa discovers Odysseus washed up by the river and gives him food, clothing, and advice for reaching her parents' palace.

Odysseus's crew secretly opens Aeolus's bag of winds, releasing a gale that blows the ships back from within sight of Ithaca.

The sorceress Circe turns Odysseus's men into pigs, but the god Hermes gives Odysseus an herb to resist her magic.

Odysseus forces Circe to swear an oath not to harm him and demands she immediately restore his men to human form.

Odysseus performs the required sacrifices at the boundary of the underworld and consults the prophet Tiresias about returning home.

Odysseus has himself lashed to the mast to safely hear the Sirens' song while his crew rows with ears sealed in wax.

The six-headed monster Scylla snatches six of Odysseus's crewmen from the deck and devours them in her cliff-side cave.

Odysseus arrives at Eumaeus's farmhouse in his beggar disguise and receives generous food and shelter from the loyal swineherd.

The suitors' families assemble to seek revenge on Odysseus; Athena stops the fighting and both sides swear oaths of peace.

While Athena guides the inexperienced Telemachus on a coming-of-age voyage to Pylos and Sparta, the gods work behind the scenes to free Odysseus from Calypso's island by sending Hermes with Zeus's direct command. Poseidon retaliates by destroying Odysseus's raft in a storm, but the Phaeacian princess Nausicaa finds him and sets him on the path to their court. During his narrated wanderings, Odysseus recounts losing men to the treacherous winds from Aeolus's bag, surviving Circe's dangerous sorcery, and descending to the underworld's edge to consult the prophet Tiresias for guidance home. He then sails past the deadly Sirens and endures the monster Scylla before eventually reaching Ithaca and the shelter of Eumaeus's farmhouse. The epic closes with the suitors' grieving families mounting a revenge attack, until Athena steps in to impose a final, lasting peace over Odysseus's restored kingdom.

The secondary journeys and adventures that shape the epic.

Antinous reveals in the public assembly that Penelope's burial shroud trick has been exposed by disloyal slave women.

The suitors discover Telemachus has secretly sailed away and quickly plot to ambush and kill him when he returns.

Athena sends a phantom in the likeness of Penelope's sister to assure the weeping queen that Telemachus will return safely.

Enraged after escaping, Odysseus shouts his real name back to the blinded Polyphemus, giving the Cyclops power to curse him to Poseidon.

Odysseus's dead mother Anticleia appears at the underworld boundary and reveals that Penelope remains faithful and Laertes grieves alone.

The shade of Agamemnon warns Odysseus to return home in secret and never reveal his full plans even to his wife.

Poseidon turns the Phaeacian ship to stone in the harbor as punishment for the crew carrying Odysseus home against his will.

Penelope confronts Antinous before the suitors, shaming him with Odysseus's past kindness and demanding the suitors stop threatening her son.

Odysseus's old hunting dog Argos recognizes his master after 20 years and dies at the moment he sees him return.

Eurycleia recognizes Odysseus by the scar on his thigh while bathing him, but Athena diverts Penelope's attention at that moment.

Penelope describes her dream of an eagle slaughtering her geese to the disguised Odysseus and announces the upcoming bow contest.

Odysseus reveals himself to the herdsmen Eumaeus and Philoetius by showing his scar and recruits both as allies for the attack.

Telemachus boldly insists the disguised Odysseus be allowed a turn with the bow, and the amused suitors back down.

The bard Phemius and the slave Medon supplicate Odysseus after the suitors' slaughter, and Telemachus confirms their innocence so Odysseus spares them.

Athena restores Laertes's strength, and the old man hurls a spear that kills Eupeithes, leader of the suitors' vengeful families.

The exposure of Penelope's shroud trick strips away her only delaying strategy, raising the stakes for Odysseus's return, while the suitors' murder plot against Telemachus introduces a new and urgent danger. Odysseus's fatal boast to Polyphemus gives Poseidon a name to curse, and his conversations with the dead—his grieving mother and the bitter shade of Agamemnon—deepen his resolve and shape his strategy for returning home in secret. Back in Ithaca, small moments of recognition accumulate their tension: a dying dog, a scar discovered at the bath, a dream interpreted between strangers who are not strangers at all. Odysseus's quiet recruitment of his loyal herdsmen and the bow contest's dramatic climax bring the plan to the moment of action. The story ends not with slaughter alone but with resolution, as Athena empowers old Laertes to strike the final blow and then commands both sides to lay down their arms forever.