Ancient Greeks named males after their fathers, producing a
patronymic with the suffix
-id-; for example, the sons of
Atreus were the Atreids. For royal houses, the patronymic was formed from the name of the founder or of an early significant figure of a dynasty. A ruling family might thus have a number of dynastic names; for example, Agis I named the Agiads, but he was a Heraclid and so were his descendants. If the descent was not known or was scantily known, the Greeks made a few standard assumptions based on their cultural ideology. Agiad people were treated as a tribe, presumed to have descended from an ancestor bearing its name. He must have been a king, who founded a dynasty of his name. That mythologizing extended even to place names. They were presumed to have been named after kings and divinities. Kings often became divinities, in their religion.
Lelegids The Lelegid were the descendants of Lelex (a
back-formation), ancestor of the
Leleges, an ancient tribe inhabiting the Eurotas valley before the Greeks, who, according to the mythological descent, amalgamated with the Greeks
Lacedaemonids The Lacedaemonids contain Greeks from the age of legend, now treated as being the
Bronze Age in Greece. In the language of mythologic descent, the kingship passed from the Leleges to the Greeks. :
Years with no dates (only " ") are unknown Atreids The
Atreidai (Latin Atreidae) belong to the Late Bronze Age, or the
Mycenaean Period. In mythology, they were the
Perseids. As the name of
Atreus is attested in Hittite documents, this dynasty may well be protohistoric. :
Years with no dates (only "") are unknown ==Heraclids==