Character Summary

Prologue: armed in war regalia, it sets the stage for the entire play

Troilus: a son of Priam and a prince who is in love with Cressida

Pandarus: Cressida's uncle who acts as Troilus and Cressida's go-between

Aeneas: a commander of Troy

Cressida: daughter to Calchas--Calchas who has defected to the Greeks

Alexander: a servant to Cressida

Agamemnon: the General of Greece and Menelaus' brother

Ulysses: a Greek commander who is renowned for his shrewd mind

Nestor: a Greek commander who is a wise, old, trusted man

Ajax: a big, slow, and clumsy Greek commander who is part Trojan by blood (his mother is Priam's sister) and who is eager to earn glory vis-a-vis Hector

Thersites: an ill-tempered, spiteful Greek who is also physically deformed

Achilles: a Greek commander and the most renowned Greek soldier who refuses to fight the Trojans on account of a deal he had made with Hecuba (Troy's Queen) but who eventually does and unfairly massacres Hector on account of his dearest friend's--Patroclus'--death

Patroclus: a Greek commander and Achilles' best friend

Priam: King of Troy and father to Hector, Paris, Deiphobus, and Troilus

Hector: son of Priam and Troy's most renowned warrior whose sense of honor and fair play leads to his demise

Paris: son of Priam who has cuckolded Menelaus

Diomedes: a Greek commander who carries on a romantic intrigue with Cressida to Troilus' disgust and rage

Helen: wife to Menelaus who elopes with Paris to Troy

Servant: servant to Paris who is a punning clown

Calchas: a Trojan priest and Cressida's father who has defected to the Greeks

Deiphobus: a son of Priam and a prince of Troy

Andromache: Hector's wife who fails dissuades her husband from engaging in combat

Cassandra: Hector's sister who has clairvoyant powers and who fails to dissuade her brother from engaging in combat

Margarelon: a bastard son of Priam who challenges Thersites on the battlefield