In the first book, the gods discuss Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, alluding to a story that we are not told outright in this particular epic. Essentially, Agamemnon had been away, fighting in the Trojan War with Odysseus (among others), and, while he was gone, his treacherous wife, Clytemnestra, and her lover, Aegisthus, plotted his murder. When Agamemnon returned from the war, hoping to be greeted by a loyal and adoring wife, he was murdered by his disloyal wife's new lover instead. Orestes, Agamemnon's son, then grows up and kills his mother, Clytemnestra, as well as Aegisthus, proving himself to be a good and loyal son for avenging his father's death. At various points in the narration, Telemachus is compared to Orestes because he, too, is proving himself to be loyal to his own long-absent father, Odysseus.
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