The Myth of Thesesias and the Homeric Tradition

Theseses is a fascinatingly bizarre and like objectively bad hero who's a hero. He still manages to not look totally great but it's one of his most redeeming stories i would say if you ignore the versions where he leaves her on an island. Theseus abducting Helen connects to Athens and Sparta and so many things. It's explicitly Athens trying to write themselves into the homeric tradition which seems like it's kind of what they were doing all around with Theseus.