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Laocoön (Greek Λαοκοων, pronounced roughly Lao-koh-on), son of Acoetes, was a priest of Poseidon (or of Apollo, by some accounts) at Troy.
Homer's Iliad and Virgil's Aeneid detail the circumstances of Laocoön's death. Laocoön warned his fellow Trojans against the wooden horse presented to the city by the Greeks. In the Aeneid, Virgil gives Laocoön the famous line Equo ne credite, Teucri / Quidquid id est, timeo Danaos et dona ferentis, or "Do not trust the Horse, Trojans / Whatever it is, I fear the Greeks even when they bring gifts." This line is usually translated as "beware of Greeks bearing gifts."
In his anger that the Trojans had ignored his advice, Laocoön threw his spear at the Horse. Poseidon (some say Athena), who was supporting the Greeks, subsequently sent sea-serpents to strangle Laocoön and his two sons, Antiphantes and Thymbraeus. (Some accounts say Apollo sent the serpents for an unrelated offense, and only unlucky timing caused the Trojans to misinterpret them as punishment for striking the Horse.)
Virgil describes the scene (original Latin):
| ;Ille simul manibus tendit diuellere nodos ;perfusus sanie uittas atroque ueneno, ;clamores simul horrendos ad sidera tollit: ;qualis mugitus, fugit cum saucius aram ;taurus et incertam excussit ceruice securim. |
Literal English translation:
| ;At the same time as, with his hands, he tries to tear away the coils round his waist, ;the coils round his head; soaked with slaver and black poison, ;he also raises horrifying shrieks to the stars: ;like the bellowing, when flees, wounded, from the altar ;a bull, and it shakes a badly aimed axe from its neck. |
John Dryden's poetic English translation (see [1], line 290):
| ;With both his hands he labors at the knots; ;His holy fillets the blue venom blots; ;His roaring fills the flitting air around. ;Thus, when an ox receives a glancing wound, ;He breaks his bands, the fatal altar flies, ;And with loud bellowings breaks the yielding skies. |
The death of Laocoön is depicted in the monumental statue of Laocoön and his Sons (attributed to Rhodian sculptors Hegesandros, Athenedoros, and Polydoros).
An unrelated Laocoon, also spelled "Lacoon", son of Porthaon, was one of the Argonauts.
