Editing Orestes (section)

== Reported remains ==
=== Brought to Sparta ===
{{further|List of tallest people#Disputed and unverified claims}}
In ''[[Histories (Herodotus)|The History]]'' by [[Herodotus]], the [[Oracle of Delphi]] foretold that the [[Sparta]]ns could not defeat the [[Tegea]]ns until they moved the bones of Orestes to Sparta.<ref name=Fragkaki2016>{{cite web|author=Mary Fragkaki|url=https://www.ucm.es/data/cont/docs/106-2017-05-02-19.%20Mary%20FRAGKAKI.pdf|title=The "repatriation" of Orestes and Theseus|date=2016|work=Antesteria|pages=285–302|issn=2254-1683|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220127115004/https://www.ucm.es/data/cont/docs/106-2017-05-02-19.%20Mary%20FRAGKAKI.pdf|archive-date=27 January 2022}}</ref> [[Lichas (Spartan)|Lichas]] discovered the body, which measured 7 [[cubits]] long<ref name=Huxley1976>{{cite web|author=George Huxley|url= https://grbs.library.duke.edu/article/viewFile/7181/4957|title=Bones for Orestes|date=1979|publisher=Duke University Libraries|issn=2159-3159|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200802151239/https://grbs.library.duke.edu/article/viewFile/7181/4957|archive-date=2 August 2020}}</ref> (311.5&nbsp;cm if 1 cubit is 44.5&nbsp;cm<ref>{{cite book|author=Peter W. Flint, Emanuel Tov, James C. WonderKam|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ku15DwAAQBAJ&dq=og+size+bible&pg=PA71|title=Studies in the Hebrew Bible, Qumran, and the Septuagint: Presented to Eugene Ulrich|date=2006|page=71|publisher=Koninklijke Brill NV|isbn=9004137386}}</ref>). Thus Orestes would have been a [[giant (mythology)|Giant]]. These remains could have belonged to a huge animal from the [[Pleistocene]] epoch.<ref name=Fragkaki2016/> Huge bones found in caves in nearby areas of Greece have been attributed to [[horse]]s (''[[Equus abeli]]''), [[mammoth]]s, [[elephant]]s, [[deer]]s, [[Bovidae|bovids]] and [[cetacea]]ns.<ref name=Huxley1976/><ref>{{cite journal|author=Marina Milićević Bradać, Ivor Karavanić|date=December 2015|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/297055855|title=Phlegon of Tralles and fossils from Dalmatia|journal=Vjesnik Za Arheologiju I Povijest Dalmatinsku|volume=108|issue=1|pages=109–118|issn=1845-7789}}</ref>

=== The ashes of Orestes as ''Pignora Imperii'' ===
[[Maurus Servius Honoratus]], an early 4th century grammarian, regards the ashes of Orestes (''Cineres Orestis'') as one of the seven ''[[pignora imperii]]'' of the Roman empire in his ''In Vergilii Aeneidem commentarii'' (‘Commentary on Virgil’s Aeneid’). Alongside the ashes, Servius lists the other six pignora: the stone of the Mother of the Gods, the terracotta chariot of the Veientines, the [[ancile]], the [[Priam|sceptre of Priam]], the veil of Iliona, and the [[Palladium (classical antiquity)|palladium]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Maurus Honoratus |first=Servius |title=In Vergilii Aeneidem commentarii |pages=ad Aen. 7, 188}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Balbuza |first=Katarzyna |title=Rerum gestarum monumentis et memoriae: Cultural Readings in Livy |year=2018 |editor-last=Gillmeister |editor-first=Andrzej |pages=127–136 |chapter=Livy and the pignora imperii. The Historian from Patavium as a Eulogist of the Idea of the Eternity of Rome}}</ref>

The ashes were kept at the [[Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus]] on the [[Capitolium]].