The Library of Greek Mythology (Oxford World's Classics) (22 page)

In addition to these, he had a third daughter, Arsinoe, who gave birth to Asclepios after Apollo had made love with her. Some say, however, that Asclepios was not the daughter of Arsinoe, daughter of Leucippos, but rather of Coronis,
*
daughter of Phlegyas in Thessaly; and they say that Apollo fell in love with her and immediately had intercourse with her, but that she, against her father’s wishes, preferred Ischys, the brother of Caineus, and became his wife. Apollo cursed the crow that brought him this news, and turned it black, instead of white as it had been hitherto. Coronis he put to death; and as she was consigned to the flames, he seized her [unborn] baby from the pyre, and took him to Cheiron the Centaur, who brought him up and taught him the arts of medicine and hunting. Asclepios became a surgeon, and he developed the art to such a degree that he not only prevented some people from dying, but even raised them from the dead. For he had received from Athene blood that had flowed from the veins of the Gorgon; and he used the blood that had flowed from the veins on the left side
*
to put people to death, and that which had flowed from the right, to save them—and it was by this means that he raised the dead.t
⁴
But Zeus, fearing that human beings would acquire the art of healing from him and be able to come to one another’s rescue, struck him down
*
with a thunderbolt. Angered by this, Apollo killed the Cyclopes who had forged the thunderbolt
*
for Zeus. As Zeus was about to hurl him into Tartaros, Leto interceded on his behalf, and he
ordered him instead to serve a man as a labourer for a year. So Apollo went to Admetos,
*
son of Pheres, at Pherae, and served him as a herdsman, causing all his cows to deliver twins at every birth.

But there are those who say that Aphareus and Leucippos were born to Perieres, son of Aiolos, and that Perieres, son of Cynortas, was the father of Oibalos, who fathered Tyndareus, Hippocoon, and Icarios by a naiad nymph, Bateia.
*

⁵
Hippocoon became father of the following sons: Dorycleus, Scaios, Enarophoros, Euteiches, Boucolos, Lycaithos, Tebros, Hippothoos, Eurytos, Hippocorystes, Alcinous, and Alcon. With the help of his sons, Hippocoon expelled Icarios and Tyndareus
*
from Lacedaimon. They took refuge with Thestios,
*
and joined him as allies in the war he was waging against his neighbours; and Tyndareus married Thestios’ daughter, Leda. Afterwards, however, when Heracles had killed Hippocoon and his sons,
*
they returned to Lacedaimon and Tyndareus succeeded to the throne.

⁶
Icarios and a naiad nymph, Periboia, had five sons, Thoas, Damasippos, Imeusimos, Aletes, and Perileos, and a daughter, Penelope, who became the wife of Odysseus; Tyndareus and Leda had some daughters, namely, Timandra, who became the wife of Echemos, and Clytemnestra, who became the wife of Agamemnon, and also Phylonoe, who was made immortal by Artemis.

⁷
Taking the form of a swan, Zeus had intercourse with Leda, as did Tyndareus on the same night, and she bore Polydeuces and Helen to Zeus, and Castor
*
[and Clytemnestra
*
] to Tyndareus. According to some, however, Helen was a daughter of Zeus by Nemesis;
*
for when Nemesis tried to avoid intercourse with Zeus by changing herself into a goose, Zeus in turn took the form of a swan and had intercourse with her. As the fruit of their intercourse, she laid an egg, which was discovered in the woods by a shepherd, who took it to Leda and presented it to her. She placed it in a chest and kept it safe, and when
in due time Helen hatched out, Leda brought her up as her own daughter.

Helen grew into a girl of such remarkable beauty that Theseus carried her off and took her to Aphidnai;
*
but while he was in Hades, Polydeuces and Castor marched against the city, captured it, and recovered Helen, and also took away Theseus’ mother, Aithra, as a captive.

⁸
The kings of Greece came to Sparta to seek the hand of Helen. These were her suitors: Odysseus, son of Laertes; Diomedes, son of Tydeus; Antilochos, son of Nestor; Agapenor, son of Ancaios; Sthenelos, son of Capaneus; Amphimachos, son of Cteatos; Thalpios, son of Eurytos; Meges, son of Phyleus; Amphilochos, son of Amphiaraos; Menestheus, son of Peteos; Schedios [and] Epistrophos[, sons of Iphitos]; Polyxenos, son of Agasthenes; Peneleos[, son of Hippalcimos]; Leitos[, son of Alector]; Aias, son of Oileus; Ascalaphos and Ialmenos, sons of Ares; Elephenor, son of Chalcodon; Eumelos, son of Admetos; Polypoites, son of Peirithoos; Leonteus, son of Coronos; Podaleirios and Machaon, sons of Asclepios; Philoctetes, son of Poias; Eurypylos, son of Evaimon; Protesilaos, son of Iphiclos; Menelaos, son of Atreus; Aias and Teucros, sons of Telamon; and Patroclos, son of Menoitios.

⁹
When Tyndareus saw the throng of suitors, he was afraid that if he picked out one of them, the rest would turn to violence. Odysseus promised, however, that if Tyndareus would help him to gain the hand of Penelope, he would suggest a means by which all dissension could be averted; and when Tyndareus promised his help, Odysseus told him to make all the suitors swear an oath
*
that they would come to the aid of the chosen bridegroom if he were ever injured by another with regard to his marriage. On hearing this advice, Tyndareus made the suitors swear the oath, and while he himself chose Menelaos as a bridegroom for Helen, he asked Icarios to grant Penelope in marriage to Odysseus.

¹
By Helen, Menelaos had a daughter, Hermione, and according

11

to some accounts, a son, Nicostratos;
*
and by a slave-woman,
Pieris, of Aetolian descent (or according to Acousilaos, by Tereis), he had a son, Megapenthes, and by a nymph, Cnossia, he had, according to Eumelos, a son, Xenodamos.

²
Of the two sons born to Leda, Castor devoted himself to the arts of war, and Polydeuces to boxing; and because of their valour,
*
the pair were called the Dioscuri. Wishing to marry the daughters of Leucippos,
*
they abducted them from Messene and took them as their wives; and Polydeuces became the father of Mnesileos by Phoebe, and Castor the father of Anogon by Hilaeira. After driving some plundered cattle from Arcadia with the aid of Idas and Lynceus, sons of Aphareus, they entrusted them to Idas for division. Cutting a cow into four, he said that whoever ate his share first should have half of the plunder, and the one who ate his share second should have the remainder. And before the others had a chance, Idas swallowed down his own portion and then his brother’s too, and with his brother’s help, drove the plunder to Messene. The Dioscuri responded by marching against Messene and taking away the plundered cattle and much else besides; and they waited in ambush for Idas and Lynceus. But Lynceus caught sight of Castor
*
and revealed his presence to Idas, who killed him. Polydeuces chased after them, and killed Lynceus with a javelin throw, but as he was pursuing Idas, he was hit on the head by a stone that Idas had thrown, and fell unconscious. And Zeus struck Idas with a thunderbolt and carried Polydeuces up to heaven; and when Polydeuces was unwilling to accept immortality while Castor lay dead, Zeus granted that both of them should live alternate days amongst the gods and amongst mortals.
*
After the Dioscuri had been raised to the gods, Tyndareus summoned Menelaos to Sparta and transferred the kingdom to him.

¹
Electra, daughter of Atlas, had two sons, Iasion and

2

Dardanos, by Zeus. Iasion conceived a passion for Demeter
and was struck by a thunderbolt because he wanted to violate the goddess;
*
and Dardanos, stricken with grief at his brother’s death, left Samothrace and went to the mainland opposite.
*
The king of that land was Teucros, son of the River Scamander and a nymph, Idaia, and its inhabitants were called the Teucrians after him. Dardanos was welcomed by the king, and after receiving a share of the land and the king’s daughter, Bateia, in marriage, he founded a city, Dardanos; and when Teucros died, he called the whole country Dardania.
²
He had two sons, Ilos and Erichthonios, one of whom, Ilos, died without offspring, while the other, Erichthonios, inherited the kingdom, married Astyoche, daughter of Simoeis, and became the father of Tros. When Tros succeeded to the throne, he named the country Troy
*
after himself, and taking Callirrhoe, daughter of Scamander, as his wife, he had a daughter, Cleopatra, and three sons, Ilos, Assaracos, and Ganymede. This Ganymede
*
was so beautiful that Zeus used an eagle to carry him off, and made him cupbearer to the gods in heaven. Assaracos for his part had a son, Capys, by Hieromneme, daughter of Simoeis. And by Themiste, daughter of Ilos, Capys had a son, Anchises, who aroused Aphrodite’s amorous desire;
*
and she slept with him, and gave birth to Aeneas, and to Lyros, who died without offspring.

³
Ilos went to Phrygia, and finding that games were being held there by the king, he became victor in the wrestling. As a prize he received fifty boys and as many girls, and the king, in obedience to an oracle, also gave him a dappled cow, telling him to found a city at the place where the cow lay down.
*
So he followed the cow, and when it arrived at a certain hill, called the Hill of Phrygian Ate, it lay down; and there Ilos founded a city, naming it Ilion. And he prayed to Zeus to reveal a sign to him, and when day arrived, he saw the Palladion,
*
which had fallen from the sky, lying outside his tent. It was three cubits high; its feet were joined together, and in its right hand it held a raised spear and in the other, a distaff and spindle.

This is the story that people tell about the Palladion. They say that after her birth, Athene was brought up by Triton,
*
who had a daughter, Pallas; and that both girls practised the arts of war, and this led them into conflict one day. And when
Pallas was about to land a blow, Zeus grew alarmed and placed his aegis
*
in the way, causing Pallas to look upwards in fright and fall victim to a fatal wound from Athene. Greatly distressed at her loss, Athene fashioned a wooden statue in her likeness, and wrapping the aegis which had aroused her fear around its chest, she set it up by Zeus’ side and paid honour to it. Subsequently, since Electra had sought refuge at the Palladion when she was raped,
*
Zeus threw the Palladion along with Ate
*
into the land of Ilion, where Ilos built a temple for it and honoured it. That is what people say about the Palladion.

Ilos married Eurydice, daughter of Adrastos, and became the father of Laomedon, who married Strymo, daughter of Scamander (though according to some, his wife was Placia, daughter of Otreus, or according to others, Leucippe). Laomedon had five sons, Tithonos, Lampos, Clytios, Hicetaon, and Podarces, and three daughters, Hesione, Cilia, and Astyoche; and by a nymph, Calybe, he had a son, Boucolion.

⁴
Dawn so loved Tithonos
*
that she carried him off and took him to Ethiopia, where she slept with him and gave birth to two sons, Emathion and Memnon.

⁵
After Ilion was captured by Heracles, as we mentioned
*
somewhat earlier, Podarces, afterwards known as Priam, became king there. He took as his first wife Arisbe, daughter of Merops, by whom he had a son, Aisacos, who married Asterope, daughter of Cebren, and so mourned for her when she died that he was turned into a bird.
*
Priam later gave Arisbe to Hyrtacos, and took as his second wife Hecuba, daughter of Dymas (or according to some, the daughter of Cisseus, or according to others, of the River Sangarios and Metope). The first child born to her was Hector; and when her second child was about to be born, Hecuba had a dream
*
in which she gave birth to a firebrand and the fire spread through the whole city and burned it down. When Priam learned of the dream from Hecuba, he sent for his son Aisacos, who could interpret dreams because he had been taught the art by his maternal grandfather
Merops. Aisacos said that the birth of the child meant the ruin of his country, and advised that the baby should be exposed. So when the baby was born, Priam gave it to a servant (Agelaos by name) to be taken to Mount Ida for exposure; and after it had been exposed by him, the baby was suckled for five days by a bear. When Agelaos found the child still alive, he picked him up and took him home to rear in the country as his own son, naming him Paris. When he grew up to be a young man, Paris, who was superior to many in beauty and strength, acquired the further name of
Alexander
, for warding off robbers and
protecting
*
the flocks. And not long afterwards he rediscovered his parents.
*

After Paris, Hecuba gave birth to some daughters, Creousa, Laodice, Polyxene, and Cassandra. Apollo wanted to sleep with Cassandra and promised to teach her the art of prophecy;
*
but after she had learned it, she refused to sleep with him. In response, Apollo deprived her prophecies of all power to convince. Afterwards, Hecuba had eight sons, Deiphobos, Helenos, Pammon, Polites, Antiphos, Hipponoos, Polydoros, and Troilos—she is said to have borne this last to Apollo.

And by other women Priam had further sons, Melanippos, Gorgythion, Philaimon, Hippothoos, Glaucos, Agathon, Chersidamas, Evagoras, Hippodamas, Mestor, Atas, Doryclos, Lycaon, Dryops, Bias, Chromios, Astygonos, Telestas, Evandros, Cebriones, Mylios, Archemachos, Laodocos, Echephron, Idomeneus, Hyperion, Ascanios, Democoon, Aretos, Deiopites, Clonios, Echemmon, Hypeirochos, Aigeoneus, Lysithoos, and Polymedon, and also some daughters, Medusa, Medesicaste, Lysimache, and Aristodeme.

⁶
Hector married Andromache, daughter of Eetion, and Alexander married Oinone, daughter of the River Cebren. Oinone had learnt the art of prophecy from Rhea, and warned Alexander not to sail for Helen; but when she failed to convince him, she told him to come to her if he were ever wounded,
*
for she alone could cure him. When he had abducted Helen from Sparta and Troy was under attack, he was struck by an arrow that Philoctetes had shot from the bow of Heracles, and made his way back to Oinone on Mount Ida. But she was bitter at the wrong she had suffered and refused to cure him. So
Alexander was carried off to Troy, where he died; and when Oinone had a change of heart and brought the remedies for his cure, she found him already dead and hanged herself.