Exam 3 Flashcards
Cecrops and Erichthonius
Cecrops: was a half-snake (below waist) half-human (above) and he was the first king of Athens. He is credited with marriage, the patriarchy of man and woman, and stopped human sacrifice. He established Athens and the monarchy. It was said that he was autochthony (“sprung from earth”)
Erichthonius: was the child of Athena (Hephaestus came on her). He had snake legs for some reason and Athena placed him into a box for Cecrop’s daughters (Aglaurus, Herse, and Pandrosus). Alaurus and Herse looked in the box even though they were told not to, got scared, and jumped off a tower to kill herself. He grew up and became another king of Athens. This shows that the early royal family was snake-like and rash.
Cephalus and Procris
Cephalus and Procris were married but didn’t trust one another Cephalus went hunting with a spear, dogs, and said “oh Breeze.” Procris was hiding in the bush and overheard him saying this and she thought he was talking about a girl named Breeze. Cephalus speared the bush thinking it was game, which killed Procris.
Procne and Tereus
Procne married Tereus. Philomela was Procne’s sister and Procne wanted to see her. While Philomela was heading there, Tereus rapes her. He cuts off her tongue so she can’t tell, but Philomela makes a tapestry of it. Procne sees the tapestry, kills her sons, and feed them to Tereus in revenge.
Theseus Birth
Theseus’s dad was an Athenian king named Aegeus. He had fertility issues, but he went to the oracle and she tells him something. He goes to the king of Troezen Pittheus and he deciphers it as the next time he has sex he’ll have a boy. Pitthius gets his daughter Aethra to have sex with Aegeus. After intercourse, Aethra gets possessed by Poseidon, so Theseus is part Aegeus and part Poseidon. Aegeus wanted Aethra to raise the child in secret, so he leaves her to raise it on her own. He leaves a sword and sandals underneath a large rock, and when Theseus gets strong enough to lift it, he can go back to Athens.
Theseus Labors
- Periphetes (“clubber”) son of Hephaestus would bash passerby with his club. Theseus killed Periphetes with it. Theseus is sometimes pictured with the club.
- Isthmus (“pinebender”) is a giant, son of Poseidon, and from Corinth. He would bend a pine tree to the ground and kill people with it. Theseus killed him by doing the same.
- The Crommyonian sow was killed north of Isthmus. It was bred by Phaea.
- Sciron near Megara would make people wash his feet then kick them off a mountain into a giant turtle. Theseus gave him the treatment.
- Theseus killed Cercyon a powerful wrestler on the way to Eleusis.
- Procrustes would make people the same size as his bed because he liked symmetry. Theseus did the same to him.
Amazonomachy
Theseus took the Amazon Queen Hippolyta, which started the Amazonomachy. The Amazons took camp on a hill in Attica now called the Areopagus. Theseus eventually beat the Amazons.
Centauromachy
A centaur abducted Hippodamia who was Pirithous’s wife. Theseus joined the fight to rescue her from the centaurs, and the battle is called Centauromachy.
Phaedra
Phaedra is Theseus’s wife after he has sex with Hippolyta. She is the stepmom of Hippolytus, but she falls in love with him. When she gets rejected she kills herself and in her note she says that Hippolytus raped her.
Hippolytus
Hippolytus is the son of Hippolyta and Theseus. He was against sex and worshipped Artemis. His stepmom said he raped her but he didn’t, so he gets kicked out of Athens. This eventually leads to his death.
Europa
Agenor and Telephassa had Europa along with three sons in Phoenicia. Zeus is attracted to Europa, and he comes to her in the form of a bull. She has sex with the bull (might’ve been raped or seduced). When he rapes her, he sends her to Crete. Her brothers search for her, but never find her.
Pasiphae
Pasiphae was the daughter of Helios, and she married Minos. A bull rose from the sea, and Minos wouldn’t sacrifice it to Poseidon because it was so good. This angers Poseidon, so he makes Pasiphae fall in love with and have sex with the bull. She gives birth to the minotaur. For some reason, the minotaur liked human blood and flesh. She did this by getting into a wooden cow that Daedalus made for her.
Minotaur and Theseus
Theseus arrived on Crete to kill the Minotaur and Ariadne, the Cretan princess and half brother of the minotaur, fell in love with him. She promised to help him if he would marry her. In the labyrinth, Theseus unraveled a ball of thread and killed the minotaur with his sword. He used the thread to find his way back out.
Daedalus and Icarus
Daedalus was from Athens, but he is in a lot of Cretan myth. He built the labyrinth and helped Pasiphae get penetrated by the bull. After Theseus escapes Crete, Minos imprisons Daedalus in the labyrinth along with his son Icarus (born from a Cretan slave). To escape the labyrinth Daedalus makes him and Icarus wings. They get out of the labyrinth, and Daedalus told Icarus to not fly close to the sun. He ends flying to close to the sun, the wax melts, and he dies. Daedalus is upset by this.
Cadmus
Cadmus was Europa’s sister. He gets sent to find her after she gets taken by the bull. His search brought him to the Pythia where she told him to give up. She told him to follow a cow instead, and where it gets exhausted, he will create a great city. When the cow stops, Cadmus starts building the city of Thebes. Cadmus goes on to fight a sacred dragon of Ares that was guarding a spring. He plants the teeth into the ground, and the Sparti (“sown men”) become the first aristocratic families of Thebes. After serving Ares for 8 years, he gets married to Harmonia the daughter of Aphrodite and Ares.
Amphion and Zethus
Amphion and Zethus were twins from Zeus and Antiope. They were born in a bush when Antiope was getting taken back to Thebes. Antiope goes to Thebes and gets tortured by Dirce, but Amphion and Zethus get raised by a shepherd. Antiope escapes her tormenter and happens to go into Amphion and Zethus’s hut where they decide they’ll take revenge on Dirce. The tied her to a bull, and she got dragged to death. They also killed their great uncle Lycus. They were polar opposites, but the end up ruling Thebes together.
