Arcas had two sons, Elatus and Aphidas, by Leanira, daughter of Amyclas, or by Meganira, daughter of Croco, or, according to Eumelus, by a nymph Chrysopelia. 1 These divided the land between them, but Elatus had all the power, and he begat Stymphalus and Pereus by Laodice, daughter of Cinyras, and Aphidas had a son Aleus and a daughter Stheneboea, who was married to Proetus. And Aleus had a daughter Auge and two sons, Cepheus and Lycurgus, by Neaera, daughter of Pereus. Auge was seduced by Hercules 2 and hid her babe in the precinct of Athena, whose priesthood she held. But the land remaining barren, and the oracles declaring that there was impiety in the precinct of Athena, she was detected and delivered by her father to Nauplius to be put to death, and from him Teuthras, prince of Mysia, received and married her. But the babe, being exposed on Mount Parthenius, was suckled by a doe and hence called Telephus. Bred by the neatheards of Corythus, he went to Delphi in quest of his parents, and on information received from the god he repaired to Mysia and became an adopted son of Teuthras, on whose death he succeeded to the princedom.
Lycurgus had sons, Ancaeus, Epochus, Amphidamas, and Iasus, 3 by Cleophyle or Eurynome. And Amphidamas had a son Melanion and a daughter Antimache, whom Eurystheus married. And Iasus had a daughter Atalanta 4 by Clymene, daughter of Minyas. This Atalanta was exposed by her father, because he desired male children; and a she bear came often and gave her suck, till hunters found her and brought her up among themselves. Grown to womanhood, Atalanta kept herself a virgin, and hunting in the wilderness she remained always under arms. The centaurs Rhoecus and Hylaeus tried to force her, but were shot down and killed by her. She went moreover with the chiefs to hunt the Calydonian boar, and at the games held in honor of Pelias she wrestled with Peleus and won. Afterwards she discovered her parents, but when her father would have persuaded her to wed, she went away to a place that might serve as a racecourse, and, having planted a stake three cubits high in the middle of it, she caused her wooers to race before her from there, and ran herself in arms; and if the wooer was caught up, his due was death on the spot, and if he was not caught up, his due was marriage. When many had already perished, Melanion came to run for love of her, bringing golden apples from Aphrodite, 5 and being pursued he threw them down, and she, picking up the dropped fruit, was beaten in the race. So Melanion married her. And once on a time it is said that out hunting they entered into the precinct of Zeus, and there taking their fill of love were changed into lions. 6 But Hesiod and some others have said that Atalanta was not a daughter of Iasus, but of Schoeneus; and Euripides says that she was a daughter of Maenalus, and that her husband was not Melanion but Hippomenes. 7 And by Melanion, or Ares, Atalanta had a son Parthenopaeus, who went to the war against Thebes. 8
Library. Apollodorus. ed. Sir James George Frazer. Cambridge, MA. 1921.
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