For after killing his own wife +Melissa [17.0333,39.3] (Perseus) Melissa, Periander suffered yet another calamity on top of what he had already suffered. He had two sons by +Melissa [17.0333,39.3] (Perseus) Melissa, one seventeen and one eighteen years old.

Their mother's father, Procles, the sovereign of Epidauros [23.0917,37.6] (Perseus)Epidaurus, sent for the boys and treated them affectionately, as was natural, seeing that they were his own daughter's sons. When they left him, he said as he sent them forth: