1. According to some accounts a son of Pandion II. king of Athens, and of Pylia, while
others call him a son of Scyrius or Phemius, and state that he was only an adopted son of
Pandion. (Paus. 1.5.3, &c.; Schol. ad
Lycophr. 494; Apollod. 3.15.5.) Pandion had been
expelled from his kingdom by the Metionids, but Aegeus in conjunction with his brothers,
Pallas, Nysus, and Lycus restored him, and Aegeus being the eldest of the brothers succeeded
Pandion. Aegeus first married Meta, a daughter of Hoples, and then Chalciope, the daughter of
Rhexenor, neither of whom bore him any children. (Apollod.
3.15.6,&c.) He ascribed this misfortune to the anger of Aphrodite, and in order to
conciliate her introduced her worship at Athens. (Paus. 1.14.6.)
Afterwards he begot Theseus by Aethra at Troezen. (Plut. Thes.
3; Apollod. 3.15.7; Hyg. Fab.
37.) When Theseus had grown up to manhood , and was informed of his descent, he went
to Athens and defeated the fifty sons of his uncle Pallas, who claiming the kingly dignity of
Athens, had made war upon Aegeus and deposed him, and also wished to exclude Theseus from the
succession. (Plut. Thes. 13.) Aegeus was restored, but died
soon after. His death is related in the following manner : When Theseus went to Crete to
deliver Athens from the tribute it had to pay to Minos, he promised his father that on his
return he would hoist white sails as a signal of his safety. On his approach to the coast of
Attica he forgot his promise, and his father, who was watching on a rock on the seacoast, on
perceiving the black sail, thought that his son had perished and threw himself into the sea,
which according to some traditions received from this event the name of the Aegaean sea.
(Plut. Thes. 22; Diod. 4.61;
Paus. 1.22.5; Hyg. Fab. 43; Serv. ad Aen. 3.74.) Medeia, who was believed to have spent
some time at Athens on her return from Corinth to Colchis, is said to have becomee mother of a
son, Medus, by Aegens. (Apolled. 1.9.28; Hyg. Fab. 26.) Aegeus
was one of the eponymic heroes of Attica; and one of the Attic tribes (Aegeis) derived its
name from him. (Paus. 1.5.2.) His grave, called the heroum of
Aegeus, was believed to be at Athens (Paus. 1.22.5), and
Pausanias mentions two statues of him, one at Athens and the other at Delphi, the latter of
which had been made of the tithes of the booty taken by the Athenians at Marathon. (Paus. 1.5.2, 10.10.1.)