Library

Apollodorus

Apollodorus. The Library. Frazer, James George, Sir, editor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.

Electra, daughter of Atlas, had two sons, Iasion and Dardanus, by Zeus.[*](This account of the parentage of Iasion had the authority of Hellanicus (Scholiast on Hom. Od. v.125). Compare Diod. 5.48.2.) Now Iasion loved Demeter, and in an attempt to defile the goddess he was killed by a thunderbolt.[*](Compare Conon 21; Strab. 7 Fr. 50, ed. Meineke; Hyginus, Ast. ii.4. A different turn is given to the story by Homer, who represents the lovers meeting in a thrice-ploughed field (Hom. Od. 5.125-128). To the same effect Hes. Th. 969-974 says that the thrice-ploughed field where they met was in a fertile district of Crete, and that Wealth was born as the fruit of their love. Compare Diod. 5.77.1ff.; Hyginus, Fab. 270. The Scholiast on Hom. Od. v.125, attempts to rationalize the myth by saying that Iasion was the only man who preserved seed-corn after the deluge.) Grieved at his brother's death, Dardanus left Samothrace and came to the opposite mainland. That country was ruled by a king, Teucer, son of the river Scamander and of a nymph Idaea, and the inhabitants of the country were called Teucrians after Teucer. Being welcomed by the king, and having received a share of the land and the king's daughter Batia, he built a city Dardanus, and when Teucer died he called the whole country Dardania.[*](As to the migration of Dardanus from Samothrace to Asia and his foundation of Dardania or Dardanus, see Diod. 5.48.2ff.; Conon 21; Stephanus Byzantius, s.v. Δάρδανος ; compare Hom. Il. 20.215ff. According to one account he was driven from Samothrace by a flood and floated to the coast of the Troad on a raft. See Lycophron, Cassandra 72ff., with the scholia of Tzetzes; Scholiast on Hom. Il. xx.215. As to his marriage with Batia, daughter of Teucer, and his succession to the kingdom, compare Diod. 4.75.1. According to Stephanus Byzantius, s.v. Δάρδανες , Batia, the wife of Dardanus, was a daughter of Tros, not of Teucer.)

And he had sons born

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to him, Ilus and Erichthonius, of whom Ilus died childless,[*](Compare Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 29. As to Erichthonius, son of Dardanus, see Hom. Il. 20.219ff.; Diod. 4.75.2. According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Ant. Rom. i.50.3) the names of the two sons whom Dardanus had by his wife Batia were Erichthonius and Zacynthus.) and Erichthonius succeeded to the kingdom and marrying Astyoche, daughter of Simoeis, begat Tros.[*](Compare Hom. Il. 20.230, who does not mention the mother of Tros. She is named Astyoche, daughter of Simoeis, by Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 29 in agreement with Apollodorus.) On succeeding to the kingdom, Tros called the country Troy after himself, and marrying Callirrhoe, daughter of Scamander, he begat a daughter Cleopatra, and sons, Ilus, Assaracus, and Ganymede.[*](Compare Hom. Il. 20.231ff.; Diod. 4.75.3. The name of the wife of Tros is not mentioned by Homer and Diodorus. She is called Callirrhoe, daughter of Scamander, by Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 29 and the Scholiast on Hom. Il. 20.231, who refers to Hellanicus as his authority. See Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem Townleyana, ed. E. Maass, vol. ii. p. 321.) This Ganymede, for the sake of his beauty, Zeus caught up on an eagle and appointed him cupbearer of the gods in heaven;[*](Compare Hom. Il. 20.232-235; HH Aphr. 202ff. These early versions of the myth do not mention the eagle as the agent which transported Ganymede to heaven. The bird figures conspicuously in later versions of the myth and its representation in art. Compare Lucian, Dial. Deorum iv.1; Verg. A. 5.252ff.; Ov. Met. 10.155ff.; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i. pp. 56, 139, 162, 256 (First Vatican Mythographer 184; Second Vatican Mythographer 198; Third Vatican Mythographer 3.5, 15.11).) and Assaracus had by his wife Hieromneme, daughter of Simoeis, a son Capys; and Capys had by his wife Themiste, daughter of Ilus, a son Anchises, whom Aphrodite met in love's dalliance, and to whom she bore Aeneas[*](Compare Hom. Il. 20.239ff.; Diod. 4.75.5. Neither writer names the wives of Assaracus and Capys. As to the love of Aphrodite for Anchises, and the birth of Aeneas, see Hom. Il. 2.819-821; Hom. Il. 5.311-313; Hes. Th. 1008-1010ff. ) and Lyrus, who died childless.