Niobe
Family: Argive · Role: princess · First appears: Apollodorus, Library 2.1
🌐 Also appears in: The Iliad (as Niobe) · The Metamorphoses of Ovid (as Niobe)
Niobe is described as the daughter of Phoroneus and Teledice, and as the first mortal woman with whom Zeus cohabited; she bore Argus and, according to Acusilaus, Pelasgus. Another account calls her the daughter of Tantalus and records her marriage to Amphion. Together they had seven sons—Sipylus, Eupinytus, Ismenus, Damasichthon, Agenor, Phaedimus, and Tantalus—and seven daughters—Ethodaia or Neaera, Cleodoxa, Astyoche, Phthia, Pelopia, Astycratia, and Ogygia.
Blessed with these children, Niobe claimed she was more blessed than Latona, making Latona her rival. At Cithaeron, Artemis and Apollo killed Niobe’s children: “Artemis shot down the females in the house, and Apollo killed all the males together as they were hunting on Cithaeron.”
Relationship record
Life events
- Artemis and Apollo killed Niobe's children, sparing only the stated survivors.(Apollodorus, Library 3.5 · 📍 Cithaeron)
Apollodorus, Library 2.1
- parent: Phoroneus “Phoroneus, reigning over the whole land afterwards named Peloponnese , begat Apis and Niobe by a nymph Teledice.”
- parent: Teledice “Phoroneus, reigning over the whole land afterwards named Peloponnese , begat Apis and Niobe by a nymph Teledice.”
- child: Argus “But Niobe had by Zeus ( and she was the first mortal woman with whom Zeus cohabited) a son Argus, and also, so says Acusilaus, a son Pelasgus”
- child: Pelasgus “But Niobe had by Zeus ( and she was the first mortal woman with whom Zeus cohabited) a son Argus, and also, so says Acusilaus, a son Pelasgus”