Theseus

Family: Athenian · Role: hero · First appears: Book 1 · Chapter 1

In Book 1, Theseus sailed to avenge Androgeos’s death by Minos, then besieged Themiscyra with Hercules; Antiope handed the place over to him, and later Molpadia killed Antiope before Theseus killed Molpadia. He restored political equality to the Athenians. Taken by Minos to Crete, he retrieved the king’s ring from the sea and emerged with a golden crown from Amphitrite. He was sent to Crete to Deucalion, and, after reaching Scyrus, died when Lycomedes (of Scyrus) plotted his death; later, Cimon brought his bones to Athens.

In later Book 1 episodes, Theseus and Pirithous agreed to travel to Lacedæmon and Thesprotia. As he put out to sea, Dionysus carried off the sleeping Ariadne. When Theseus intended to marry Phædra, he sent Hippolytus to Pittheus at Træzen to be raised and become king there. After Pallas and his sons revolted, Theseus slew them and was later acquitted. He united the Athenians from several townships and established worship of Aphrodite and Persuasion. When Ægeus mistook Theseus’s black-sailed ship for proof that his son had died, he drowned himself. Theseus fought the Minotaur, and at eighteen lifted the stone beneath which Ægeus had left his boots and sword.

He drove a bull into the Acropolis and sacrificed it to Athene, refused Eurystheus’s demand to surrender the children who had come as suppliants, and slew robbers including Sinis, Polypemon (also called Procrustes), and Sciron. At Eleusis he defeated the Bœotians and buried the dead, and at Cercyon’s wrestling ground he beat Cercyon through skill. In Book 2, he cleared the road from Trœzen to Athens of evildoers, killing Periphetes, and Medea fled Athens after her plot against him was detected. He killed Asterion (son of Minos) on returning from Crete, married Helen, and built the temple of Bridal Aphrodite. Later, while he was detained in Thesprotia, the Athenians inclined toward Menestheus; in Book 8 he instituted games at Delos for Apollo. In Book 9, after Dionysus deprived him of Ariadne, Theseus gave her statue to Apollo at Delos; in Book 10, Acamas joined him in giving names to the Athenian tribes.