The locals, called the Doliones, were all descended from Poseidon. Delayed many days there, they were chided by Hercules and Perdix.Īfter Lemnos, the Argonauts made their second stop at Bear Mountain, an island of the Propontis shaped like a bear. The Lemnian women gave the names of the Argonauts to the children they had conceived by them. (Later, these Minyans were driven out from the island and came to Lacedaemon). The other Argonauts consorted with the Lemnian women, and their descendants were called Minyans, since some among them had previously emigrated from Minyan Orchomenus to Iolcus. She bore him sons, Euneus and Nebrophonus or Deipylus. Hypsipyle fell in love with their captain Jason and bedded with him. Polyxo who by virtue of her middle age, gave advice that she should put them under obligation to the gods of hospitality and invite them to a friendly reception. In the meantime, the Argonauts sailing along, the guardian of the harbour Iphinoe saw them and announced their coming to Hypsipyle, the new queen. She put Thoas on board a ship which a storm carried to the island of Taurica. They then deposed King Thoas, who should have died along with the whole tribe of men, but was secretly spared by his daughter Hypsipyle. Dishonored, all the Lemnian women, except Hypsipyle, were instigated by the same goddess in conspiring to kill their fathers and husbands. Therefore, their spouses took captive women from the neighboring country of Thrace and bedded with them. The reason of which was as follows: for several years, the women did not honor and make offerings to Aphrodite and because of her anger, she visited them with a noisome smell. The Argonauts first stopped at Lemnos where they learned that all the males had been murdered. However, Hera acted in Jason's favour during the perilous journey. Pelias swore before Zeus that he would give up the throne at Jason's return while expecting that Jason's attempt to steal the Golden Fleece would be a fatal enterprise. This fleece now hung from a tree in the grove of the Colchian Ares, guarded night and day by a dragon that never slept. According to an oracle, Iolcus would never prosper unless his ghost was taken back in a ship, together with the golden ram's fleece. Phrixus had fled from Orchomenus riding on a divine ram to avoid being sacrificed and took refuge in Colchis where he was later denied proper burial. Jason learned later that Pelias was being haunted by the ghost of Phrixus. Instead, he asked Jason: "What would you do if an oracle announced that one of your fellow-citizens were destined to kill you?" Jason replied that he would send him to go and fetch the Golden Fleece, not knowing that Hera had put those words in his mouth. He could not kill him because prominent kings of the Aeolian family were present. Pelias recognized that Jason was his nephew.
Among the crowd stood a tall youth in leopard skin with only one sandal. Pelias was presiding over a sacrifice to Poseidon with several neighboring kings in attendance. The goddess was angry with King Pelias for killing his stepgrandmother Sidero after she had sought refuge in Hera's temple.Īnother oracle warned Pelias to be on his guard against a man with one shoe. While traveling Jason lost his sandal crossing the muddy Anavros river while helping an old woman ( Hera in disguise). When Jason was 20 years old, an oracle ordered him to dress as a Magnesian and head to the Iolcan court. He was raised by the centaur Chiron, the trainer of heroes. She faked a burial and smuggled the baby to Mount Pelion. Pelias intended to kill the baby at once, but Alcimede summoned her kinswomen to weep over him as if he were stillborn. Aeson married Alcimede, who bore him a son named Jason. Instead, Pelias kept Aeson prisoner and forced him to renounce his inheritance. Pelias put to death every prominent descendant of Aeolus he could, but spared Aeson because of the pleas of their mother Tyro. Because of this unlawful act, an oracle warned him that a descendant of Aeolus would seek revenge. After the death of King Cretheus, the Aeolian Pelias usurped the throne from his half-brother Aeson and became king of Iolcus in Thessaly (near the modern city of Volos).