M ORTALS M EN ABDERUS Son of Hermes. Page and lover of Heracles. Devoured by the Mares of Diomedes. City of Abdera founded by Heracles in his honour. ABSYRTUS Son of Aeëtes and Idyia. Brother of Chalciope and Medea. Dismembered by Medea to delay Aeëtes pursuit of the Argonauts. ACAMAS AND DEMOPHON Sons of Theseus and Phaedra. Rescuers of Aethra during the fall of Troy. ACASTUS Son of Pelias. Brother of the Peliades. Possibly one of the Argonauts. Holds magnificent funeral games to honour Pelias. Succeeds to the throne of Iolcos after turning its people against Jason and
Medea. Tricked by his wife Astydameia into trying to murder Peleus. Overthrown by Jason (at Peleus’s instigation). ACRISIUS King of Argos. Brother of Proetus. Father of Danaë. Distant cousin of Aegyptus, Cepheus and Phineus. Accidentally slain by his grandson Perseus. ADMETUS King of Pherae. Son of Pheres. Famed for his hospitality and kindness to strangers. Master and lover of Apollo. Husband of Alcestis. Their wedding night spoiled by Artemis’s snakes in their bed. Accepts Alcestis’s offer to die on his behalf and fulfil Apollo’s scheme to make him immortal, until Heracles brings her back from death. Hunter of the Calydonian Boar. AEACUS King of Aegina. Son of Zeus and Aegina. Half-brother of Zeus’s plethora of progeny. Husband of Chiron’s daughter. Father of Peleus and Telamon. With his half-brothers Minos I and Rhadamanthus, one of the three Judges of the Underworld. Charmed by the music of Orpheus. AEËTES King of Colchis. Son of Helios and the Oceanid Perseis. Brother of Circe and Pasiphae. Husband of (his aunt) the Oceanid Idyia. Father of Absyrtus, Chalciope and Medea. Distrustful grandfather of the Phrixides. Custodian of the Golden Fleece. Owner of the Colchian Dragon