Adrastus

Adrastus was a king of Argos in Greek mythology, the leader of the expedition of the Seven Against Thebes and the only one of the seven leaders to come home alive. He was the son of Talaus, and he owed his escape to his immortal horse Arion. He is one of the central figures in the stories of Polynices, Tydeus and Amphiaraus.

Family of Adrastus

According to Apollodorus, Adrastus was the son of Talaus, son of Bias and Pero, and of Lysimache, a daughter of Abas. His brothers were Parthenopaeus, Pronax, Mecisteus and Aristomachus, and his sister was Eriphyle, who became the wife of Amphiaraus. Adrastus himself married Amphithea, daughter of Pronax. They had three daughters, Argia, Deipyle and Aegialia, and two sons, Aegialeus and Cyanippus (Library 1.9.13). Pausanias gives a different mother: he says that Polybus of Sicyon gave his daughter Lysianassa to Talaus (Description of Greece 2.6.6).

Exile in Sicyon

Adrastus left Argos and went to Polybus, king of Sicyon, and when Polybus died he became king of Sicyon. Later he returned to Argos, and another king, Ianiscus, was brought from Attica to rule in Sicyon (Pausanias 2.6.6). Apollodorus does not say why he fled, but reports that Adrastus and Amphiaraus, the husband of his sister Eriphyle, had once quarrelled; when Amphiaraus made it up with him, he swore to let Eriphyle decide any future dispute between them (Library 3.6.2). The people of Sicyon continued to honor Adrastus as a hero. In the time of Herodotus his shrine stood in the marketplace of Sicyon, and the Sicyonians honored him with tragic choruses (Herodotus 5.67).

The Marriage of His Daughters

When Polynices was banished from Thebes by his brother Eteocles, he came to Argos at night and fought with Tydeus, who had fled from Calydon. Adrastus came out at the noise and separated them. He remembered an oracle that told him to give his daughters in marriage to a boar and a lion; he saw that Tydeus and Polynices had the foreparts of a boar and of a lion on their shields, and gave Deipyle to Tydeus and Argia to Polynices (Apollodorus, Library 3.6.1).

The Seven Against Thebes

Adrastus promised to restore both of his sons-in-law to their homelands, and mustered an army with seven leaders. Apollodorus lists them as Adrastus, Amphiaraus, Capaneus, Hippomedon, Polynices, Tydeus and Parthenopaeus, and notes that others count Eteoclus and Mecisteus instead of Tydeus and Polynices (Library 3.6.3). Amphiaraus, who was a seer, foresaw that all but Adrastus would die and tried to discourage the others; Polynices gave Amphiaraus’ wife Eriphyle the necklace of Harmonia, and she persuaded her husband to go (Library 3.6.2). On the way the army stopped at Nemea, where the infant Opheltes was killed by a snake while his nurse Hypsipyle was showing them a spring, and the funeral games for him are the origin of the Nemean games (Library 3.6.4).

At Thebes the Argives were beaten. Eteocles and Polynices killed each other in single combat, and the other champions died one by one; Amphiaraus was swallowed by the earth when Zeus split it with a thunderbolt. “Adrastus alone was saved by his horse Arion” (Library 3.6.8). Arion, the swift horse of Adrastus, “of divine race”, is already mentioned in the Iliad (23.346–347); in Apollodorus he was begotten by Poseidon on Demeter, who had taken the shape of a Fury.

Burial of the Dead

Creon, ruling at Thebes, refused to let the Argives bury their dead. According to the Athenian tradition, Adrastus came to Theseus as a suppliant, and the Athenians defeated the Thebans and buried the dead at Eleusis (Pausanias 1.39.2). Euripides makes this the subject of his play The Suppliants, in which Adrastus brings the grieving mothers of the fallen to Theseus.

The Epigoni and the Death of Adrastus

Ten years later the sons of the fallen champions, the Epigoni, marched against Thebes. The oracle foretold victory if Alcmaeon, the son of Amphiaraus, led them (Library 3.7.2). Amphiaraus was long dead by then. Adrastus’ son Aegialeus took part in the expedition and was killed by Laodamas, the Theban king, who was in turn killed by Alcmaeon (Library 3.7.3). Thebes was captured. The Megarians say that Adrastus, as he was leading his army home after taking Thebes, died among them, from old age and from the fate of Aegialeus, and they honored him there (Pausanias 1.43.1).

Another Adrastus

A Phrygian prince named Adrastus, son of Gordias, accidentally killed his own brother and was purified by Croesus; he then unintentionally killed Croesus’ son Atys on a boar hunt and killed himself on Atys’ tomb (Herodotus 1.35–45). He is a different person from the king of Argos.

Adrastus Sources

Homer, Iliad 23.346–347; Euripides, Suppliants; Apollodorus, Library 1.9.13, 3.6.1–4, 3.6.8, 3.7.2–3; Herodotus 1.35–45, 5.67; Pausanias 1.39.2, 1.43.1, 2.6.6.

See Also: Seven Against Thebes, Amphiaraus, Polynices, Tydeus, Arion, Nemesis, Eriphyle, Capaneus