Aegeus

Aegeus was a king of Athens in Greek mythology, the son of Pandion and father of the hero Theseus. After failing to have a child with his first two wives, he went to the oracle at Delphi, where he was given a riddling prophecy. The story of his son’s return from Crete, and the black sail, brought about his death.

Aegeus was not the founder of Athens. Cecrops, born from the earth, was its first king (Apollodorus 3.14.1), and Erechtheus later ruled after Pandion (3.15.1). Aegeus came after them, as the son of Pandion, and took the throne with his brothers after driving out the Metionidae. Pausanias says he became king as the eldest, while Apollodorus says that Aegeus held the whole power when the government was divided in four (3.15.5–6; Pausanias 1.5.3–4). Some say he was in fact a son of Scyrius whom Pandion passed off as his own.

The Oracle and Aethra

Aegeus married Meta, the daughter of Hoples, and then Chalciope, the daughter of Rhexenor. No child was born, and he feared his brothers. He consulted the Pythia, who answered that he should not loosen the neck of the wineskin until he reached the height of Athens (Apollodorus 3.15.6). Not understanding it, Aegeus set out for home by way of Troezen and lodged with Pittheus, son of Pelops. Pittheus understood the oracle, made him drunk and had him lie with his daughter Aethra. The same night Poseidon also lay with her.

Before leaving, Aegeus told Aethra that, if she bore a son, she should raise him without saying who his father was. He left a sword and sandals under a certain rock and said that, when the boy could roll away the stone, she should send him to Athens with them (Apollodorus 3.15.7). Aethra bore Theseus.

Androgeus and the Minotaur

Androgeus, a son of Minos, came to Athens for the Panathenaic festival and beat all his rivals. According to Apollodorus, Aegeus sent him against the bull of Marathon, which killed him; other accounts say that he was ambushed on the way to Thebes by jealous competitors (3.15.7). Diodorus says that Androgeus had become a close friend of the sons of Pallas, that Aegeus feared Minos might help them seize his throne, and that the king himself had Androgeus treacherously killed near Oenoe in Attica on his way to a festival at Thebes (4.60.4–5). In grief, Minos attacked Athens with his fleet. When the war went badly and famine and plague followed, the Athenians were required to send seven youths and seven maidens every year to be fed to the Minotaur in the labyrinth at Knossos (Apollodorus 3.15.8).

Medea and the Return of Theseus

Medea, fleeing Corinth after her break with Jason, came to Athens and married Aegeus. She bore him a son, Medus (Apollodorus 1.9.28). When Theseus arrived in Athens, Medea, who knew who he was, persuaded Aegeus to fear him as a traitor. Aegeus sent him against the Marathonian bull. When Theseus had killed it, Aegeus offered him a cup of poison that Medea had given him that same day; just as the draught was about to be handed over, Theseus gave his father the sword, Aegeus recognised it and dashed the cup from his hands (Apollodorus, Epitome 1.5–6). Medea was driven out of Athens with her son (Apollodorus 1.9.28).

Theseus then became one of the youths sent to the Minotaur as the third tribute, or, in another version, volunteered. The ship carried a black sail, and Aegeus asked his son to spread white sails if he came back alive (Epitome 1.7). Theseus killed the Minotaur, but in his grief over Ariadne he forgot to change the sail. Aegeus, watching from the Acropolis and seeing the black sail, believed his son was dead and threw himself down and died (Epitome 1.10; Pausanias 1.22.5 and Diodorus 4.61.7 also place his leap on the Acropolis). In another version he threw himself into the sea, which was named the Aegean after him (Hyginus, Fabulae 43). Theseus succeeded him as king (Epitome 1.11).

See Also: Theseus, Medea, Minos, Aethra, Pittheus, Cecrops, Erechtheus, Minotaur