Glauce

Glauce is a name given to several different figures in Greek mythology. The best known is the daughter of Creon, king of Corinth, whom Jason married when he left Medea, and who died by Medea’s poisoned gifts. A second Glauce, the daughter of Cychreus of Salamis, was the first wife of Telamon. There are also minor Glauces among the Nereids and the nymphs.

Glauce, Daughter of Creon

After Jason and Medea had lived happily at Corinth for ten years, Creon, king of Corinth, betrothed his daughter Glauce to Jason, who married her and divorced Medea (Apollodorus, Library 1.9.28). Hyginus calls her the younger daughter of Creon, son of Menoeceus, and also gives her the name Creusa (Hyginus, Fabulae 25). Diodorus likewise calls her Glauce, Creon’s daughter, and says that Jason became enamoured of her and sought her hand (Diodorus Siculus 4.54). In Euripides’ Medea the princess is not named but is the bride whom Jason is to marry, and Medea sends her a robe and a golden wreath by her sons (Euripides, Medea 947–950).

Her Death

Most accounts agree that Medea killed Glauce by magic. In Apollodorus, Medea invoked the gods by whom Jason had sworn and sent the bride a robe steeped in poison; when Glauce put it on, she was consumed with fierce fire together with her father, who went to her rescue (Library 1.9.28). In Euripides, the golden wreath sends out a stream of devouring fire, the fine robe eats the bride’s flesh, and Creon dies clinging to his daughter (Euripides, Medea 1186–1221). Diodorus gives two versions: in one, Medea set fire to the palace so that Glauce and Creon were hemmed in and burned while Jason escaped; in another, the sons of Medea brought the bride gifts anointed with poison (Diodorus Siculus 4.54).

The Fountain of Glauce

Pausanias writes that on the road from the market-place of Corinth towards Sicyon there is a well called the Well of Glauce, into which she is said to have thrown herself, believing that the water would cure the drugs of Medea (Pausanias 2.3.6). Not every account has her jump into the water: in the versions of Euripides and Apollodorus above she is consumed by the fire where she stands.

Glauce, Daughter of Cychreus

Another Glauce was a daughter of Cychreus, king of Salamis, who was himself a son of Poseidon and Salamis (Apollodorus, Library 3.12.7; Diodorus Siculus 4.72). Diodorus says that Telamon, fleeing from Aegina, came to Salamis and married Glauce, the daughter of Cychreus, and so became king of the island; when she died he married Eriboea of Athens, by whom he had Ajax (Diodorus Siculus 4.72.7). Apollodorus adds that Pherecydes made Telamon the son of Actaeus and Glauce, daughter of Cychreus, rather than a son of Aeacus (Library 3.12.6). This Glauce was therefore a granddaughter of Poseidon and Salamis, not their daughter.

Other Glauces

Glauce is also the name of a Nereid, listed in Homer among the sea-nymphs who gather around Thetis when Achilles mourns Patroclus (Homer, Iliad 18.39) and in Hesiod among the daughters of Nereus (Hesiod, Theogony 244). Pausanias lists a Glauce among the nymphs carved on an altar at Tegea beside Rhea and the baby Zeus (Pausanias 8.47.3). Apollodorus also names a Glauce among the daughters of Danaus, married to Alces, son of Aegyptus (Library 2.1.5). In the Epitome of Apollodorus, Hippolyte, the Amazon mother of Hippolytus, is said to go also by the names Glauce and Melanippe (Apollodorus, Epitome 5.2).

See Also: Jason, Medea, Creon, Telamon, Cychreus, Poseidon, Thetis, Zeus