Adrastus
In Greek mythology, Adrastus or Adrestus (Ancient Greek: Ἄδραστος or Ἄδρηστος),[1] (perhaps meaning "the inescapable"),[2] was a king of Argos, and leader of the Seven against Thebes. He was the son of the Argive king Talaus, but was forced out of Argos by his dynastic rival Amphiaraus. He fled to Sicyon, where he became king. Later he reconciled with Amphiaraus and returned to Argos as its king.
Because of an oracle Adrastus married his daughters to the exiles Polynices and Tydeus and promised to restore them to their homelands. He first assembled an army to place Polynices on the throne of Thebes, led by seven champions, famously called the Seven against Thebes. The expedition failed and all the champions died except Adrastus, saved by his divine horse Arion. He went with the Epigoni, the sons of the Seven, in the successful second war against Thebes, and was said to have died on his way home.
Adrastus is mentioned as early as
Family
The mythographer
Adrastus' daughters had several notable husbands and sons. Argia married
Mythology
The
Pindar does not say what circumstances caused Adrastus to flee from Argos to Sicyon, or how he became its king, but later sources do.[21] According to one version, after Adrastus' brother Pronax, who was king of Argos, died, Adrastus fled to Sicyon, where his mother's father Polybus was king, and eventually inherited the Sicyonian throne.[22] While according to another, Adrastus fled to Sicyon after Amphiaraus killed Talaus, and got the throne by marrying Polybus' daughter.[23]
In any case, Adrastus became king of Sicyon. Then, according to Pindar, Adrastus (and his brothers) were able to effect a reconciliation with Amphiaraus by giving him their sister Eriphyle in marriage, and Adrastus was able to return to Argos and assume the Argive throne.[24]
Adrastus was the owner of the fabulously fast horse
Adrastus seems to have had a reputation as a skillful speaker.[29]
Seven against Thebes
The war of the Seven against Thebes resulted from a quarrel between Oedipus' sons Polynices and Eteocles over the kingship of Thebes, which left Eteocles on the throne, and Polynices in exile.[30] One night, Polynices arrived at Adrastus' palace seeking shelter. He found a place to sleep, but soon after Tydeus, the exiled son of the Calydonian king Oeneus, also arrived seeking shelter, and the two began to fight over the same space. When Adrastus discovered Polynices and Tydeus fighting like wild beasts (or in later accounts when he saw that Polynices wore the hyde of a lion and that Tydeus wore the Hyde of a Boar, or that they had those animals on their shields), he remembered an oracle of Apollo that said he should marry his daughters to a lion and a boar. So Adrastus gave his daughters, Argia to Polynices, and Deipyle to Tydeus, and promised to restore them to their kingdoms, beginning with Polynices.[31]
Adrastus proceeded to assemble a large Argive army to attack Thebes, appointing seven champions to be its leaders. These became known as the Seven against Thebes. One of those chosen, the seer Amphiaraus, had foreseen that the expedition was doomed to fail, and that all of the champions but Adrastus would die, and so refused to join. But when Polynices bribed Amphiaraus' wife Eriphyle to tell her husband to join the expedition, he was forced to obey because of a promise Amphiaraus had made to allow his wife, who was also Adrastus' sister, to settle any disputes between the two men.[32]
Adrastus and his army were forced to stop for water at Nemea, where they became involved in the death of the child-hero Opheltes. There Adrastus held funeral games in Opheltes' honor, in which he won the horse race with his horse Arion. These games were said to have been the origin of the Nemean Games.[33]
As the seer Amphiaraus had foretold, the expedition ended in disaster at Thebes. All of the champions perished, except for Adrastus who was saved by the speed of his divine horse Arion.
One of the "Seven"
Prior to the fifth century BC, the number and names of the "seven" champions is uncertain. In The Phoenician Women and Apollodorus (as in the Seven Against Thebes) each of the Seven is assigned to one of the seven gates of Thebes, with Adrastus being assigned the "Seventh" gate, in The Phoenician Women, and the "Homoloidian" gate in Apollodorus.
Second war against Thebes
Ten years after the failed expedition against Thebes, to avenge their father's deaths, the sons of the fallen Seven, who were called the
Death
According to
Principal sources
The Iliad, Stesichorus, and the Thebaid
There are only a few surviving references to Adrastus before the 5th century BC. The Iliad has four passing mentions of Adrastus. It describes him as being "at the first" the king of Sicyon,[45] and his "swift horse" Arion, being "of heavenly stock".[46] It mentions his daughter Aegiale being the wife of Diomedes,[47] and another daughter of his marrying Tydeus.[48]
The lyric poet Stesichorus (c. 630 – 555 BC) apparently wrote a poem (now lost) about the war against Thebes,[49] in which Adrastus would presumably have figured. A fragment from the poem mentions Adrastus giving a daughter to Polynices.[50]
The Cyclic Thebaid (early sixth century BC?)[51] was a Greek epic poem whose entire subject was the Seven's Theban war, however only a few fragments have survived.[52] One fragment has Adrastus being the only one saved at Thebes, thanks to his horse Arion.[53] Another fragment has Adrastus lamenting the death of Amphiaraus.[54] Much of the later tradition concerning Adrastus probably derives from this work.[55]
Pindar
The 5th-century lyric poet Pindar mentions Adrastus in several of his poems. He devotes twenty lines of his Nemian 9 to Adrastus, and the expedition of the Seven against Thebes.[56] He begins by praising Adrastus as the founder of the Sicyonian games, which Pindar says Adrastus did during his reign as king of Sicyon:
- Let us rouse up, then, the resounding lyre and rouse the pipe for the very apex of contests
- for horses, which Adrastus established for Phoebus by the streams of Asopus. Having mentioned them,
- I shall exalt the hero with fame-bringing honors,
- who, reigning there [Sicyon] at that time, made the city famous
- by glorifying it with new festivals and contests for men’s strength and with polished chariots.[57]
He then tells of a dispute between Adrastus and the seer Amphiaraus, which resulted in Adrastus and his brothers being overthrown, and Adrastus fleeing Argos:
- For in time past, to escape bold-counseling Amphiaraus and terrible civil strife, he had fled
- from his ancestral home and Argos. No longer were Talaus’ [Adrastus' father] sons rulers; they had been overpowered by discord.[58]
And how Ardastus and Amphiaraus were reconciled by Adrastus giving his sister Eriphyle to Ampiaraus:
- But the stronger man puts an end to a former dispute.
- After giving man-subduing Eriphyle as a faithful pledge
- to Oecles’ son [Amphiaraus] for a wife, they became the greatest of the fair-haired Danaans . . .[59]
After which, Adrastus was a leader of the disastrous ill-omened expedition of the Seven against Thebes:
- and later they led an army of men to seven-gated Thebes
- on a journey with no favorable omens, and Cronus’ son brandished his lightning and urged them not to set out
- recklessly from home, but to forgo the expedition.
- But after all, the host was eager to march, with bronze
- weapons and cavalry gear, into obvious disaster, and on the banks of the Ismenus
- they laid down their sweet homecoming and fed the white-flowering smoke with their bodies,
- for seven pyres feasted on the men’s young limbs. But for Amphiaraus’ sake, Zeus split the deep-bosomed
- earth with his almighty thunderbolt and buried him with his team,
- before being struck in the back by Periclymenus' spear
- and suffering disgrace in his warrior spirit.[60]
Pindar attributes the founding of the Nemean Games to Adrastus.[61] And, after the death of Amphiaraus, Pindar has Adrastus say: "I dearly miss the eye of my army, good both as a seer and at fighting with the spear."[62]
In Pythian 8, Pindar mentions Ardastus receiving a prophecy from the dead Amphiaraus during the battle of the Epigoni at Thebes:[63]
- ... he who suffered in a former defeat,
- the hero Adrastus,
- is now met with news
- of better omen, but in his own household
- he will fare otherwise: for he alone from the Danaan army
- will gather the bones of his dead son and with the favor
- of the gods will come with his host unharmed
The Suppliants
Adrastus is a principal character in Euripides' tragedy The Suppliants (c. 420 BC).[64] The action of the play takes place after the disastrous defeat of the Seven against Thebes, and the refusal of Creon, the new Theban king, to allow the burial of the expedition's dead. Adrastus has come to Eleusis seeking the Athenians' help in recovering the bodies of the fallen warriors.
In the play we hear for the first time an account of why Adrastus made war on Thebes.[65] In an initial interview, Adrastus tells Theseus, the king of Athens, that because of an oracle of Apollo, he had given his daughters (unnamed) to Polynices and Theseus, and that, because of the "crime" done to Polynices by his brother Eteocles, who had stolen "his property" (i.e. the Theban throne), Adrastus marched "seven companies against Thebes".[66] Theseus then asks Adrastus whether he consulted seers and the gods before making war on Thebes, and Adrastus answers that, not only did he go to war "without the gods’ good will", he also "went against the wish of Amphiaraus."[67]
Finally persuaded to help recover the dead, Theseus leads an Athenian army to Thebes, where he defeats the Thebans in battle and brings back the dead warriors to Eleusis. Adrastus then, in a long speech of 60 lines, eulogizes the fallen champions.[68]
Late sources
The Greek historian
Diodorus Siculus
According to Diodorus Siculus, Polynices fled Thebes, when Eteocles refused to give up the kingship, as had been agreed, and Tydeus fled Calydon, after killing his cousins. The two princes came to Argos where "Adrastus received both the fugitives kindly". As in Euripides, because of an oracle, Adrastus married his daughters Argia to Polynices and Deipyle to Tydeus, and promised to restore the exiles to their native kingdoms.[69] Adrastus decided to deal with Thebes first. So he sent his son-in-law Tydeus on an embassy to negotiate a peaceful return for Polynices. Upon learning of the failure of Tydeus' mission, Adrastus began organizing an expedition against Thebes.[70]
The seer Amphiaraus refused to take part, at first, because he knew if he did he would die. But Polynices gave Amphiaraus's wife Eriphyle the necklace of Harmonia, so that she would persuade her husband to join the expedition. Diodorus reports that "at the time" Adrastus and Amphiaraus were "at variance ... striving for the kingship", and they agreed that Eriphyle, Adrastus' sister and Amphiaraus's wife, would settle the matter. And when Eriphyle "awarded the victory to Adrastus" saying that the expedition "should be undertaken", Amphiaraus agreed to go.[71]
Adrastus recruited Capaneus, Hippomedon and Parthenopaeus, the son of Atalanta, to join himself, Polynices, Tydeus, and Amphiaraus as the seven leaders of the "notable army", the same list of Seven as in Euripides' The Phoenician Women.[72] Omitting any mention of the Seven's stop at Nemea, Diodorus next gives an account of the battle at Thebes. As always, all of the Seven died, except Adrastus. As for the burial of the Seven, Diodorus (with no mention of Creon or Theseus) says that the Thebans refused to allow Adrastus to remove the dead, so he went home to Argos, and (as in Euripides' The Suppliants) the Athenians recovered the bodies and buried them.[73]
Hyginus
In his
At Polynices request, Adrastus assembled an army to take back the kingship of Thebes from Eteocles. Adrastus chose "seven generals" (including himself) for the army because the walls of Thebes had seven gates.[78] The army stops at Nemea in search of water, Opheltes is killed by a snake, Adrastus and the Seven kill the snake and establish funeral games in the child's honor.[79] At Thebes, all of the Seven die except Adrastus.[80]
Statius
Just as the Cyclic Thebaid had been, the Latin poet Statius's Thebaid (c. 92 AD), is devoted entirely to the Seven against Thebes.[81] An epic poem in 12 books, it gives the most detailed account of Adrastus' story.
In Book 1, the situations at Thebes and Argos are described. In Thebes, Polynices and Eteocles having agreed to rule in alternate years,[82] Eteocles occupies the throne, while Polynices is in exile for a year.[83] While in Argos:
- There king Adrastus governed his people in tranquillity, verging from life’s midway into old age. Rich was he in ancestry, back to Jove on either side. The better sex he lacked, but flourished in female offspring, supported by twin pledge of daughters. To him Phoebus prophesied (a deadly prodigy to tell, but the truth of it was soon revealed) that husbands for them were on their way by fate’s leading: a bristly pig and a tawny lion. That pondering, neither the father himself nor Amphiaraus skilled in futurity sees light, for Apollo the source forbids. Only in the parental heart anxiety sits and festers.[84]
One night, during a raging storm, Polynices and Tydeus (also an exile) separately arrive at Adrastus' palace in Argos seeking refuge. They quarrel over the same bit of shelter, a fight breaks out, Adrastus is awoken, and separates them. He invites the two inside, and notices that Polynices wears a lion's pelt and that Tydeus a boar's skin and tusks, and by these signs, Adrastus recognizes in Polynices and Tydeus, the husbands that had been prophesied for his two daughters.[85] Adrastus feasts the young princes and introduces them to his daughters.[86]
The next day, in Book 2, Polynices and Tydeus accept Adrastus' offer of his daughters
In Book 3, on returning to Argos, the wounded Tydeus urges an immediate attack of Thebes, an action the angry crowd supports.[90] But addressing Polynices, Adrastus "deep of counsel and no novice in manipulating the weight of command" urges restraint:[91]
- Leave all this, I pray you, to the High Ones and my care for remedy. Neither shall your brother wield the sceptre and you fail of satisfaction nor yet are we eager to let war loose. But now all welcome Oeneus’ noble son triumphing in so great a bloodshed. Let rest at last relax his courageous spirit. For my part indignation shall not go short of reason[92]
Adrastus consults the seers Amphiaraus and Melampus who receive omens too terrifying to divulge. Meanwhile, the Argives eagerly arm themselves, and at "the sad kings door" demand war.[93] Amphiaraus is finally forced to reveal what he has foreseen: death and defeat at Thebes, but the Argives are undeterred.[94] Argia, now Polynices' wife, tearfully urges her father Adrastus to make war on Thebes, who begins assembling an army.[95]
In Book 4, the expedition sets out from Argos with Adrastus leading the first of the seven contingents:
- King Adrastus, sad and sick with weight of cares and nearer to departing years, walks scarce of his own accord amid words of good cheer, content with the steel that girds his side; soldiers bear his shield behind him. His driver grooms the swift horses right at the gate and Arion is already fighting the yoke. ... This band, three thousand strong, follows Adrastus exulting. ... He himself joins them, venerable alike in years and sceptre, like a bull moving tall among the pastures he has long possessed; his neck is slack now and his shoulders empty, but still he is the leader; the steers have no stomach to attempt him in battle, for they see his horns broken from many a blow and the massive nodules of breast wounds.[96]
In desperate need of water the expedition is forced to stop at Nemea.[97] There they encounter Hypsipyle, the nurse of the infant Opheltes, and Adrastus urgently asks her to lead them to water, which she does.[98]
Meanwhile, in Book 5, the unattended Opheltes is killed by a serpent, and the infant's father the king, holding Hypsipyle responsible, intends to kill her with his sword.[99] The Archive champions rush to defend Hypsipyle—their army's savior—and Nemeans rally to their king, but Adrastus and Amphiaraus intercede, preventing an armed clash.[100] A rumor of Hypsipyle's imminent death reaches the Archive army, and they attack the palace, but Adrastus is able to stop them by racing to the palace with Hypsipyle in his chariot to show his army that she is safe.[101]
In Book 6, Adrastus presides over games held in honor of Opheltes.[102] As a final honor, Adrastus is asked to give a display of his prowess with the bow or spear. He gladly complies, choosing a tree a great distance away as a target. Adrastus shoots an arrow, which hits the tree, but bounces all the way back to his feet. An ill omen: "the shaft promised its master a war from which he alone would return, a sad homecoming."[103]
In Book 7, the expedition arrives at Thebes, and the fighting begins and continues through Book 11. One by one each of the Seven champions die, all except Polynices and Adrastus. The brothers Polynices and Eteocles, having agreed to fight in single combat to decide the war, Adrastus drives his chariot between them and tries to stop them:[104]
- Sons of Inachus and Tyrians, shall we then watch this wickedness? Where is right and the gods, where war? Persist not in your passion. I pray you desist, my enemy—though did this anger permit, you too are not far from me in blood; you, my son-in-law, I also command. If you so much desire a sceptre, I put off my royal raiment, go, have Lerna and Argos to yourself.[105]
But when Polynices and Eteocles refuse to stop, Adrastus flees:[106]
- leaving it all behind—camp, men, son-in-law, Thebes—and drives Arion on as he turns in the yoke and warns of Fate.[107]
Apollodorus
Apollodorus also gives an account of Adrastus story. Apollodorus gives the following genealogy:
- Bias and Pero had a son Talaus, who married Lysimache, daughter of Abas, son of Melampus, and had by her Adrastus, Parthenopaeus, Pronax, Mecisteus, Aristomachus, and Eriphyle, whom Amphiaraus married. Parthenopaeus had a son Promachus, who marched with the Epigoni against Thebes; and Mecisteus had a son Euryalus, who went to Troy. Pronax had a son Lycurgus; and Adrastus had by Amphithea, daughter of Pronax, three daughters, Argia, Deipyle, and Aegialia, and two sons, Aegialeus and Cyanippus.[108]
According to Apollodorus, Polynices, being banished from Thebes by Eteocles, came to Argos one night and fought with Tydeus. They were heard by Adrastus, who separated them. Adrastus, noticing their shields, one with a lion and the other a boar, remembered an oracle which told him that he should marry his daughters to "a boar and a lion", and married his daughters Argia and Deipyle to the two young men. Adrastus promised to restore both his son-in-laws to their kingdoms, and "eager to march against Thebes" first, began to assembled an army.[109]
The seer Amphiaraus, having foreseen that all, except Adrastus, who went to Thebes were destined to die, at first refused to join Adrastus' expedition. But, as part of the resolution of an old dispute between Adrastus and Amphiaraus, Adrastus' sister Eriphyle had married Amphiaraus, and Amphiaraus had promised to let Eriphyle decide any future disputes between the two men. So, when Polynices bribed Amphiaraus' wife Eriphyle to tell her husband to join the expedition, he was forced to obey.[110] In addition to himself, his son-in-laws Polynices and Tydeus, and his brother-in-law Amphiaraus, Adrastus chose Capaneus, Hippomedon (who Apollodorus says according to some accounts was a brother of Adrastus), and Parthenopaeus, to be the seven leaders of the expedition against Thebes. However, as Apollodorus notes, some do not count Polynices and Tydeus as being among the seven, instead including Eteoclus, son of Iphis, and Mecisteus (another brother of Adrastus) in the list of the seven.[111]
At Thebes, when Capaneus was killed by Zeus' thunderbolt, Adrastus, and the rest of the Argive army fled, but "Adrastus alone was saved by his horse Arion".[112] When Creon forbade the burial of the Argive dead, Arastus having "fled to Athens and took refuge at the altar of Mercy, and laying on it the suppliant's bough he prayed that they would bury the dead", and Theseus and the Athenians captured Thebes and recovered the dead.[113]
Hero cult
Adrastus had
According to Herodotus, Adrastus had a hero shrine (Iconography
Adrastus appears in vase painting as early as the late 6th century BC. A
Pausanias reports seeing Adrastus depicted on the
Adrastus appears on an Etruscan gem from the first half of the 5th century BC (Berlin:Ch GI 194). With Adrastus are four of the Seven champions: Parthenopaeus, Amphiaraus, Polynices and Tydeus. Adrastus and Tydeus are standing, in arms, with the rest seated.[122] Pausanias also describes seeing a monument (c. 450s BC?) at Delphi which depicted the Seven, and included Adrastus.[123]
Pallor of Adrastus
A line in
Notes
- ^ Grimal, s.v. Adrastus 1; Parada, s.v. Adrastus 1. For Ἄδρηστος, see Herodotus, 5.67 .
- ^ Oxford Classical Dictionary, s.v. Adrastus.
- ^ Oxford Classical Dictionary, s.v. Adrastus; Grimal, s.v. Asrastus; Tripp, s.v. Adrastus (1); Brill's New Pauly, s.v. Adrastus; Parada, s.v. Adrastus 1; Smith, s.v. Adrastus 1.
- ^ For a discussion of the early sources for Adrastus' genealogy see Gantz, pp. 506–507. For genealogical tables containing Adrastus see Hard, p. 707, Table 14; and Grimal, p. 525, Table I.
- ^ Hesiod fr. 35 Most [= fr. 37 MW].
- ^ Bacchylides, 9.19; Pindar, Nemean 9.14, Olympian 6.15; see also Euripides, The Phoenician Women 422. For Talaus as an Argonaut see Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica 2.110–111.
- ^ Parada, s.v. Adrastus 1.
- ^ Apollodorus, 1.9.13.
- ^ Pausanias, 2.6.6. Compare with Herodotus, 5.67, and a scholion to Pindar Nemean 9.30 (see Gantz, p. 507), where Adrastus' maternal grandfather is said to be Polybus.
- Fabulae69, 70.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 5.410–415; compare with Apollodorus, 1.8.6.
- FGrHist4 F 100).
- Cyanippus was the son of Aegialeus, see Parada, s.vv. Aegialeus 1, Cyanippus.
- , all have Argia marry Polynices and Deipyle marry Tydeus.
- descending from Adrastus.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 5.410–415; compare with Apollodorus, 1.8.6.
- Fabulae 33. Grimal, s.v. Adrastus, has Hippodamia being Adrastus' daughter, however according Diodorus Siculus, 4.70.3, Hippodamia was the daughter of Butes (the only father of Hippodamia noted by Parada, s.v. Hippodamia 4), while according to Ovid, Heroides 17.247–248, her father was one "Atrax".
- ^ Homer, Iliad 2.572, see also Pindar, Nemean, 9.11; Herodotus, 5.67; Statius, Thebaid 2.179, 4.49; Pausanias, 2.6.6.
- Argolid, see also Hard, pp. 332–335.
- ^ Gantz, p. 507; Race 1997a, pp. 96–97; Tripp, s.v. Adrastus (1); Pindar, Nemean, 9.8–14. According to Herodotus, 5.67, the Sicyonian games were founded by Cleisthenes of Sicyon. See also Pausanias, 2.6.6, which has Adrastus fleeing to Polybus at Sicyon, and becoming king when Polybus died.
- ^ Gantz, pp. 507–508.
- , which says that Adrastus' maternal grandfather Polybus died without an heir, and bequeathed the kingship to Adrastus.
- ^ Gantz, pp. 507–508; Thebaid fr. 7* West, pp. 48, 49 [= Schol. Pindar Nemean 9.30b].
- ^ Pindar, Nemean, 9.13–17.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 23.346–7; Antimachus (apud Pausanias, 8.25.9); Statius, Thebaid 6.314; Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica 4.569–573.
- ^ Hard, p. 101; Apollodorus, 3.6.8; Pausanias, 8.25.5, 8.25.7.
- ^ Schol. (D) Iliad 23.346 (see Thebaid fr. 11 West, pp. 52–55); Pausanias 8.25.10. Compare with Statius, Thebaid 6.311–314 and Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica 4.569–573, which say that Arion was given to Adrastus by the gods.
- ^ Hard, p. 102, p. 321; Gantz, p. 517; Thebaid fr. 11 West, pp. 52–55; Apollodorus, 3.6.8; Strabo, 9.2.11; Pausanias, 8.25.8; Pancrates of Alexandria (Page, pp. 518, 519); compare with Euripides, Hypsipyle fr. 757.116–118; Greek Anthology 7.431.
- ^ Grimal, s.v. Adrastus; Tyrtaeus, fr. 12.8; Plato, Phaedrus 269a [= Thebaid fr. 4* West, pp. 46, 47].
- ^ For discussions of the quarrel between Polynices and Eteocles, see Gantz, pp. 502–506; Hard, pp. 315–317.
- , with Polynices and Tydeus wearing the pelts of a lion and boar in Hyginus and Statius, and with a lion and a boar on their shields in Apollodorus. The daughters, unnamed in Euripides, are named in Diodorus, Hyginus, Statius, and Apollodorus.
- ^ Hard, pp. 317–318; Gantz, pp. 508, 510; Tripp, s.v. Seven against Thebes B; Pindar, Nemean, 9.13–17; Sophocles, fr. 187 Lloyd-Jones; Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.5–6; Apollodorus, 3.6.2.
- ^ Hard, p. 318; Gantz, pp. 510–512; Tripp, s.vv. Adrastus (1), Opheltes, Seven against Thebes C; Pindar, Nemean 8.50–51, 10.26–28 with Races' note 13; Bacchylides, 9.10–24; Apollodorus, 3.6.4. For the horse race see also Propertius, Elegies 2.37–38; Statius, Thebaid 6.301–530 (which has Arion being driven by Adrastus' son-in law Polynices, finishing first, but pulling an empty chariot, Polynices having been thrown off along the way). Compare with Callimachus, fr. 223 Trypanis and Whitman pp. 154, 155.
- ^ Hard, p. 321; Gantz, p. 517; Thebaid fr. 11 West, pp. 52–55; Apollodorus, 3.6.8; Strabo, 9.2.11; Pausanias, 8.25.8; Pancrates of Alexandria (Page, pp. 518, 519).
- ^ Hard, pp. 321–322; Gantz, pp. 296–297, 519–522; Tripp, s.v. Seven against Thebes E; Oldfather's note 16 to Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.9; Frazer, pp. 519–520; Apollodorus, 3.7.1, with Frazer's note 2; Aeschylus, Eleusinians (Sommerstein 2009b, pp. 56–57); Euripides, Suppliants (Kovacs 1998, pp. 4–6); Plutarch, Theseus 29.4–5. Herodotus, 9.27, says that, during the Battle of Plataea (479 BC), the Athenians cited the burial as one of the great achievements of Athens; compare with Lysias, Funeral Oration 7–10; Isocrates Panegyricus 54. Pausanias, 1.39.2, reports seeing the tombs of the Seven on the road leading out of Eleusis.
- ^ For a discussion of the identities of the seven champions see Gantz, pp. 514–517.
- Seven Against Thebes 375ff..
- ^ Gantz, p. 515; Euripides, The Suppliants 857–931; Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus 1301–1325.
- .
- ^ Hard, pp. 325–326; Tripp, s.v. Adrastus (1); Pindar, Pythian 8.39–55; Apollodorus, 3.7.2–3 (which says the second war came ten tears after the first, but does not mention Adrastus); Pausanias, 1.43.1, 9.9.2. For a discussion of the Epigoni, see Gantz, pp. 522–525.
- ^ Hard, p. 326; Gantz, p. 522; Pindar, Pythian 8.39–55.
- , implies a tradition in which other of the Epigoni also died, see Gantz, p. 524.
- ^ Hard, p. 327; Pausanias, 1.43.1.
- Fabulae242.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 2.572.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 14.121.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 5.410–415.
- ^ Homer, Iliad 14.121.
- ^ Campbell, pp. 137–141.
- ^ Gantz, pp. 508–509; fr. 222A Campbell [= P. Lille 76 + 73], lines 270-280.
- ^ West, p. 7.
- ^ Gantz, p. 502; Pausanias, 9.9.5. For a discussion of the Thebaid and the surviving fragments see West, pp. 6–9, 43–53.
- ^ Thebaid fr. 11 West, pp. 52, 55; Gantz, p. 517.
- ^ Thebaid fr. 6 West, pp. 48, 49; Gantz, p. 510. For other possible mentions of Adrastus in the poem, see Thebaid frs. 4*, 7* West, pp. 46–49.
- ^ Oxford Classical Dictionary, s.v. Adrastus.
- ^ Race, pp. 96–103; Pindar, Nemean 9.8–27.
- ^ Pindar, Nemean 9.8–12.
- ^ Pindar, Nemean 9.13–14.
- ^ Pindar, Nemean 9.15–17.
- ^ Pindar, Nemean 9.18–27.
- ^ Pindar, Nemean 8.50–51, 10.26–28 with Race's note 13. See also Bacchylides, 9.10–24; Apollodorus, 3.6.4.
- ^ Pindar, Olympian 6.16–17.
- ^ Pindar, Phythian 8.48–55.
- ^ Gantz, pp. 296, 522. For a discussion of the play see Kovacs 1998, pp. 3–11. Adrastus was also probably a character in Aeschylus' lost plays Elusinians, Women of Argos, and Epigoni, and possibly in Nemea, see Sommerstein 2009b, pp. 10–11, 56–59, 154–155.
- ^ Gantz, p. 509.
- ^ Euripides, The Suppliants 131–154. A similar is account is given by Euripides, The Phoenician Women 408–429.
- ^ Euripides, The Suppliants 155–161.
- ^ Gantz, p. 516; Euripides, The Suppliants 857–917.
- ^ Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.1–3.
- ^ Gantz, p. 513; Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.4.
- ^ Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.5–6.
- ^ Gantz, p. 516; Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.7.
- ^ Diodorus Siculus, 4.65.8–9.
- Fabulae68–74.
- , Nemean 9.14, Olympian 6.15; and Euripides, The Phoenician Women 422. Compare with Apollodorus, 1.9.13, where his mother is Lysimache, the daughter of Abas; and Pausanias, 2.6.6, where his mother is Lysianassa, the daughter of Polybus.
- Fabulae 69.1–5. The story is told in Euripides, The Suppliants 131–154, The Phoenician Women 408–423, however, Euripides makes no mention of Polynices and Tydeus wearing animal hides, he says only that Adrastus identified the two as the husbands referred to by the oracle because they fought like wild beasts.
- Fabulae69.5.
- Fabulae69.6–7.
- Fabulae74.
- Fabulae70.
- ^ So also was the fifth-fourth-century BC Thebaid of Antimachus.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 1.138–139.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 1.164–165.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 1.390–399.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 1.400–512.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 1.514–720.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 2.152–200.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 2.363–451.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 2.482–743.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.324–386.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.386–388.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.388–393.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.440–597.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.618–677.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 3.678–721.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 4.38–73.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 4.646–745.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 4.646–850.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 5.499–661.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 5.662–671.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 5.691–703.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 6.249–923.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 6.924–946.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 11.424–429.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 11.429–435.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 11.435–441.
- ^ Statius, Thebaid 11.441–446.
- ^ Apollodorus, 1.9.13.
- ^ Apollodorus, 3.6.1.
- ^ Apollodorus, 3.6.2.
- ^ Apollodorus, 3.6.3.
- ^ Apollodorus, 3.6.7–8.
- ^ Apollodorus, 3.7.1.
- ^ For a discussion of the hero cult of Adrastus, see Farnell, pp. 334–336.
- ^ Herodotus, 5.67.
- ^ Hard, p. 327; Pausanias, 1.43.1.
- ^ Pausanias, 1.30.4.
- ^ Gantz, p. 509.
- ^ Gantz, pp. 511–512; Pausanias, 3.18.12. The scene might refer either to the Seven setting out from Argos, or to their stop in Nemea
- ^ Gantz, p. 511.
- ^ Gantz, p. 512.
- ^ Gantz, p. 515.
- ^ Gantz, p. 516; Pausanias, 10.10.3.
- ^ Virgil, Aeneid 6.480.
- Servius, Commentary on the Aeneid of Vergil 6.480 Adrasti pallentis imago.
- ^ E.g. Ammianus Marcellinus, History 14.11.22, with n. 2.
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