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Aeschreis

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In Greek mythology, Aeschreis (Ancient Greek: Αἰσχρηίδος) was a Thespian princess as one of the 50 daughters of King Thespius and Megamede, daughter of Arneus[1] (or by one of his many wives[2]). She bore Leucones to the hero Heracles.[3][4]

Mythology

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When the Cithaeronian lion was harassing the kine of Thespius, the latter asked Herakles to kill the lion.[5] The son of Zeus hunted it for fifty days and finally slayed the beast. The Thespian king entertained him as a guest in a brilliant fashion during that span of time, making Heracles drunk and slept unwittingly with each of his fifty daughters, including Aeschreis. The hero having thought that his bed-fellow was always the same. Thespius intended this to happen because he strongly desired that all his daughters should have children by Hercules.[6] In another version of the myth, the latter had an intercourse with Aeschreis and her siblings for one week,[7] seven laid with Heracles each night.[8]

In some accounts, Heracles bedded in a single night[9] with Aeschreis and her sisters except for one who refused to have a connection with him. The hero thinking that he had been insulted, condemned her to remain a virgin all her life, serving him as his priest.[10]

Notes

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  1. ^ Apollodorus, 2.4.10; Tzetzes, Chiliades 2.222
  2. ^ Diodorus Siculus, 4.29.2
  3. ^ Apollodorus, 2.7.8
  4. ^ Bell, Robert E. (1991). Women of Classical Mythology: A Biographical Dictionary. ABC-CLIO. p. 10. ISBN 9780874365818.
  5. ^ Apollodorus, 2.4.9
  6. ^ Apollodorus, 2.4.10 & 2.7.8; Diodorus Siculus, 4.29.1 & 3; Tzetzes, Chiliades 2.221–225
  7. ^ Athenaeus, 13.4 with Herodorus as the authority
  8. ^ Diodorus Siculus, 4.29.3, f.n. 51
  9. ^ Pausanias, 9.27.6–7; Gregorius Nazianzenus, Orat. IV, Contra Julianum I (Migne S. Gr. 35.661)
  10. ^ Pausanias, 9.27.6

References

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