Chapter 6: Other Early Families
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♠ Hes fr 123 MW – Hesiod, Ehoiai (Catalogue of Women) in Fragmenta Hesiodea, p. 60, ed. R. Merkelbach and M. L. West. Oxford 1967.
Strabo x. 3. 19 p.471
For Hesiod says that Hekateos and the daughter of Phoroneus had five daughters from whom
the divine mountain nymphai sprang
and the race of the worthless Satyroi, unfit for work,
and the Kouretes, playful dancing gods. (Transl. E. Bianchelli)
♠ Bak 19.18 – Bakchylides, Dithyrambs
the rose-fingered daughter of Inachus Greek Text
♠ PD 589-90 – Aischylos, Prometheus Desmotes (Prometheus Bound)
How can I fail to hear the maiden frenzied by the gadfly, the [590] daughter of Inachus? Greek Text
♠ PD 663 – Aischylos, Prometheus Desmotes (Prometheus Bound)
Then at last there came an unmistakable utterance to Inachus, charging and commanding him clearly that [665] he must thrust me forth from home and native land to roam at large to the remotest confines of the earth. Greek Text
♠ ApB 2.1.3 – Apollodoros, Bibliotheke (Library)
But the annalist Castor and many of the tragedians allege that Io was a daughter of Inachus; and Hesiod and Acusilaus say that she was a daughter of Piren. Zeus seduced her while she held the priesthood of Hera, but being detected by Hera he by a touch turned Io into a white cow and swore that he had not known her; wherefore Hesiod remarks that lover’s oaths do not draw down the anger of the gods. Greek Text
♠ Hes fr 124 MW – Hesiod, Ehoiai (Catalogue of Women) in Fragmenta Hesiodea, p. 60, ed. R. Merkelbach and M. L. West. Oxford 1967.
♠ Hes fr 126 MW – Hesiod, Ehoiai (Catalogue of Women) in Fragmenta Hesiodea, p. 61, ed. R. Merkelbach and M. L. West. Oxford 1967.
“Heraclitus’, Alleg. Hom. 72. 10 (p. 78 Buffière)
For he calls the god (Hermes) “Argeiphontes” or “Slayer of Argos” certainly not–by Zeus–because he knew the Hesiodiac myths, occording to which he killed the herdsman of Io. (Transl. E. Bianchelli)
♠ ApB 2.1.3 – Apollodoros, Bibliotheke (Library)
But Hera requested the cow from Zeus for herself and set Argus the All-seeing to guard it. Pherecydes says that this Argus was a son of Arestor; but Asclepiades says that he was a son of Inachus, and Cercops says that he was a son of Argus and Ismene, daughter of Asopus; but Acusilaus says that he was earth-born. He tethered her to the olive tree which was in the grove of the Mycenaeans. But Zeus ordered Hermes to steal the cow, and as Hermes could not do it secretly because Hierax had blabbed, he killed Argus by the cast of a stone; whence he was called Argiphontes. Hera next sent a gadfly to infest the cow, and the animal came first to what is called after her the Ionian gulf. Then she journeyed through Illyria and having traversed Mount Haemus she crossed what was then called the Thracian Straits but is now called after her the Bosphorus. And having gone away to Scythia and the Cimmerian land she wandered over great tracts of land and swam wide stretches of sea both in Europe and Asia until at last she came to Egypt, where she recovered her original form and gave birth to a son Epaphus beside the river Nile. Greek Text
♠ Paus 3.18.13 – Pausanias, Description of Greece
Hera is gazing at Io, the daughter of Inachus, who is already a cow Greek Text
The Throne of Amyklai, retored drawing based on Pausanias.
Munich, Antikensammlung, 585. Ionian amphora. Hermes, Io, Argos.
London British Museum, B164. Attic ampohra, painter near Exekias. Hermes, Io Argos.
British Museum Collection on line
♠ Hes fr 294 MW – Hesiod, Fragmenta Hesiodea, pp. 151-52, ed. Merkelbach and M.L. West. Oxford 1967.
Schol. Eurip. Phoen. 1116 (i. 366. 4. Schwartz), “Lord Hippomedon came having as a seal in the middle of his shield the All-seeing (i.e. Argos) watching with branded eyes”
The poet of the Aigimios says:
and she (i.e. Hera) placed upon her (i.e. Io) Argos as a guard, strong and large, and watching with four eyes here and there; and the goddess set on him tireless strength, nor sleep ever fell on his eyelids, and he always kept a steadfast watch. (Transl. E. Bianchelli)
♠ Hes fr 296 MW – Hesiod, Fragmenta Hesiodea, p. 153, ed. Merkelbach and M.L. West. Oxford 1967.
Stephanus Byz. p. 3. 1 Meineke
Abantis: Euboia; as Hesiod says in the second book of the Aigimios about Io:
In the holy island of Abantis; which previously the gods who always are used to call Abantis, but Zeus named it Euboia, eponymous of the cow. (Transl. E. Bianchelli)
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Literary sources edited by Elena Bianchelli, Retired Senior Lecturer of Classical Languages and Culture, Univ. of Georgia, January 2024.
