Alcimede is presented in the classical Argonautic genealogies as the daughter of Phylacus (eponym of Phylace) and Clymene (one of the Minyan daughters), and the wife of Aeson. In these traditions she is the mother of Jason, linking him to the house of Minyas and to Phylace. Classical authors and summaries variably name other women (Polymede, Arne, Scarphe) as Jason's mother in alternate traditions; Alcimede is one of the attested maternal attributions in the Argonautica-related corpus (see Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica Book I, and summarized mythographic sources).
Ancient sources do not supply a physical description of Alcimede. She is referred to by genealogy and by emotional response (for example, Apollonius notes she was 'smitten with grief for Jason') rather than by age, dress, or bodily features; no concrete descriptive details are recorded in the provided texts.
No supernatural powers are attributed to Alcimede in the cited materials. Her agency in the narratives is familial and social: she is named as Jason's mother and is depicted in contexts of maternal emotion and family protection. A fragmentary modern summary suggests a tradition in which she deceives an attacker to protect Jason, but that anecdote is incomplete in the available excerpt and not fully attested in the primary classical passages provided; classical sources emphasize her genealogical role and maternal grief rather than magical or prophetic abilities.
Weaknesses
- otherNone recorded
Wards
None recorded.
*Péh₂usōn (reconstructed)
Péh₂usōn is a hypothetical Proto‑Indo‑European pastoral guardian reconstructed by comparative scholars from parallels in Greek and Vedic traditions. Proposed as a Graeco‑Aryan ancestor‑figure, the reconstruction describes a protector of flocks, roads, and travellers rather than an attested historical cultic personality.
Aba (disambiguation / name-form)
Aba is a polyvalent name-form attested across many unrelated contexts (place names, personal names, animal names, and brief mythological listings). The provided sources do not support a single, coherent supernatural entity called "Aba" and offer no descriptive or ritual material for such a being.
Abarbarea
Abarbarea is a name attested in classical Greek and Roman sources for freshwater nymphs (naiads). The name appears for at least two individual mythic figures — a naiad wife of Bucolion and a naiad counted among ancestors of the Tyrians — and Hesychius records plural forms that may indicate the name was also used as a class-name (Abarbareai / Abarbalaiai).
Abas
Abas (Ancient Greek: Ἄβας, gen.: Ἄβαντος) is not a single mythic being but a recurring personal name borne by multiple mortals and minor mythic figures in Greek epic and genealogical traditions — kings, founders, seers, warriors, attendants, a centaur, and a youth transformed by a goddess. The name is glossed in the sources as 'guileless' or 'good-hearted' and appears across Argive, Theban, Trojan, Euboean, and other local cycles.
Abderus
Abderus (Ancient Greek: Ἄβδηρος, romanized Ábdēros) is a mortal heroic figure in Greek myth closely associated with Heracles, remembered as the youth left in charge of the Mares of Diomedes who was killed by them. He functions as an eponymous local/divine-hero ancestor for the city of Abdera and received funerary commemoration and athletic agones at his tomb.
Abomination of Desolation
An apocalyptic prophetic phrase originating in the Book of Daniel designating a profaning thing or act that renders the Jerusalem Temple cult desolate; later reused in the Synoptic Gospels as an eschatological sign prompting urgent flight. The term denotes ritual/cultic impurity (Hebrew shiqquts) and is variously interpreted as pagan offerings or altar, a foreign cult statue, or (in some New Testament readings) an acting agent.
Absyrtus
Absyrtus (Ancient Greek: Ἄψυρτος) is a Colchian prince in the Greek Argonautic cycle, son of King Aeëtes and brother or half-brother of Medea. He appears in variant traditions either as a companion taken by Medea during her flight with Jason and murdered/dismembered to delay pursuit, or as a pursuer sent by Aeëtes who is overtaken and slain by Jason; his death functions as a key narrative device in the escape from Colchis.
Acacallis
Acacallis (Ancient Greek: Ἀκακαλλίς; also Acalle) is a mythological princess of Crete in Greek tradition, daughter of King Minos and Pasiphae. She functions primarily as a dynastic and etiological figure: in varying accounts she is mother, by gods such as Hermes (Mercury) or Apollo, of eponymous or founder-figures like Cydon (founder of Cydonia), Miletus, or Lydon/ Lydus.
Acacus
Acacus (Ancient Greek: Ἄκακος) is, in Arcadian Greek tradition, a mortal eponymous founder-king of Acacesium and is remembered as the foster-father who reared the infant Hermes (Mercury) in that local tradition. He is presented in genealogies as a son of Lycaon and functions as a local ancestral/onomastic figure rather than a supernatural spirit.
Academus
Academus (Greek: Akádemos / Hekádemos) is an Attic hero-eponym tied to a sacred grove (Akademeia) on the Cephissus near Athens. In myth he revealed where Helen was hidden to the Dioskouroi, an act said to have saved the city, and the place bearing his name became a long-lived sacred precinct, later the site of Plato's Academy.
Acamas
Acamas (Ancient Greek: Ἀκάμας) is a personal name recurrent in ancient Greek narrative traditions applied to multiple human characters (warriors, princes, suitors), once to a Cyclops, and once as a hound's name. Rather than a single supernatural entity, bearers of the name appear episodically across the Trojan War, Theseid, and Theban cycles as mortal actors whose deeds intersect with gods and fate.
Acantha
Acantha (Ancient Greek: Ἀκάνθα, 'thorn') is a late or secondary mythological figure known from modern retellings as a nymph transformed into the acanthus plant. The tale that she scratched Apollo and was changed into a spiny-leaved plant is not attested in surviving classical corpora and appears to be a modern compilation or invention rather than a firmly documented ancient myth.
Community Record
- [1]Argonautica, Book I (Apollonius Rhodius). Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica, Book I (genealogical passages referring to Jason as son of Alcimede and noting his mother's grief).literary
- [2]Alcimede (mother of Jason) — Wikipedia. Wikipedia entry summarizing classical traditions and giving the Ancient Greek form Ἀλκιμέδη and the meaning 'mighty cunning'.wiki
- [3]Alcimede — Wikipedia (general). Wikipedia summary entry noting name meaning and variant traditions.wiki
- [4]The Argonautica (Internet Classics Archive translation). Translation and presentation of Apollonius' Argonautica Book I passages naming Alcimede as Jason's mother.literary
- [5]Hyginus, Fabulae — summaries (Jason and the Argonauts). Mythographic summaries (Hyginus and compendia) that record variant maternal attributions for Jason and provide contextual mythographic material.literary
- [6]Additional archive and survey summaries referencing Alcimede. Modern survey and item summaries that collect attestations and note variant traditions naming other mothers for Jason.other