Argos (Argonaut)

Argos ( Greek  Ἄργος ) was one of the heroes of the Argonaut saga in Greek mythology . With the support of the goddess Athena, he built the Argo , the first ocean- going ship with which the Argonauts sailed across the Black Sea to Colchis in order to win the Golden Fleece .

The logographer Pherecytes of Athens (6th century BC) names the Argo Argos, son of Phrixus , as the builder . It is also in the library of Apollodorus (1st century AD), where Argos, son of Phrixus, is explicitly named as the builder of the Argo and participant in the Argonaut procession. The epic poet Apollonios of Rhodes (3rd century BC) distinguishes two people named Argos in his Argonautica , on the one hand the builder of the Argo and on the other hand the son of Phrixos, who first met the Argonauts on the island of Aretia.

Apollonios names Arestor as the father of Argos, who can possibly be identified with the king of Argos . According to the fabulae of Hyginus (2nd century AD), Argos was the son of Argia and Polybos, according to others, of Danaos. Argos was after Hygin Argiver and wore a bull skin. In the Argonautica of the Roman epic Valerius Flaccus (1st century AD), Argos lives before the Argonaut procession in Thespiai in Boeotia . According to another tradition, which Johannes Tzetzes (12th century) shares in his scholien zu Lycophrons Alexandra , the father's name was Hestor or Alektor.

Apollonios of Rhodes mentions Argos in connection with the sacrifice on Mount Dindymon (near Kyzikos in Mysia , Asia Minor ). There the Argonauts hold a ceremony to placate the goddess Rhea and to be able to continue her journey. Argos carves an image of the goddess from the stump of an old vine, which is placed next to the altar on the mountain top. Clemens von Alexandria (around 150– around 215), who refers to the argolica of the local historian Demetrios, identifies this carving with the wooden portrait of Hera in Tiryns .

literature

• Richard Engelmann : Argos 4 . In: Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher (Hrsg.): Detailed lexicon of Greek and Roman mythology . Volume 1,1, Leipzig 1886, column 539 ( digitized version ).
• Konrad Wernicke : Argos 20. In: Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume II, 1, Stuttgart 1895, Col. 795 f.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Apollonios of Rhodes, Argonautika 1,18f., Who refers to an older epic tradition.
2. ↑ Pherecytes of Athens: FGrHist 3 F 106 (handed down in the Scholien to Apollonios of Rhodes: Argonautika 1,4).
3. ↑ Bibliotheke of Apollodor 1,9,16.
4. ↑ Apollonios of Rhodes, Argonautika 1,111f.
5. ^ Hyginus Mythographus, Fabulae 14.
6. ↑ Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica 1.93. 124.
7. ^ Johannes Tzetzes, Scholien zu Lykophrons Alexandra 883. Edition by Eduard Scheer , Berlin 1908, p. 286.
8. ↑ Apollonios of Rhodes, Argonautika 1,1117-1122.
9. ↑ Clemens von Alexandria, Protreptikos 4, p. 14. On Demetrios cf. FGrHist 304.