Encyclopedia > Danae

  Article Content

Danae

In Greek mythology, Danae ("parched") was a daughter of King Acrisius of Argos and mother of Perseus by Zeus. She was sometimes credited with founding the city of Ardea[?] in Latium.

Disappointed by his lack of male heirs, Acrisius asked an oracle if this would change. The oracle told him that one day he would be killed by his daughter's child. She was childless and, meaning to keep her so, he shut her up in a bronze tower or cave. But Zeus came to her in the form of rain or a shower of gold, and impregnated her. Soon after, their child Perseus was born.

None too happy, but unwilling to provoke the wrath of the gods by killing his offspring, Acrisius cast the two into the sea in a wooden chest. The sea was calmed by Poseidon at the request of Zeus and the pair survived. They washed ashore on the island of Seriphos[?], where they were taken in by Dictys, the brother of King Polydectes, who raised the boy to manhood.

Later, after Perseus killed Medusa and rescued Andromeda, the oracle's prophecy came true.

He started for Argos, but learning of the prophecy instead went to Larissa, where athletic games were being held. By chance Acrisius was there, and Perseus accidentally struck him with his javelin (or discus), fulfilling the prophecy. Too shamed to return to Argos he then gave the kingdom to Megapenthes, son of Proetus (Acrisius' brother) and took over his kingdom of Tyrins[?], also founding Mycenae and Midea[?] there.

Apollodorus. Bibiliotheke[?] IV, 1-3.



All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License

 
  Search Encyclopedia

Search over one million articles, find something about almost anything!
 
 
  
  Featured Article
North Lindenhurst, New York

... 33.8% from 25 to 44, 21.3% from 45 to 64, and 11.8% who are 65 years of age or older. The median age is 36 years. For every 100 females there are 96.3 males. For every ...

 
 
 
This page was created in 26.3 ms