Medea . . . schemed against him: to protect her position and that of her son by Aigeus; see also p. 57.

the bull of Marathon: see p. 77 and note.

tribute . . . to the Minotaur: for the tribute, see p. 137; for the Minotaur, p. 98.

the children: the boys and girls saved from the tribute.

Dionysosfell in love with Ariadne: in Od. 11. 321 ff., she was killed there by Artemis at the urging of Dionysos. For the varied tradition thereafter, see Plut. Thes. 20; she was often said to have been deserted by Theseus (either for another woman or accidentally).

the sons of Pallas: Pallas was the brother of Aigeus; he and his sons disputed the succession, alleging that Aigeus was not a true son of Pandion (Plut. Thes. 13; Ap. points to a tradition that Aigeus was a supposititious child on p. 136).

Icarian Sea: in the south-eastern Aegean, in the region of Icaria and Samos.

accompanied Heracles. . . against the Amazons: this was generally regarded as a separate and later expedition, made by Theseus alone, or in conjunction with Peirithoos (see Plut. Thes. 26).

Amazons marched against Athens: see also DS 4. 28, Plut. Thes. 27.

by the Areiopagos: see Aesch. Eumenides685 ff, where it is said that the hill gained its name because they offered sacrifices there to Ares (as god of war); but see also p. 131 and note.

Deucalion: the son of Minos and a successor as king of Crete, see pp. 97 and 99.

Phaedra . . . asked him to sleep with her: Ap. gives the traditional version of her story (cf. Ov. Met. 15. 497 ff., and Seneca’s Phaedra). Euripides’ surviving Hippolytos(his second play on the theme) is more sympathetic to Phaedra, presenting her as an unwilling victim of Aphrodite who refuses to declare her love and kills herself when her nurse betrays it to Hippolytos.

hated all women: he was a devotee of the virgin goddess Artemis.

along the sea-shore: at Troezen in the Argolid, where Hippolytos was the adopted heir of its king, Pittheus (the grandfather of Theseus, see p. 136). Historically there was a cult of Hippolytos there; girls made offerings of their hair to him at marriage (P. 2. 32. 1).

Ixion: his story is relevant to the subsequent account of Theseus’ association with Peirithoos (king of the Lapiths in Thessaly) and their battle with the Centaurs, because Ixion was both the father of Peirithoos and the ancestor of the Centaurs (through his son Centauros, who fathered them by mating with mares near Mount Pelion, Pind. Pyth. 2. 44 ff., except for the ‘good’ Centaurs Cheiron and Pholos, who were of different birth, see pp. 29 and 75). Ixion’s behaviour towards Hera was particularly reprehensible because Zeus had purified Ixion after he had murdered his father-in-law, and welcomed him in heaven (DS 4. 69. 4); for a fuller portrayal of his transgression and punishment, see Pind. Pyth. 2. 21 ff.

Theseus joined Peirithoos: this paragraph is inserted from Zenobius 5. 33. Surviving accounts of the banquet are late (e.g. DS 4. 70. 3 f, Plut. Thes. 30), although the prowess of Peirithoos, Theseus, and Caineus in fighting the Centaurs is referred to by Homer ( Il. 1. 262 ff.).

as relatives of the bride: thus Zenobius, but this is probably a mistake, because they were certainly relatives of the bridegroom(cf. VM 1. 162, where they are invited as Peirithoos’ neighbours and relatives), and this connection would surely have been explained in the preceding section on Ixion.

buried in the earth: the gods are said to have incited the Centaurs against Caineus because of his violence and his presumption in wanting to be honoured as a god (e.g. sc. Il. 1. 264). On the limits of invulnerability, see p. 73 on the Nemean lion and note.

captured Athens: according to the usual account, followed on p. 121, she was hidden at Aphidnai, to the north-east of Athens, and was recovered when the Dioscuri captured that city (cf. Plut. Thes. 32–3, where it is said that they were received into Athens afterwards without a fight). It is reported, however, that in a poem in the epic cycle they plundered Athens after taking Aphidnai (sc. Il. 3. 242; cf. P. 5. 19. 3 on the Cypselos chest). The Epitome may misrepresent the original text here.

took away Aithra: she became Helen’s servant and was taken to Troy (see Plut. Thes. 34, and Il. 3. 143 f.); and when it fell, she was recovered by these two sons of Theseus, Demophon and Acamas, see p. 157.

Menestheus: a great-grandson of Erechtheus, and thus in the royal line; the leader of the Athenians in the Trojan War, p. 148, Il. 2. 552.

became stuck to it: the rock grew to their flesh (P. 10. 29. 9, referring to Panyasis and contrasting this with the tradition that they were pinioned to the chair; it seems that two versions from different sources are combined here). The name of the chair suggests that it affected the mind also (see Horace Odes4. 7. 27 f).

Lycomedes: he ruled in Scyros, off Euboea, and either feared Theseus’ influence over his subjects or wanted to gratify Menestheus (see Plut. Thes. 35, P. 1. 17. 6). See also p. 129.

Tantalos: son of Zeus and Pluto, daughter of Cronos (or according to some, the son of Tmolos). A wealthy king in Lydia, in Asia Minor, he is introduced here as the ancestor of the Pelopids, the Peloponnesian line which provided the kings of Mycenae and Sparta at the time of the Trojan War. For his punishment, cf. Od. 11. 582 ff. (without any mention of the stone, but Archilochus knew of it in the seventh century, sc. Pind. ol. 1. 97).

share ambrosia with his friends: after he had been welcomed at the table of the gods and made immortal with ambrosia, the food of the gods, he wanted to share it with other mortals, Pind. ol. 1. 59 ff. For the betrayal of divine secrets, cf. DS 4. 74. 2. The darker story that he served his son Pelops at a banquet of the gods (which Pindar refused to believe, ol. 1. 26 ff.) must have been mentioned in the full text, as it is referred to just below.