Editing Catreus (section)

== Mythology ==

According to [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]]' account,<ref>[[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+3.2 3.2].</ref> an [[oracle]] told Catreus that one of his children would kill him. Although Catreus kept the prophecy secret, his son Althaemenes found out, and fearing that he would be the one to kill his father, took his sister Apemosyne and left [[Crete]] for [[Rhodes]]. Catreus gave his other daughters to [[Nauplius (mythology)|Nauplius]] to be sold off in foreign lands, and Aerope married [[Pleisthenes]] (or [[Atreus]]),<ref>See for example [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+Epit.+E.2.10 E.2.10], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+Epit.+E.3.12 E.3.12]. </ref> but Nauplius kept  Clymene for himself as wife. Years later, as an old man Catreus sailed the seas searching for his son, so that he could pass on his kingship to him. His ship stopped at Rhodes and was mistaken by some cowherds for a pirate ship. Catreus tried to explain who he was, but could not be heard above the barking of the cowherds' dogs. Althaemenes arrived and killed his father with his javelin, thus fulfilling the prophecy. When Althaemenes realized what he had done, Althaemenes prayed and was swallowed up by a chasm in the ground.

[[Diodorus Siculus]], gives a slightly different version of the story, saying that an oracle had been given to Althaemenes which said that he was destined to kill his father.<ref>[[Diodorus Siculus]], [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/4D*.html#60 4.60.4].</ref> Another tradition involving Catreus' daughter Aerope, followed by [[Euripides]] in his lost play  ''Kressai'',<ref>Hard, [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA355 p. 355]; Gantz, p. 271. Euripides' treatment of the story is according to the scholiast on [[Sophocles]], [[Ajax (play)|''Ajax'']] 1297, citing Euripides' ''Cretan Women'', see: Collard and Cropp, [https://www.loebclassics.com/view/euripides-dramatic_fragments/2008/pb_LCL504.521.xml pp. 520, 521]; Webster, pp. 37&ndash;38; Jebb's note to ''Ajax'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0024:text=comm:commline=1295 1295 '''Κρήσσης'''].</ref> and possibly by [[Sophocles]] in his play ''Ajax'',<ref>Gantz, pp. 554&ndash;555; Jebb's note to ''Ajax'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0024:text=comm:commline=1296 1296 '''ὁ φιτύσας πατήρ'''].</ref> was that Catreus found Aerope in bed with a slave and sent her to Nauplius to be drowned.

Catreus, an ancient Cretan city mentioned by the second-century Greek geographer [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]], was apparently supposed by the Cretans to have been founded by Catreus.<ref>[[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]], [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0525.tlg001.perseus-eng1:8.53.4 8.53.4], which also says that according to the [[Tegea]]ns, Catreus, along with [[Kydonia|Cydonia]] and [[Gortyna]], had instead been founded by three sons of [[Tegeates]], [[Cydon]], Archedius, and [[Gortys]], who had migrated to Crete from [[Arcadia (ancient region)|Arcadia]].</ref> According to Apollodorus, Catreus' grandson [[Menelaus]] (Aerope's son) was away in Crete, presiding at Catreus' funeral, when [[Paris (mythology)|Paris]] took [[Helen of Troy|Helen]] to [[Troy]].<ref>Tripp, 
s.v. Catreus, p. 152; [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+Epit.+E.3.3 E.3.3].</ref>