Amycus

A son of Poseidon by Bithynis, or by the Bithynian nymph Melia. He was ruler of the country of the Bebryces, and when the Argonauts landed on the coast of his dominions, he challenged the bravest of them to a boxing match. Polydeuces, who accepted the challenge, killed him.1 The Scholiast on Apollonius2 relates, that Polydeuces bound Amycus.

Previous to this fatal encounter with the Argonauts, Amycus had had a feud with Lycus, king of Mysia, who was supported by Heracles, and in it Mygdon, the brother of Amycus, fell by the hands of Heracles.3

Pliny4 relates, that upon the tomb of Amycus there grew a species of laurel (laurus insana), which had the effect that, when a branch of it was taken on board a vessel, the crew began to quarrel, and did not cease until the branch was thrown overboard.

❧

References

Notes

  1. Pseudo-Apollodorus. The Library i, 9.20; Hyginus. Fabulae, 17; Apollonius Rhodius. Argonautica ii, init.
  2. ii, 98.
  3. Pseudo-Apollodorus. The Library ii, 5.9; Apollonius Rhodius. Argonautica ii, 754.
  4. Naturalis Historia xvi, 89.

Source

  • Smith, William. (1870). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. London: Taylor, Walton, and Maberly.

This article incorporates text from Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) by William Smith, which is in the public domain.