Aethra

Princess of Troezen and mother of Theseus. Plutarch (*Theseus* 3) preserves the Troezenian story that her father Pittheus — reputed the wisest man of his age — heard an oracle from Delphi given to Aegeus that he could not understand, and that same night contrived for the Athenian king to lie with his daughter; in some versions Poseidon also lay with her on the island of Sphairia the same night, giving Theseus his two-fold paternity (Bacchylides 17). When she was pregnant, Aegeus hid his sword and sandals under a great rock on the road out of Troezen and told her that when the boy could lift it he should set out for Athens; she raised Theseus alone until he was sixteen (Apollodorus 3.15.7; Pausanias 2.32.7 names the rock still shown at Troezen in his day). Many years later, at Aphidnae, the Dioscuri carried her off as the slave of Helen whom Theseus had helped abduct, and she went with Helen to Troy as her handmaid, only to be freed by her grandsons Demophon and Acamas at the sack (Apollodorus *Epitome* 1.23, 5.22).

Associated Places