Apsyrtus

Son of Aeëtes of Colchis, half-brother of Medea, and commander of the fleet Aeëtes sent after the Argo when his daughter fled west with Jason and the fleece. He caught the Argonauts at the mouth of the Ister and demanded Medea back; she agreed to a parley at the temple of Artemis on the Brygeides islands, and there Jason killed him in ambush while Medea held his hand to stop his cries (Apollonius *Argonautica* 4.303-481). An older and darker tradition has Medea dismembering him as a child at sea to slow her father's pursuit (Pherecydes fr. 32a).

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