Both Herodotus and Euripidês represent Kadmus as an emigrant from
Phœnicia, conducting a body of followers in quest of Eurôpa. The
account of Apollodôrus describes him as having come originally from
Libya or Egypt to Phœnicia: we may presume that this was also the
statement of the earlier logographers Pherekydês and Hellanikus. Conôn,
who historicizes and politicizes the whole legend, seems to have found
two different accounts; one connecting Kadmus with Egypt, another
bringing him from Phœnicia. He tries to melt down the two into one, by
representing that the Phœnicians, who sent out Kadmus, had acquired
great power in Egypt—that the seat of their kingdom was the Egyptian
Thêbes—that Kadmus was despatched, under pretence indeed of finding
his lost sister, but really on a project of conquest—and that the name
Thêbes, which he gave to his new establishment in Bœôtia, was borrowed
from Thêbes in Egypt, his ancestorial seat.[621]
[621] Conôn, Narrat. 37. Perhaps the most remarkable thing of all
is the tone of unbounded self-confidence with which Conôn winds
up this tissue of uncertified suppositions—περὶ μὲν Κάδμου καὶ
Θηβῶν οἰκίσεως οὗτος ὁ ἀληθὴς λόγος· τὸ δὲ ἄλλο μῦθος καὶ γοητεία
ἀκοῆς.
Kadmus went from Thrace to Delphi to procure information respecting
his sister Eurôpa, but the god directed him to take no further trouble
about her; he was to follow the guidance of a cow, and to found a
city on the spot where the animal should lie down. The condition was
realized on the site of Thêbes. The neighboring fountain Areia was
guarded by a fierce dragon, the offspring of Arês, who destroyed all
the persons sent to fetch water. Kadmus killed the dragon, and at
the suggestion of Athênê sowed his teeth in the earth:[622] there
sprang up at once the armed men called the Sparti, among whom he flung
stones, and they immediately began to assault each other until all
were slain except five. Arês, indignant at this slaughter, was about to
kill Kadmus; but Zeus appeased him, condemning Kadmus to an expiatory
servitude of eight years, after which he married Harmonia, the
daughter of Arês and Aphroditê—presenting to her the splendid necklace
fabricated by the hand of Hêphæstos, which had been given by Zeus to
Eurôpa.[623] All the gods came to the Kadmeia, the citadel of Thêbes,
to present congratulations and gifts at these nuptials, which seem to
have been hardly less celebrated in the mythical world than those of
Pêleus and Thetis. The issue of the marriage was one son, Polydôrus,
and four daughters, Autonoê, Inô, Semelê and Agavê.[624]
[622] Stesichor. (Fragm. 16; Kleine) ap. Schol. Eurip. Phœniss.
680. The place where the heifer had lain down was still shown in
the time of Pausanias (ix. 12, 1).
Lysimachus, a lost author who wrote Thebaïca, mentioned Eurôpa
as having come with Kadmus to Thêbes, and told the story in many
other respects very differently (Schol. Apoll. Rhod. iii. 1179).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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