Comeliest of the daughters of Pelias, queenly among women, who married Admetus of Pherae and bore him Eumelus, leader of the Pheraean ships against Troy.1
Apollodorus and Hyginus tell how Alcestis was won. When Admetus reigned over Pherae, Apollo served him as a thrall, and Admetus wooed Alcestis, daughter of Pelias. Pelias had promised his daughter to the man who could yoke a lion and a boar to a single car; Apollo, who had been kindly treated in his servitude, yoked the wild beasts and gave them to Admetus, who brought them to Pelias and so obtained Alcestis. Hyginus names her mother as Anaxibia, daughter of Bias.2
At the wedding Admetus offered sacrifice but forgot Artemis, and when he opened the bridal chamber he found it full of coiled snakes. Apollo bade him appease the goddess and won from the Fates a grace: that when Admetus was about to die he might be released from death, if someone would choose to die for him willingly. When the day came neither his father nor his mother would die in his place, but Alcestis died in his stead.3
What followed her death the sources tell variously. Apollodorus says the Maiden sent her up again from below, or, as some say, Heracles fought with Hades and brought her up to her husband. Hyginus says simply that when Alcestis had offered herself and died for Admetus in vicarious death, Heracles afterward called her back from the dead.4
Her devotion set her name among the women remembered for it: Hyginus lists Alcestis, daughter of Pelias, among those who died for the sake of their husbands and among the most chaste of women, who for Admetus's sake suffered a vicarious death. Pausanias saw her too on the chest of Cypselus, the only one of Pelias's daughters whose name was inscribed beside the funeral games of her father.5
By Admetus she bore Eumelus, whom Homer marks twice: leader of eleven ships from Pherae beside lake Boebeis, dear son of Admetus, born of Alcestis, queenly among women, the comeliest of the daughters of Pelias.6
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the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story
