In Greek mythology, Autonoë is a Theban princess, eldest daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, wife of the rustic culture-god Aristaeus, and mother of the hunter Actaeon. With her sisters she was driven into Dionysiac frenzy for slandering Semele; in Euripides' Bacchae she joins Agave in the sparagmos of Pentheus. Grief over Actaeon later drove her from Thebes to Ereneia in Megarid.
Adapted from Wikipedia, "Autonoë (daughter of Cadmus)" · CC BY-SA 4.0
I.Marriage and Actaeon
Hesiod and Apollodorus place Autonoë among Cadmus's daughters given in marriage at Thebes: she wed Aristaeus (son of Apollo and Cyrene) and bore Actaeon, trained by Chiron as a hunter before his own hounds tore him apart after he saw Artemis bathing. Pausanias saw mother and son together on Polygnotus's Delphic painting.
Nonnus elaborates the wedding gifts of flocks, oil, and honey and Autonoë's fruitless search for Actaeon's remains when she could not recognize the stag's bones as her son's.
II.Bacchae and aftermath
When Dionysus came to Thebes, Autonoë and her sisters were among the first struck with madness for denying Semele's divine union. In the Bacchae they help destroy Pentheus on Cithaeron. Oppian also makes Autonoë, Ino, and Agave nurses of the infant Dionysus. Pausanias says she finally left Thebes for Ereneia and died there.
The atlas id autonoe is Cadmus's daughter — not other minor Autonoës in mythographic lists.