Son of Deion, king of Phocis, by Diomede, daughter of Xuthus, and so an Aeolid of the fourth generation. He married Procris, daughter of Erechtheus, but Dawn fell in love with him and carried him off.1
Apollodorus sets him in the Phocian branch of the Aeolid stem: Deion reigned over Phocis and married Diomede, daughter of Xuthus, and there were born to him a daughter, Asterodia, and the sons Aenetus, Actor, Phylacus, and Cephalus, who married Procris, daughter of Erechtheus. The marriage is named only to be undone: afterwards Dawn fell in love with him and carried him off.2
The fuller saga turns on jealousy and a fatal aim. Bribed by a golden crown, Procris admitted Pteleon to her bed and, detected, fled to Crete; there Minos, smitten, won her with two gifts — a swift dog and a dart that flew straight — which she carried back to Athens when she was reconciled to Cephalus. They went out together to the chase, for she too loved hunting; and as she pursued game in the thicket Cephalus, not knowing she was there, threw the dart and killed her. Tried in the Areopagus, he was condemned to perpetual banishment.3
Hyginus tells the same death by another road. Aurora, wife of Tithonus, desired the hunter and, to break his vow to Procris, changed his shape and sent him to seduce his own wife with gifts — so that each betrayed the other. Diana gave the wronged Procris the dog Laelaps that no beast escaped and a javelin none could avoid; reconciled at last, the wife followed her husband to watch him at dawn and hid among the bushes. Seeing them stir, Cephalus hurled the unerring javelin and killed her. By Procris, Hyginus adds, he had a son Arcesius, whose son was Laertes, the father of Ulysses.4
His hound served a second hunt. When a monstrous vixen plagued Thebes, Amphitryon sought out Cephalus, son of Deioneus, and won, for a share of the Teleboan spoils, the dog Procris had brought from Crete — destined to catch whatever it pursued. Set against a beast destined never to be caught, dog and quarry alike were turned to stone by Zeus. Cephalus of Thoricus then joined the campaign against the Taphians, and after the conquest Amphitryon gave the islands to him and Heleus, who each founded a city of his own name and dwelt in it.5
⁂
the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story
