A princess of the Calydonian house, daughter of Oeneus, whom Heracles won by wrestling the river-god Achelous for her hand and afterward took as his wife.1
Apollodorus reports a strange tradition that Deianira was begotten on Althaea not by Oeneus but by Dionysus, and that this Deianira drove a chariot and practised the art of war. Hyginus likewise tells that Liber lay with Althaea, who became mother of Deianira.2
The prevailing account, however, names her plainly the daughter of Oeneus, king of Calydon, and sister of Gorge whom Andraemon married and of Meleager. So she is reckoned in Apollodorus, in Ovid, in Hyginus, and in Pausanias alike.3
When Heracles came to Calydon he wooed her, and had to wrestle for her hand against the river-god Achelous. In Apollodorus the river took the likeness of a bull, but Heracles broke off one of his horns and so won the bride; Ovid lets the defeated Achelous tell the tale himself, recalling how Deianira, once the envied hope of many suitors, was sought in the home of her great father Oeneus, Parthaon's son. Pausanias too records the contest of Heracles and Achelous over the daughter of Oeneus.4
Heracles fathered sons on her — Hyllus, Ctesippus, Glenus, and Onites. Going into exile toward Trachis with Deianira, he came to the river Evenus, where the centaur Nessus ferried travellers across for hire. Heracles crossed alone, but Nessus assaulted Deianira as he bore her over; struck by an arrow, the dying centaur gave her his blood, claiming it a charm to keep her husband's love.5
Years later, when Heracles took Iole and sent the herald Lichas to fetch fine raiment for sacrifice to Cenaean Zeus, Deianira learned of the girl and feared he would love her more than herself. Believing Nessus' blood truly a love-charm, she smeared it on the tunic; Heracles put it on, and the venom destroyed him. Ovid tells the same ruin, the gift soaked with the Lernaean hydra's poison consuming the hero. So by her hand, all unwilling, Heracles met his end.6
Hyginus closes her story among the women who died by their own hand: Deianira, daughter of Oeneus, killed herself on account of Hercules, deceived by Nessus into sending the tunic in which he was burned.7
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the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story
