One of the Aloadae, the monstrous twin sons whom Iphimedeia, wife of Aloeus, bore after she declared she had lain with Poseidon — godlike Otus and far-famed Ephialtes, whom the grain-giving earth reared as the tallest and comeliest of men after Orion.1
In the underworld Odysseus saw Iphimedeia, wife of Aloeus, who declared she had lain with Poseidon. She bore two sons, short of life but godlike — Otus and far-famed Ephialtes, whom the grain-giving earth reared as the tallest of men and far the comeliest after famous Orion. At nine years they were nine cubits in breadth and nine fathoms in height, and they threatened the immortals with the din of furious war on Olympus.2
They were fain to pile Ossa upon Olympus, and Pelion with its waving forests upon Ossa, that heaven itself might be scaled — and this they would have accomplished had they reached the measure of manhood. But the son of Zeus whom fair-haired Leto bore slew them both before the down had blossomed beneath their temples and clothed their chins with beard. Apollonius too recalls how the sons of Aloeus blurted reckless taunts against the blessed gods and were laid low by the swift arrows of Leto's son, mighty though they were.3
Apollodorus keeps the twins biologically Poseidon's though nominally Aloeus': Aloeus wedded Iphimedia daughter of Triops, but she loved Poseidon and would draw the sea-waves into her lap, and the god begat upon her Otus and Ephialtes, called the Aloads. Growing a cubit broad and a fathom tall each year, at nine years they set Ossa on Olympus and Pelion on Ossa, threatening by these mountains to climb to heaven, and boasting that by damming the sea with the hills they would make the sea dry land and the land sea. Ephialtes wooed Hera, while Otus wooed Artemis.4
By the same telling Artemis brought their end through cunning, not battle: changing herself into a deer she leapt between the brothers in Naxos, and as each hurled his dart in his eagerness to strike the quarry, they killed one another instead. Pausanias, however, records that they met their end at the hands of Apollo, according to both Homer and Pindar, that their doom overtook them in Naxos, and that their tombs lie at Anthedon by the sea.5
Even the war-god fell into the brothers' power. When Otus and mighty Ephialtes, the sons of Aloeus, bound Ares in cruel bonds, he lay chained in a brazen jar for thirteen months, and would have perished there, insatiate of war though he was, had not their stepmother, fair Eëriboea, brought tidings to Hermes, who stole the worn god out from under his grievous chains. Hyginus, naming them sons of Aloeus and Iphimede, has them grow nine inches a month and at nine years attempt to climb into heaven.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
