The Messenian strongman, son of Aphareus and Arene and brother of keen-eyed Lynceus, whom Homer names the mightiest of men then upon the earth; he carried off Marpessa from the very god Apollo, fathered Cleopatra, sailed with the Argonauts, and died in the cattle-feud with his cousins the Dioscuri.1
In Apollodorus' Messenian stemma, Aphareus and Arene, daughter of Oebalus, had as sons Lynceus, Idas, and Pisus; Lynceus excelled in sharpness of sight, so that he could even see things underground. But according to many, Apollodorus adds, Idas is said to have been begotten by Poseidon — so that the strongest of mortals is, in the rival telling, no mortal's son at all.2
Homer makes Idas the measure of human strength: telling how the Calydonians fought the Curetes over Meleager, he calls Cleopatra the daughter of Marpessa of the fair ankles and of Idas, the mightiest of men that were then upon the face of earth, who also took up his bow to face the lord Phoebus Apollo for the sake of the fair-ankled maid. In Apollodorus the abduction is given its machinery: Evenus begat Marpessa, wooed by Apollo, but Idas carried her off in a winged chariot he had received from Poseidon; Evenus gave chase, could not catch him at the river Lycormas, slaughtered his horses and threw himself in, and the river was thereafter called Evenus after him.3
On the chest of Cypselus at Olympia Pausanias read the scene of the contest in verse: "Idas brings back, not against her will, fair-ankled Marpessa, daughter of Evenus, whom Apollo carried off" — a telling in which the maid is no unwilling prize. Of the marriage Pausanias knew the issue: Idas had by Marpessa a daughter Cleopatra, who married Meleager, while of his brother Lynceus he says we know of no child.4
Idas takes his place in the great gatherings of heroes. Apollodorus counts Idas and Lynceus, sons of Aphareus, among those who came from Messene to hunt the Calydonian boar, and lists the same pair in the roll of the Argonauts; Apollonius, mustering the crew, brings them from Arene with great confidence in their strength, Lynceus excelling in the keenest eyes, said to see even beneath the earth.5
The Apharetids end in a feud with their Spartan cousins. In Apollodorus, after a cattle-raid in Arcadia Idas was let divide the spoil, cheated the Dioscuri and ran the herds to Messene; the twins ambushed him, but Lynceus spied Castor in hiding and Idas killed him, and Pollux ran Lynceus through — until Idas struck Pollux with a stone and Zeus blasted Idas with a thunderbolt. Hyginus instead traces the quarrel to the stolen Leucippides betrothed to Idas and Lynceus: there Castor first kills Lynceus, and Idas, enraged at the funeral monument, runs Castor through before Pollux overcomes him.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
