Amphictyon in Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

, was the second son of Deucalion

Deucalion

In Greek mythology Deucalion was a son of Prometheus and Pronoia. The anger of Zeus was ignited by the hubris of the Pelasgians, and he decided to put an end to the Bronze Age. Lycaon, the king of Arcadia, had sacrificed a boy to Zeus, who was appalled by this savage offering...

 and Pyrrha

Pyrrha

In Greek mythology, Pyrrha was the daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora and wife of Deucalion.When Zeus decided to end the Bronze Age with the great deluge, Deucalion and his wife, Pyrrha, were the only survivors...

, although there was also a tradition that he was autochthonous (born from the earth); he is also said to be a son of Hellen

Hellen

Hellen , the son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, brother of Amphictyon and father of Aeolus, Xuthus, and Dorus. His name is also another name for Greek, meaning a person of Greek descent or pertaining to Greek culture, and the source of the adjective "Hellenic".Each of his sons founded a primary tribe of...

 son of Deucalion and Pyrrha. Amphictyon was king of Thermopylae

Thermopylae

Thermopylae is a location in Greece where a narrow coastal passage existed in antiquity. It derives its name from its hot sulphur springs. "Hot gates" is also "the place of hot springs and cavernous entrances to Hades"....

 and married a daughter of Cranaus

Cranaus

In Greek mythology, Cranaus was the second King of Athens, son of river god Nile and Alkippe, succeeding Cecrops I. He is supposed to have reigned for either nine or ten years....

 of Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

. According to some accounts this daughter was named Atthis, although this conflicts with other accounts which relate that she died young as a unmarried virgin. Amphictyon eventually deposed Cranaus, proclaiming himself king of Athens

King of Athens

Before the Athenian democracy, the tyrants, and the Archons, the city-state of Athens was ruled by kings. Most of these are probably mythical or only semi-historical...

.

Amphictyon had a son, Itonus

Itonus

In Greek mythology, Itonus was the son of Amphictyon. He was married to Melanippe, a nymph, and had a son Boeotus and two daughters, Chromia and Iodame.He founded a sanctuary of Athena, where his daughter Iodame served as priestess...

, who in his turn became the father of Boeotus

Boeotus

In Greek mythology, Boeotus was the eponym of Boeotia in Greece. Poseidon fathered both Aeolus and Boeotus with Arne . It was then through Boeotus that Arne became the ancestress of the Boeotians. In some traditions Boeotus is the father of Ogyges.A late source tells the story of Boeotus' marriage...

, Iodame

Iodame

In Greek mythology, Iodame was the daughter of Itonus and granddaughter of Amphictyon. She was a priestess at the temple of Athena Itonia built by her father. One night, Athena appeared in front of her; at the sight of Medusa's head which was worked in the goddess' garment, Iodame turned into stone...

 and Chromia

Chromia

In Greek mythology, Chromia is the daughter of Itonus , son of Amphictyon, himself son of Deucalion. She was also, in some traditions, the mother of Aetolus, Paeon, Epeius and Eurycyda by Endymion.-References:...

 by Melanippe. He also had a daughter, never mentioned by name, who became the mother of Cercyon

Cercyon

Cercyon - Κερκύων was a figure in Greek mythology. He was the King of Eleusis, and a very strong man. According to the different versions, he was the son of:*Poseidon and one of the daughters of Amphictyon, or...

 by Poseidon

Poseidon

Poseidon was the god of the sea, and, as "Earth-Shaker," of the earthquakes in Greek mythology. The name of the sea-god Nethuns in Etruscan was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon...

, and of Triptolemus

Triptolemus

Buzyges redirects here. For the genus of grass skipper butterflies, see Buzyges .Triptolemus , in Greek mythology always connected with Demeter of the Eleusinian Mysteries, might be accounted the son of King Celeus of Eleusis in Attica, or, according to the Pseudo-Apollodorus , the son of Gaia and...

 by Rarus. Some add that Amphictyon had another son, Physcus, by Chthonopatra; others, however, state that Physcus was the grandson of Amphictyon through Aetolus.

Amphictyon ruled Athens for ten, or in some accounts, twelve years and founded the Amphictyonic League

Amphictyonic League

In the Archaic period of ancient Greece, an amphictyony , a "league of neighbors", or Amphictyonic League was an ancient association of Greek tribes formed in the dim past, before the rise of the Greek polis...

, which traditionally met at Thermopylae in historical times. During his reign, Dionysus

Dionysus

Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

 was supposed to have visited Amphictyon in Athens and taught him how to mix water with wine in the proper proportions. Amphictyon was deposed by Erichthonius, another autochthonous king of Athens.