Lycurgus of Arcadia
son of Aleus in Greek mythology
In Greek mythology, Lycurgus (Ancient Greek: Λυκοῦργος, romanized: Lykoûrgos, lit. 'wolf-work', 'tamer of wolves', or 'defender'), also Lykurgos, was a king of Tegea in Arcadia.
Family
Lycurgus was the son of Aleus, the previous ruler of Tegea, and Neaera, daughter of Pereus, and thus, brother to the Argonauts Amphidamas, Cepheus, Auge and Alcidice. He married either Cleophyle, Eurynome or Antinoe and fathered these sons: Ancaeus, Epochus, Amphidamas, and Iasius.
Mythology
Lycurgus was notorious for killing, by ambushing him, a warrior called Areithous. He attacked the man unexpectedly in a narrow passage where Areithous' famous club was useless. Lycurgus took Areithous' armor as spoils and wore it himself, but handed it over to Ereuthalion when he had grown old. In homer's Iliad Nestor recounts killing Ereuthalion in a battle between Pylos and Arcadia. According to scholia on the Argonautica, Ereuthalion was also vanquished by Lycurgus, who laid an ambush against him and overcame him in the ensuing battle. The Arcadians celebrated a feast known as Moleia in commemoration of this mythical event (mōlos being a word for "battle" according to the scholiast), and paid general honors to Lycurgus.
Lycurgus outlived his sons and reached an extreme old age for Epochus fell ill and died while Ancaeus was wounded by the Calydonian boar.
“Lycurgus of Arcadia” enters the record as son of Aleus in Greek mythology. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Lycurgus, Arcadia and Aleus can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “Lycurgus of Arcadia” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.