Meganeira or Meganira (

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

Μεγάνειρα) is a name that may refer to one of the following figures in

Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the Cosmogony, origin and Cosmology#Metaphysical co ...

: *Meganeira, daughter of

Crocon In Greek mythology, Crocon (Ancient Greek: Κρόκωνος) was the husband of Saesara, daughter of Celeus of Eleusis.Pausanias, ''Graeciae Descriptio'' 1.38.2 This couple became the parents of Meganeira, mother of Apheidas and Elatus by Arcas ...

and

Saesara In Greek mythology, Saesara (Ancient Greek: Σαισάρᾳ) was an Eleusis, Eleusinian princess as the daughter of King CeleusPausanias (geographer), Pausanias, 1.38.2 and possibly Metanira, Metaneira, and thus probably the sister of Callidice, De ...

Pausanias Pausanias ( el, Παυσανίας) may refer to: *Pausanias of Athens, lover of the poet Agathon and a character in Plato's ''Symposium'' *Pausanias the Regent, Spartan general and regent of the 5th century BC *Pausanias of Sicily, physician of th ...

, 1.38.2 and mother of

Apheidas In Greek mythology, the name Apheidas (; Ancient Greek: Ἀφείδας or Ἀφείδαντα) may refer to: * Apheidas, son of Arcas *Apheidas, a Centaur who attended the wedding of Pirithous and Hippodamia. *Apheidas, son of Polypemon, from A ...

and

Elatus There were several figures named Elatus or Élatos (Ancient Greek: Ἔλατος means "ductile") in Greek mythology. * Elatus, a son of Arcas by either Leaneira (or Laodameia), Meganeira, Chrysopeleia or Erato and the brother of Apheidas and ...

Arcas In Greek mythology, Arcas (; Ancient Greek: Ἀρκάς) was a hunter who became king of Arcadia. He was remembered for having taught people the arts of weaving and baking bread and for spreading agriculture to Arcadia. Family Arcas was the so ...

, son of

Zeus Zeus or , , ; grc, Δῐός, ''Diós'', label=Genitive case, genitive Aeolic Greek, Boeotian Aeolic and Doric Greek#Laconian, Laconian grc-dor, Δεύς, Deús ; grc, Δέος, ''Déos'', label=Genitive case, genitive el, Δίας, ''D� ...

and

Callisto Callisto most commonly refers to: *Callisto (mythology), a nymph *Callisto (moon), a moon of Jupiter Callisto may also refer to: Art and entertainment *''Callisto series'', a sequence of novels by Lin Carter *''Callisto'', a novel by Torsten Kro ...

. *Meganeira, mother by

Diomus ''Diomus'' is a genus of lady beetles in the family Coccinellidae. There are at least 20 described species in ''Diomus''. Species These 65 species belong to the genus ''Diomus'': * ''Diomus akonis'' (Ohta, 1929) * ''Diomus amabilis'' (LeConte, ...

Alcyoneus In Greek mythology, Alcyoneus or Alkyoneus (; Ancient Greek: Ἀλκυονεύς ''Alkuoneus'') was a traditional opponent of the hero Heracles. He was usually considered to be one of the Gigantes (Giants (Greek mythology), Giants), the offspring ...

. Together with her family, they lived in the city of

Crisa Computadoras, Redes e Ingeniería, S.A. (CRISA) is a Spanish leading company in space Flight Electronics design and production. Established in 1985, Crisa has been working since its inception in the area of space qualified electronics with the succe ...

at the foot of the

Parnassus Mount Parnassus (; el, Παρνασσός, ''Parnassós'') is a mountain range of central Greece that is and historically has been especially valuable to the Greek nation and the earlier Greek city-states for many reasons. In peace, it offers ...

. This Alcyoneus was destined by lot to be sacrificed to the monster

Sybaris Sybaris ( grc, Σύβαρις; it, Sibari) was an important city of Magna Graecia. It was situated in modern Calabria, in southern Italy, between two rivers, the Crathis (Crati) and the Sybaris (Coscile). The city was founded in 720 BC ...

on the basis of an oracle. However, the boy was saved by

Eurybarus Eurybarus or Eurybaros (Ancient Greek: Εὐρύβαρος), Eurybatos (Εὐρύβατος) or Eurybates (Εὐρυβάτης) was a Greek mythological hero, son of Euphemus and a descendant of the river god Axios.Antoninus Liberalis8as cited in ...

, who fell in love with the handsome lad and killed the monster.

Antoninus Liberalis Antoninus Liberalis ( el, Ἀντωνῖνος Λιβεράλις) was an Ancient Greek grammarian who probably flourished between AD 100 and 300. His only surviving work is the ''Metamorphoses'' (Μεταμορφώσεων Συναγωγή, ''Me ...

8
as cited in

Boeus Boios (Βοῖος), Latinized Boeus, was a Greek grammarian and mythographer, remembered chiefly as the author of a lost work on the transformations of mythic figures into birds, his ''Ornithogonia'', which was translated into Latin by Aemilius M ...

' ''Ornithogonia'' *Meganeira, same as

Metaneira In Greek mythology, Metanira (; Ancient Greek: Μετάνειρα ''Metáneira'') or Meganira was a queen of Eleusis as wife of King Celeus. She was the daughter of Amphictyon, king of Athens. Mythology While Demeter was searching for her daug ...

, wife of King

Celeus Celeus or Keleus (Ancient Greek: Κελεός ''Keleós'') was the king of Eleusis in Greek mythology, husband of Metaneira and father of several daughters, who are called Callidice, Demo, Cleisidice and Callithoe in the ''Homeric Hymn to Dem ...

Eleusis Elefsina ( el, Ελευσίνα ''Elefsina''), or Eleusis (; Ancient Greek: ''Eleusis'') is a suburban city and Communities and Municipalities of Greece, municipality in the West Attica regional unit of Greece. It is situated about northwest ...

Notes

References

, ''The Metamorphoses of Antoninus Liberalis'' translated by Francis Celoria (Routledge 1992)
Online version at the Topos Text Project.
*

Apollodorus Apollodorus (Ancient Greek, Greek: Ἀπολλόδωρος ''Apollodoros'') was a popular name in ancient Greece. It is the masculine gender of a noun compounded from Apollo, the deity, and doron, "gift"; that is, "Gift of Apollo." It may refer to: ...

, ''The Library'' with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. ISBN 0-674-99135-4
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website
*

, ''Description of Greece'' with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918.
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
*Pausanias, ''Graeciae Descriptio.'' ''3 vols''. Leipzig, Teubner. 1903.
Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library
{{Greek myth index Set index articles on Greek mythology Women in Greek mythology Characters in Greek mythology Arcadian mythology