Glaucus The best known myth concerning Polyidus is the one that deals with him saving the life of
Glaucus, which runs as follows. One day,
Glaucus, son of King
Minos and Queen
Pasiphaë of
Crete, was playing with a
mouse and suddenly disappeared. The
Kuretes told Minos: "A marvelous creature has been born amongst you: whoever finds the true likeness for this creature will also find the child." They interpreted this to refer to a newborn calf in Minos' herd. Three times a day, the calf changed color from white to red to black. Polyidus ( or
Asclepius, god of medicine) observed the similarity to the ripening of the fruit of the
mulberry, and Minos sent him to find Glaucus. Searching for the boy, Polyidus saw an
owl driving
bees away from a wine-cellar in Minos' palace. Inside the wine-cellar was a cask of honey, with Glaucus dead inside. Minos demanded Glaucus be brought back to life and ordered Polyidus to be entombed with the body. When a
snake appeared nearby, Polyidus killed it immediately. Another snake came for the first, and after seeing its mate dead, the second serpent left and returned with an
herb which then brought the first snake back to life. With the herb Polyidus resurrected the child. Minos refused to let Polyidus leave Crete until he taught Glaucus the art of
divination. Polyidus did so, but then, at the last second before leaving to Argos, he asked Glaucus to spit in his mouth. Glaucus did so and forgot everything he had been taught. The story of Polyidus and Glaucus was the subject of a lost play of
Euripides, his
Bellerophon, and of one by
Aeschylus, and Sophocles' lost
The Mantises. Previously unknown fragments of Euripedes'
Polyidus were found in 2022 and publicized in 2024.
Other stories It is related that Polyidus advised
Bellerophon as to how to find and tame
Pegasus, in order to kill the
Chimera. Polyidus was said to have come to
Megara to purify
Alcathous, son of Pelops, for the accidental murder of the latter's son Callipolis. He also built the sanctuary of
Dionysus Patroos (Paternal), and dedicated a wooden image that in Pausanias' day was covered up except the face, which alone was exposed. The tomb of his two daughters was shown at Megara. ==Notes==