Cadmus

Cadmus was a
Phoenician prince, the son
of King Agenor and Queen
Telephassa of Tyre and the
brother of Phoenix, Cilix
and Europa.
He was originally sent
by his royal parents to seek
out and escort his sister
Europa back to Tyre after
she was abducted from the
shores of Phoenicia by Zeus.
 Phonecian Script
Cadmus was credited by
the ancient Greeks with
introducing the original
Alphabet of Phoenician
alphabet or the “Phoenician
Letters” to the Greeks who
adapted it to form their Greek
Alphabet.
Herodotus estimates
that Cadmus lived sixteen
hundred years before his time,
or around 2000 BCE.
BOEOTIAN THEBES
 Cadmus consults
the Delphic Oracle
Cadmus came in the
course of his wanderings to
Delphi, where he consulted
the oracle. He was ordered
to give up his quest and
follow a special cow, with a
half moon on her flank,
which would meet him, and
to build a town on the spot
where she should lie down
exhausted.
 Cadmus and the
Serpent
Intending to sacrifice the
cow to Athena, Cadmus
sent some of his
companions to the nearby
Castellian Spring, for
water. They were slain by
the spring’s guardian
water-dragon, which was
in turn destroyed by
Cadmus.
CADMUS AND THE SERPENT
 The Spartoi ‘Sown-Men’
By instructions of Athena,
the sowed the dragon’s fangs in
the ground, from which their
sprang a race of fierce armed
men, called Spartoi. By throwing
a stone among them, Cadmus
caused them to fall upon one
another until only five survived,
who assisted him to build the
Cadmeia or citadel of Thebes,
and became the founders of the
noblest families of that city.
CADMUS SOWING THE
SeRPenT’S FAnGS
SPARTOI
THE SOWN-MEN, SPROUTED FROM THE
FANGS OF THE SERPENT
CADMUS, WITH ATHENA, RIVER ISMENOS,
SPRING NYMPH KRENAIE, AND THEBE
Cadmus and Harmonia,
metamorphosed into
serpents
While the conqueror
stares at the vast bulk of his
conquered enemy, suddenly a
voice is heard. It is not easy
where it comes from, but it is
heard.
“Why gaze son of
Agenor, at the serpent you
have killed? You too shall be
a serpent to be gazed on.”
SON OF CADMUS AND HARMONIA

Polydoros succceeded Pentheus, marying

Nykteis, the daughter of Nykteus. When their
son Labdakos was still young, Polydorus dies of
unknown causes, leaving Nycteus as regent for
the child Labdakos.
DAUGHTERS OF CADMUS AND HARMONIA

With Harmonia, Cadmus was the

father of three daughters: Ino, Autonoe,
Agave and Semele
 AGAve’S Son
Pentheus
The daughters of
Cadmus saw him in a
tree and thought him
to be a wild animal.
They pulled Pentheus
down and tore him
from limb to limb.
 AuTonoe’S son, Actaeon
When Actaeon came into the
clearing, he caught a glimpse of
Artimes bathing. Although the
nymphs tried to cover her naked
body, it was too late. In a rage,
Artemis reached for her bow
and arrow. When she was
unable to reach it, she instead
turned Actaeon into a stag.
Actaeon was not aware of the change until he saw his own
reflection in the river; however, by that time, his hunds were
closing in on him and despite his best efforts to call out to
them, the hound confused Actaeon with prey and tore him
to pieces
Ino’S stepson, Phrixus
Althamas ruled in Orchomenus
in Boeotia. His first wife was
Nephele, a cloud-goddess, who
bore him two children, a son
Phrixus and a daughter Helle.
Nephele had a little interest in
her mortal husband, so he
eventually found another wife, Ino,
one of the daughters of Cadmus,
the founder of Thebes. But Nephele
was angered that he had remarried,
so she and Hera arranged to punish Athamas, inflicting a
madness upon Ino which drove her to try to destroy her
husband’s children.
 Ino was wet-nurse
of Dionysus
Ino was a primordial
Dionysian woman, nurse
to the god and a divine
maenad.
Ino’S son Melicertes
Melicertes, later called
Palaemon, is the son of the
Boeotian prince Athamas and Ino,
daughter of Cadmus.
Ino, pursued by her
husband, who had been driven
mad by Hera because Ino had
brought up the infant Dionysus,
threw herself and Meliceres into
the sea from a high rock between
Megara and Corinth. Both were
changed into marine deities: Ino
as Leucothea, Melicertes as
Palaemon.