Bellerŏphon
（
Βελλεροφῶν) or
Bellerophontes
(
Βελλεροφόντης). Son of Glaucus of Corinth (or, according
to another account, of Poseidon), and grandson of Sisyphus. His proper name is said to have
been Hipponoüs; the name Bellerophontes implies that he was the slayer of some now
unknown monster. In later times his name was wrongly explained as the slayer of a certain
Corinthian, Bellerus, on account of which he was supposed to have fled to Proetus at Tiryns or
Corinth. The wife of Proetus, Anteia (or Stheneboea), fell in love with the beautiful youth;
he was deaf to her entreaties; she slandered him to her husband, who resolved on his
destruction. He sent Bellerophon to Lycia, to his father-in-law Iobates, with a tablet in
cipher, begging him to put the bearer to death. Iobates first commissioned Bellerophon to
destroy the fire-breathing monster Chimaera, a task which he executed with the help of his
winged horse Pegasus. (See
Pegasus.) Thereupon,
after a fierce battle, he conquered the
 |
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Bellerophon, Pegasus, and Chimaera. (Tischbein, Hamilton Vases, vol. i. pl. 1.)
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Solymi and the Amazons, on his return slew in ambush all the boldest among the
Lycians, and Iobates now recognized his divine origin, kept him with him, and gave him half of
his kingdom and his daughter to wife. The children of this marriage were Isander, Hippolochus,
the father of Glaucus and Laodamia, and the mother of Sarpedon by Zeus.
Afterwards Bellerophon was hated by all the gods, and wandered about alone, devouring his
heart in sorrow. His son Isander was killed by Ares in battle against the Solymi, while
Laodamia was sacrificed to the wrath of Artemis. This is the Homeric version; but, according
to Pindar, Bellerophon's high fortune made him so overweening that he wished to mount to
heaven on Pegasus. Zeus, however, drove the horse wild with a gadfly, and Bellerophon fell and
came to a miserable end. He was honoured as a hero in Corinth, an enclosure being consecrated
to him in the cypress grove of Craneion. See Morris,
Bellerophon in Argos, etc.
