Calydonian Boar Hunt

The Calydonian Boar Hunt was the most famous of all myths about hunting. This is because many of the famous Greek heroes took part in it, although Heracles (Heracles) was noticeably absent in this adventure. The Calydonian Boar Hunt was actually an account of Calydon's own hero, Meleager, which was his greatest achievement. But the myth was entwined with the Arcadian or Boeotian heroine named Atalanta, the beautiful huntress who would unintentionally cause his death, because of his love for her.

Many classical authors mentioned or provided accounts of this, though each of these accounts are pretty short, and often provided few details about the hunt. Ovid provided us with the most descriptive account of the adventure and its aftermath.

• Althaea and the Birth of Meleager

• Atalanta and the Boar Hunt

• Death of Meleager

Althaea and the Birth of Meleager

Oeneus married his niece, Althaea, who was his first wife, the daughter of Thestius and Eurythemis. Althaea was also the sister of Leda, who was the mother of the Dioscuri (Castor and Polydeuces) and Helen. Ovid only mentioned Meleager's two uncles. (In some accounts, Althaea had more than just two brothers, Plexippus and Toxeus. Apollodorus called Althaea's brothers: Iphiclus, Evippus, Plexippus and Eurypylus, while Hyginus named them as Ideus, Plexippus and Lynceus.)

Althaea was the mother of two daughters: Deianeira, who would later marry Heracles, and Gorge, the wife of Andraimon. Althaea was also the mother of four sons: Toxeus (not to be confused with Althaea's brother, who was killed by Meleager), Thyreus, Clymenus and Meleager (Μελέαγρος). However, some writers said that Meleager wasn't Oeneus' son; it was widely believed that the young hero was the son of Ares, the god of war.

According to the most popular account, when Althaea gave birth to Meleager, the Fates came to the queen and announced that Meleager would die on the day when a log or brand that was in their hearth was burned to ashes. Althaea saved her infant son by putting out the fire. To ensure that Meleager would never die, she hid the log in a chest, and secretly buried the chest.

See the genealogy of the House of Calydon.

Since the log was safe and secure in the chest, Meleager grew into a mighty and invulnerable warrior. In the Iliad, Homer described him as having red hair.

As a young man, he accompanied Jason and the Argonauts on the Quest of the Golden Fleece. Heracles so admired Meleager's boldness that Heracles gave the younger hero the honour to row beside him. His role in the Argonautica was only minor. In Diodorus' version of this myth, a battle took place between the Argonauts and the Colchians in which Meleager was responsible for killing King Aeëtes of Colchis, when the king pursued them with his army.

Meleager married Cleopatra, the daughter of a fellow Argonaut, Idas, and of Marpessa. Meleager had a daughter named Polydora, who would later marry Protesilaus, one of the Greek leaders in the Trojan War.

Meleager's greatest adventure was in the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Atalanta and the Boar Hunt

Oeneus (Oineus), king of Calydon, was offering sacrifices to the gods and goddesses for the bountiful harvest, but had neglected the goddess Artemis. It was considered an insult to not offer a sacrifice to the goddess Artemis. Artemis sent a giant boar that ravaged the countryside. The Calydonian Boar was destroying farms and killing people. The king sent pleas for heroes throughout Greece, asking for warriors to kill the boar. Oeneus offered the hide of the boar as a prize, for anyone to first draw blood from the boar.

Meleager led the party of hunters. Meleager was among many of his comrades who sailed on the Argo, who also joined the hunt.

Among the hunters was a beautiful huntress, Atalanta (Ἀταλάντη). Depending on the sources, she was either a Boeotian or an Arcadian heroine. Her mother was a mystery, and she was either the daughter of Schoeneus or that of Iasus. Whichever one was her father, he had wanted a son, so he exposed his infant in the wild. Like most myths, she was suckled by a wild animal, in this case, a she-bear, until the child was found by a group of hunters. These hunters brought her up, teaching her how to hunt, using the bow and arrows. Her first kill was two centaurs, who had tried to rape her.

She was as strong and brave as any hero. Not only was she skilled with the bow, with the exception of Euphemus and Iphiclus of Phylace, no-one could outrun her in a footrace.

Atalanta had wanted to join the Argonauts. A few authors said that Atalanta had indeed sailed with Jason on the epic voyage, but according to the most authoritarian work about the Quest, Jason had politely declined her, for he thought that her presence might cause trouble among the other heroes.

However, she did take part in the funeral games of Pelias, after Jason and the Argonauts had returned from the Quest. There, she had wrestled and defeated the hero, Peleus.

Some of the hunters, especially Meleager's uncles, Plexippus and Toxeus, protested vehemently against Meleager for allowing a woman to hunt with them. But Meleager, who had fallen madly in love with Atalanta, allowed her to participate. Some said that Atalanta had a son by Meleager named Parthenopaeüs (Parthenopaeus), who was one of the seven champions who fought in the ill-fated war against Thebes (see Seven Against Thebes). Atalanta, wanting to hide the fact that she had given birth to a son, exposed the baby in the forest of Mount Parthenius. Others said that Parthenopaeüs was the son of his mother's husband, either Hippomenes or Melanion. A few even said that Parthenopaeüs' father was Ares.

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Loud noises drove the giant boar out of the dense forest into a large clearing, where the hunters waited for their prey. The heroes were eager to draw first blood or to kill the boar, so javelins and arrows flew at the boar. Not only was the boar confused by so many hunters and flying missiles, so were the hunters themselves. Most of the missiles were missing their mark, so the hunter's missiles were just as deadly to the other hunters, as were the boar's tusks.

The Lapith seer Mopsus prayed to Apollo before hurling his spear. The spear did strike the boar, but only by the shaft. (In the Apollonius' Argonautica, Mopsus had died from snakebite in Libya, so he couldn't have been at this Hunt in Calydon.)

During the hunt, the boar killed several hunters. Among them, Enasimus, the son of Hippocoon of Sparta, tried to flee, but was cut down by the boar's tusks from behind. Hyleus also fell victim to the raging boar. Peleus accidentally killed Eurytion, his father-in-law, with his miscast spear. Some more hunters were wounded.

Nestor barely escaped alive. Nestor had to use his spear to vault up to the safety of a nearby tree branch. The Spartan twins, Castor and Polydeuces, were mounted on their horses with their javelins ready, but the boar slashed Hippasus' thigh before it ran off to the woods.

Telamon was the first to follow after the boar into the woods, but tripped over a tree root. Peleus quickly came to his brother's aid, with Atalanta standing guard with her arrow ready and drawn back. With a quick prayer to Artemis, her arrow flew unerringly from her bow. Atalanta drew first blood with her arrow, and it pierced through the boar's ear. This slight wound only enraged the boar.

Meleager saw the blood, and declared that Atalanta deserved the prize of the boar's hide. This angered some of the hunters, especially Meleager's uncles. The former Argonaut, Ancaeus, the son of Lycurgus, king of Tegea, was feeling ashamed that Atalanta had drawn blood first, and foolishly rushed the boar, swinging his deadly axe. However, the boar got the best in this encounter, charging at the reckless hunter, its tusks gorging deeply into his loins. Ancaeus died.

This was followed by the misadventure of reckless Peirithoüs, where Theseus had to save his friend from certain death. Jason, the captain of Argo, ignobly killed a hound with his javelin.

Apollodorus said that the seer Amphiaraüs' arrow then pierced one of the boar's eyes. (Most accounts didn't mention Amphiaraüs' wounding the boar before Meleager killed it. Ovid didn't mention it, but Apollodorus did.)

Then Meleager rushed forward and hurled two spears, one in each hand. One spear missed, but the second spear flew true; impaling the pig on the side.

All accounts agreed that Meleager had killed the Calydonian Boar, but they differed on details about the event. Homer didn't mention Atalanta at all.

Death of Meleager

When the hunt ended, Meleager eagerly awarded the hide to Atalanta. This upset Meleager's uncles, who believed that they deserved the hide, if Meleager chose not to accept it for killing the boar. They accused him of being besotted with the wench.

They snatched the hide from Atalanta. According to Diodorus Siculus, they ambushed and robbed her when she was on her way home to Arcadia. Whichever way they took the hide from Atalanta, Meleager couldn't tolerate his uncles' behaviour. This action outraged his uncles, resulting in a deadly quarrel between the young hero and his mother's brothers. In a fit of rage, Meleager killed his uncles. Meleager ran his sword through Plexippus' heart, and killed Toxeus as he tried to flee.

News of her brothers' death arrived in the palace. That her own son would kill her brothers caused distress and anger in Althaea. Althaea took out the log she had kept safe, and threw the wood into a fire. When the fire completely consumed the log, Meleager died.

Distraught from killing her own son, Althaea committed suicide, by hanging herself.

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There were a few other different versions of Meleager's death.

The mythographer Apollodorus gave us the version I just told, and another one in the war between the Calydonians and the Curetes. This can also be found in the Iliad, written by Homer.

The war began over the hunt, in which Thestius' sons claimed that Iphiclus was the first to wound the boar (Atalanta wasn't even mentioned in the epic). Meleager killed some of Althaea's brothers in the fighting. His mother cursed Meleager for killing her brothers. Meleager, in anger, withdrew from the war and locked himself in his room. As the war began to swing in the Curetes' favour, his wife Cleopatra called upon him to defend their home. Meleager rejoined the battle and killed the other sons of Thestius. However, Meleager also died in the fighting. His mother Althaea and his wife Cleopatra were so distraught over his death that they hanged themselves. His sisters, except Gorge and Deianeira, who mourned for him, were changed into birds.

According to the Catalogues of Women, the god Apollo killed Meleager, while he fought in the war against Curetes.

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When Heracles (Hercules) later went to the Underworld to fetch Cerberus in his twelfth labour, he encountered the shade of Meleager. All of the ghosts in Hades' domain fled in terror of Heracles, except for the ghosts of Meleager and the Gorgon Medusa. Heracles promised Meleager that when he had time, he would woo and marry Deianeira, Meleager's young sister.

Related Articles

• Oeneus

• Atalanta

Genealogy

House of Calydon