She was the mother ofJason byAeson, King ofIolcus.[4] She met Aeson in the caves belowIolcus inThessaly, achthonic lair where the rightful king Aeson had been imprisoned by his evil half-brotherPelias. In some accounts, Alcimede was called the daughter ofAutolycus; the same was said ofPolymele, another possible mother of Jason.[5]
A hint of matrilineal descent in archaic times among theBoeotian Minyans of Greece is in Apollonius' aside concerning Jason's heritage:
"So many then were the helpers who assembled to join the son of Aeson. All the chiefs the dwellers thereabout called Minyae, for the most and the bravest avowed that they were sprung from the blood of the daughters of Minyas; thus Jason himself was the son of Alcimede, who was born of Clymene, the daughter of Minyas."[6]
A further hint of archaic matrilineal descent is that Clymene's consort is offered in two versions: she was usually cast as the wife of Phylacus (son ofDeioneus, son ofAeolus) or in some versions, Aeson was fathered byCephalus, otherwise the consort of Procris.[7]
Along with Aeson, Alcimede was forced by the usurpingPelias to commit suicide. She hanged herself or else drank, along with her husband and the childPromachus, of bull's blood and so died.
Gaius Valerius Flaccus,Argonautica translated by Mozley, J H. Loeb Classical Library Volume 286. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1928.Online version at theio.com.
Pausanias,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
