InGreek mythology,Tereus (/ˈtɛriəs,ˈtɪərjuːs/;Ancient Greek: Τηρεύς) was aThracian king,[1][2] the son ofAres and the naiadBistonis. He was the brother ofDryas. Tereus was the husband of the Athenian princessProcne and the father ofItys.
When Tereus desired his wife's sister,Philomela, he came to Athens to his father-in-lawPandion to ask for his other daughter in marriage, stating that Procne had died. Pandion granted him the favour, and sent Philomela and guards along with her. But Tereus threw the guards into the sea, and finding Philomela on a mountain, forced himself upon her. He then cut her tongue out and held her captive so she could never tell anyone. After he returned to Thrace, Tereus gave Philomela to KingLynceus and told his wife that her sister had died. Philomela wove letters in atapestry depicting Tereus's crime and sent it secretly to Procne. Lynceus' wifeLathusa, who was a friend of Procne, at once sent Philomela to her.
When Procne recognized her sister and knew the impious deed of Tereus, the two planned to return the favour to the king. Meanwhile, it was revealed to Tereus by prodigies that death by a relative's hand was coming to his son Itys. When he heard this, thinking that his brother Dryas was plotting his son's death, he killed the innocent man. Procne, however, killed Itys, her son by Tereus,served his flesh in a meal at his father's table in revenge, and fled with her sister.
When Tereus learned of her crime, he pursued the sisters and tried to kill them, but all three were changed by theOlympian Gods into birds out of pity: Tereus became ahoopoe or a hawk; Procne became theswallow whose song is a song of mourning for the loss of her child; Philomela became thenightingale. Incidentally, the female nightingale has no song. (Hyginus,Fabulae, 45).
A very similar story was told aboutPolytechnus.
Tereus was also a common given name among Thracians.[1]
TheAttic playwrightsSophocles andPhilocles both wrote plays entitledTereus on the subject of the story of Tereus.[3] The popularity of Sophocles' play caused a confusion among Athenians betweenTereus andTeres, a Thracian king and father of the king with whom Athenians made an alliance in 431 BC.[4]
Shakespeare refers to Tereus inTitus Andronicus, after Chiron and Demetrius have raped Lavinia and cut out her tongue and also both her hands. He also makes reference to Tereus inCymbeline, when Iachimo spies upon the sleeping Imogen to gather false evidence so he can persuade Posthumus he has seduced her.
The transformed Tereus is a character inThe Birds byAristophanes.
Other fathers who were tricked into consuming their children:
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