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LegendUndated

Phineus and the Harpies

Also called: Harpies, Phineus

A legend handed down over the centuries.

A Greek myth told in Book 2 of the Argonautica. The blind seer Phineus, living near the Bosporus, was tormented by the Harpies, monstrous birds that snatched away his food. When the sons of the North Wind drove them off, Phineus told the Argonauts how to pass the Clashing Rocks.

This Greek myth is told in Book 2 of Apollonius’ Argonautica. Punished by the gods for revealing too much of the future, the Thracian seer Phineus had been blinded, and whenever food was set before him the Harpies — birds with women’s faces — swooped down to snatch and foul it. He was starving, little more than skin and bone.

When Zetes and Calais, the winged sons of the North Wind Boreas who sailed on the Argo, drove the Harpies far away, Phineus repaid them with advice: at the Clashing Rocks guarding the way into the Black Sea, they should first release a dove, and if it passed through, row with all their strength.

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Themes that include this event

  • Heroes of Greek Myth1400 BC – 1900

    Perseus and Medusa, the labours of Heracles, Jason and the Golden Fleece, Theseus and the Minotaur, the wings of Icarus, Oedipus and Antigone — the heroes of Greek myth, alongside the real sites of Tiryns, Knossos and Thebes, the first performance of a tragedy, and the sculptures and paintings their stories inspired