Phrixus- Greek FigureMortal

The Plot against Phrixus

Phrixus was the son of King Athamas of Orchomenus and the cloud nymph Nephele. When Nephele departed, Athamas married Ino, daughter of Cadmus, who resented her stepchildren. Ino secretly parched the city's seed grain so the crops would fail, then bribed the messengers sent to consult the oracle at Delphi. They returned with a fabricated prophecy: the famine would end only if Phrixus were sacrificed to Zeus. Athamas reluctantly consented, and Phrixus was led to the altar. But Nephele, watching from above, sent the golden-fleeced ram Chrysomallus to rescue her children.

The Flight to Colchis

Phrixus and his sister Helle climbed onto the ram's back as it soared into the sky and flew eastward over the Aegean. As they passed over the narrow strait between Europe and Asia, Helle lost her grip and fell into the waters below — the strait was forever after called the Hellespont, "Helle's Sea," in her memory. Phrixus continued alone across the Black Sea, reaching the kingdom of Colchis on its eastern shore, where King Aeetes, son of Helios, ruled.

The Golden Fleece

Aeetes received Phrixus with hospitality and gave him his daughter Chalciope in marriage. She bore him four sons who would later be rescued by the Argonauts on their own voyage to Colchis. In gratitude for his safe passage, Phrixus sacrificed Chrysomallus to Zeus and presented the golden fleece to Aeetes, who hung it in a sacred grove of Ares, guarded day and night by a sleepless dragon. Phrixus lived out his days in Colchis. In some accounts, his ghost later appeared to King Pelias of Iolcus in a dream, demanding that the fleece be brought back to Greece.