The Argonautica

and of revered young maiden Acacallis, whom king Minos

sent into Libya while she bore a god's heavy burden,

though his own daughter; she bore Phoebus a splendid son,

whom men called by the double names Amphithemis and Garamas.

Then mighty Amphithemis joined a fair Tritonian nymph;

she bore two sons, Nasamon and mighty Caphaurus,

who slew Canthus that day in defense of his own sheep.

Nor did Caphaurus escape the punishing hands of the heroes,

when they learned his deed. The heroes raised the fallen corpse

and carried it back; the Minyans buried it deep in earth,

mourning, then drove all the sheep away together.

On that same day fate caught Mopsus too,

Ampycus' son; he did not escape the bitter doom

through prophecy; for no man can turn death away.

There in the sand, avoiding the heat of the midday sun,

lay a dread serpent, sluggish, harming none unprovoked;

nor would it swiftly dart straight at one shrinking away.

Whatever living creature first received its injection

with black venom, of all that life-giving earth feeds,

for it no road to Hades remained even a cubit long,

not even if Paeon himself, if I may speak this openly,

should treat the victim, when its teeth had only grazed the skin.

For godlike Perseus once flew across Libyan country,

Eurymedon, the second name his mother herself gave him,