View source for Aerope

===In Crete===
According to the tradition followed by [[Euripides]] in his lost play ''Cretan Women'' (''Kressai''), Catreus found Aerope in bed with a slave and handed her over to [[Nauplius (mythology)|Nauplius]] to be drowned. Instead, Nauplius spared Aerope's life and she married [[Pleisthenes]].<ref>Hard, [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA355 p. 355]; Gantz, p. 271. Euripides' treatment of the story is according to the Scholia on [[Sophocles]], [[Ajax (play)|''Ajax'']] 1297, citing Euripides' ''Cretan Women'', see: Collard and Cropp 2008a, [https://www.loebclassics.com/view/euripides-dramatic_fragments/2008/pb_LCL504.521.xml pp. 520, 521]; Webster, pp. 37&ndash;38; Jebb's note to ''Ajax'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0024:text=comm:commline=1295 1295 '''Κρήσσης'''].</ref> [[Sophocles]], in his play [[Ajax (play)|''Ajax'']], may also refer to Aerope's father finding her in bed with a man and handing her over to Nauplius to be drowned. However, the potentially corrupt text may instead refer to Aerope's husband Atreus finding her in bed with Thyestes, and having her drowned (see below).<ref>Gantz, pp. 554&ndash;555; Jebb's note to ''Ajax'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0024:text=comm:commline=1296 1296 '''ὁ φιτύσας πατήρ'''].  The possible Sophoclean reference is found in lines 1295&ndash;1297, spoken by [[Teucer]] to [[Agamemnon]]. Here, by way of insulting Agamemnon, Teucer malign's Agamemnon's mother Aerope as having been found in bed with a strange man, by a "father" who then has her drowned. The difficulty arises in knowing whose "father" is meant, Aerope's, or Agamemnon's. Compare [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0011.tlg003.perseus-eng1:1290-1315 Jebb's]: "a Cretan mother, ''whose father'' (i.e. Catrues) found ... ",  with's [https://www.loebclassics.com/view/sophocles-ajax/1994/pb_LCL020.149.xml Lloyd-Jones's]: "a Cretan mother, ''whom your father'' (i.e. Atreus), finding ...".</ref>

The mythographer [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]] followed a different tradition, with no mention of any sexual transgression. In his account, Catreus gave Aerope and her sister Clymene to Nauplius to be sold off in foreign lands after an oracle prophesied that he would be killed by one of his children. Aerope's brother Althaemenes also found out about the prophecy, and fearing that ''he'' would be the one to kill Catreus, fled to [[Rhodes]] with Apemosyne.<ref>Collard and Cropp 2008a, [https://www.loebclassics.com/view/euripides-dramatic_fragments/2008/pb_LCL504.517.xml pp. 516&ndash;518]; [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+3.2 3.2].</ref> In this telling, Aerope eventually becomes the wife of Pleisthenes.