Greek PantheonRegion
Thrace
The wild northern land of the Thracians, home of King Diomedes, son of Ares, whose man-eating mares Heracles captured in his eighth labour after feeding the king to them.
About Thrace
Diomedes's mares
Apollodorus 2.5.8: the eighth labor takes Heracles to Thrace, to the man-eating mares of King Diomedes, son of Ares. He feeds Diomedes to his own horses (in the usual version), then brings the team to Eurystheus. Thrace in myth is a northern elsewhere: Ares, harsh kings, wild horses. The labor is not a tour of Thracian religion. Euripides' Alcestis already assumes Heracles heading toward these mares.
On the map
Thrace among other places of the Greek Pantheon.
Sources and further reading
Source notes
These references are recorded in the catalog. Their passage wording and translation have not been checked, so quotations are not displayed here.
- Apollodorus, Library 2.5.8
About this entry
By Elizabeth Stein for Mythos Atlas. About the author. Editorial notes are grounded in the site's cited sources and can be challenged through the contact page.
Coordinates mark where the myths place a site, or where the tradition locates it today. Mythic realms are left off the map or marked as symbolic placements.
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