Mnemosyne — Classical Greek Myth Library

Trophonius and his brother Agamedes were master-builders (Apollo’s Delphic temple; a treasury for Hyrieus or Augeas). In the treasury-tale they left a movable stone to steal; Agamedes was caught in a snare, and Trophonius cut off his brother’s head to avoid recognition, then was swallowed by the earth at Lebadeia. There a famous oracle arose. Pausanias details the rite: days of purification, bathing in the Hercyna, drinking of Forgetfulness (Lethe) and Memory (Mnemosyne), descent by ladder into a chthonian chasm where the consultant is whisked feet-first into darkness and hears or sees the response, then returns shaken—hence the proverb that one who has consulted Trophonius does not laugh again for a time. The Lebadeian descent is classical Greece’s fullest local parallel to Amphiaraus’s incubation: a hero taken underground who still speaks to the living.