Coroebus and Poine at Argos (Pausanias)

Catalogue ID: 05-local-and-lesser/121-coroebus-poena-argos-pausanias

Cycle: Local and lesser — Argive local / Apollo’s vengeance aetiology

Version line: Pausanian Argive — Poine sent for Psamathe’s death; Coroebus slays her

Sources: Pausanias 1.43.7–8, 2.19.8; Conon, *Narratives* 19 (parallel handbook)

Source file: /workspace/greek-myth-catalogue/05-local-and-lesser/121-coroebus-poena-argos-pausanias.md

Characters

Artemis — father of Linus; sender of Poine; Delphic director of Coroebus’s exile
Coroebus — Argive youth; slays Poine; exiled; founds Tripodiscus area settlement
Crotopus — Argive king; father of Psamathe
Linus — exposed infant torn by dogs (prelude)
Poine — Apollo’s child-snatching monster; slain
Psamathe — Crotopus’s daughter; mother of Linus; exposure leads to the god’s wrath

Places

Megara — tomb and reliefs Pausanias describes
Mycenae — crime, Poine’s ravages, Coroebus’s deed
Pytho — exile oracle; tripod given
Scironian Rocks — where the tripod falls; Coroebus settles

Themes

Narrative

Pausanias tells that Crotopus of Argos had a daughter Psamathe who bore Apollo a son, Linus. She exposed the child; dogs tore him apart. Apollo sent Poine (Punishment)—a female monster who snatched children from mothers—against Argos. Coroebus killed Poine to free the city. A plague followed; the Argives were told to appease Apollo by banishing Coroebus and having him take an image of Poine with him. He went to Delphi, and the god ordered him to take a tripod, walk until he dropped it, and found a shrine where it fell; there he settled (near Tripodiscus in the Megarid). Pausanias saw Coroebus’s tomb at Megara, claimed as the oldest in the land, and reliefs of Coroebus killing Poine; at Argos he notes related cult memory. The tale joins Apollo’s Linus-grief to an Argive child-snatching daimon and a founder-exile. Catalogue Coroebus and Poine apart from the broader Linus mourning-song aetiology (05/048): this is the monster-slaying and Megarian tomb charter.