Inachus: River-King of Argos
Catalogue ID: 05-local-and-lesser/128-inachus-argos-river-king-pausanias
Cycle: Local and lesser — Argive origins / river eponym
Version line: Pausanian / Apollodorean — Inachus as first king or river; father of Io
Sources: Pausanias 2.15.4–5, 2.16.1; Apollodorus, *Library* 2.1.1–3; cf. Aeschylus, *Prometheus Bound* (Inachus as Io’s father)
Source file: /workspace/greek-myth-catalogue/05-local-and-lesser/128-inachus-argos-river-king-pausanias.md
Characters
- Amphitrite — loser; dries the river
- Argives — river-god / first king of Argos; father of Io (and of Phoroneus in handbook stemmata)
- Io — daughter; Hera’s priestess; Zeus’s beloved (cross-ref)
- Oceanus and Tethys — parents of Inachus in Apollodorus
- Philotes — winner of the Argive contest
- Phoroneus — son or successor in Argive lists
Places
- Mycenae — kingdom and cult-land of Hera
- River Inachus — eponymous stream; summer-dry by Poseidon’s wrath
Themes
Narrative
Argive tradition places Inachus at the head of the land’s memory: either the river Inachus itself personified, or a mortal king who gave his name to the stream. Pausanias records disputes over whether Inachus, Phoroneus, or another was first to rule; Apollodorus makes Inachus a son of Oceanus and Tethys, father of Phoroneus and Aegialeus, and—crucially—father of Io, the priestess Zeus loved and Hera tormented. When Poseidon and Hera contested Argos, Inachus (or a tribunal of river-gods including him) judged for Hera; Poseidon dried the Inachus in anger, so that the river runs scant in summer—an aetiology Pausanias knows. Catalogue Inachus as the Argive origin-node linking river, kingship, Io’s line, and the Hera–Poseidon contest, apart from Io’s own wanderings and Phoroneus’s separate “first man” file.