Alcmæon

Alcmæon, a son of Amphiarus and Eriphyle, was one of the heroes who took part in the successful expedition of the Epigoni against Thebes. He was charged by his father to put his mother to death, in revenge for her having urged her husband to take part in an expedition in which his foresight showed him he should perish. She had been gained over to urge this fatal course by a gift from Polynices of the fatal necklace of Harmonia. The matricide brought upon Alcmæon madness and the horror of being haunted by the Furies, but at Psophis he was purified by Phegeus, whose daughter he married, giving her the fatal present. But the land became barren in consequence of his presence, and he fled to the mouth of the river Achelous, the god of which gave him his daughter Callirhoë in marriage. His new wife longed for the fatal necklace, and sent her husband to Psophis to procure it, under pretence of dedicating it at Delphi; but Phegeus, learning for whom it was really intended, caused his sons to murder the ill-fated Alcmæon.