Greek river god
Asopus
Asopus is the god of the rivers that bear his name in Greece, especially the Boeotian and the Phliasian, whose myths were often confused with one another. He is best known for the story of his daughter Aegina, abducted by Zeus.
The myth
According to tradition, Asopus was a son of Oceanus and Tethys, though other accounts make him a son of Poseidon by Pero, according to Acusilaus, or of Zeus by Eurynome. Hesiod speaks of three thousand river gods who sprang from Oceanus. Asopus married Metope, daughter of the river Ladon, and they had many daughters, the Asopides, whom the gods carried off: Zeus took Aegina, Thebe and Plataea; Poseidon took Corcyra, Salamis and Euboea; Apollo took Sinope and Thespia; Hermes took Tanagra.
The seer Acraephen told him where his daughters were and advised him to accept their fate, since he was now father-in-law to gods. The most famous episode is that of Aegina. Zeus seized her in the form of an eagle, and Asopus set out to find her. Sisyphus, king of Corinth, promised to reveal the abductor if Asopus gave his city a permanent spring, and Asopus created the spring of Peirene. When he found Zeus with his daughter in a wood, he pursued him; the unarmed god escaped by turning into stone, then struck the river with a thunderbolt that forced it back. Ever since, the Asopus flows slowly and lamely, and bits of burnt coal are said to lie in its bed.
Legacy
The name survives in the landscape: the Boeotian river still bears it, and the plain of Plataea, where the famous battle was fought, lies along its banks.
Ancient sources: Hesiod, Apollodorus, Pausanias, Diodorus Siculus, Pindar and Ovid mention Asopus or his daughters.