Part Two, Chapters III–IV

Summary: Chapter III — The Quest of the Golden Fleece

Hamilton’s account of the Golden Fleece comes from Apollonius of Rhodes, a Greek poet
from about 300 b.c. Athamas, a king, gets tired of his first wife, Nephele, and marries a
second, Ino. Ino wants Nephele’s son, Phrixus, out of the way so her own son can inherit the
throne. Hermes sends a flying golden ram to rescue Phrixus and his sister, Helle, who falls
off the ram and dies. Phrixus safely reaches the land of Colchis, where he sacrifices the ram
to Zeus and gives its skin—the Golden Fleece—to Colchis’s king, Aetes.
Meanwhile, a man named Pelias has usurped the throne of Phrixus’s uncle, a Greek king.
Jason, the deposed king’s son, grows up and returns to reclaim the throne. En route to
Pelias’s kingdom, Jason loses a sandal. Pelias is afraid when he sees Jason approach, as an
oracle has told him that he will be overthrown by a stranger wearing only one sandal. The
wicked Pelias pretends to acquiesce but says that the gods have told him that the Golden
Fleece must be retrieved for the kingdom first. This is a lie—Pelias assumes that anyone
sent on that dangerous journey will never come back. Jason, intrigued by the challenge,
assembles a remarkable group of heroes to help him, including Hercules, Theseus, Peleus,
and Orpheus. Their ship is named the Argo, so the group is called the Argonauts.
The Argonauts face many challenges on the way to Colchis. They first meet the fierce
women of Lemnos, who have killed their men, but find them atypically kind. Hercules
leaves the crew, and the Argonauts meet an oracle, Phineus. The sons of Boreas, the North
Wind, help Phineus by driving off some terrible Harpies who foul his food whenever he
tries to eat. Phineus gives the Argonauts information that helps them pass safely through
their next challenge—the Symplegades, gigantic rocks that smash together when a ship sail
through them. After narrowly avoiding conflict with the Amazons, bloody women warriors,
and passing by the chained Prometheus, the Argonauts finally arrive at Colchis.
Though more trials await here, Hera and Aphrodite help Jason. Like Pelias, Aetes pretends
to want to give Jason the Fleece but first demands that he complete two tasks that are
designed to kill him. Aphrodite sends Cupid to make Aetes’s daughter, a witch named
Medea, fall in love with Jason and help him through the tasks. The first challenge is to yoke
two fierce magical bulls with hooves of bronze and breath of fire, and Medea gives Jason an
ointment that makes him invincible. The second task is to use the bulls to plow a field and
sow it with dragon’s teeth, which causes armed men to spring up from the earth and attack
Jason. Medea tells him that if he throws a rock in the middle of the armed men, they will
attack each other, not him. After Jason’s success, Aetes plots to kill the Argonauts at night,
but Medea again intercedes, warning Jason and enabling him to steal the Fleece by putting
its guardian serpent to sleep. Medea joins the Argonauts and flees back to Greece. On the
way home, she commits the ultimate act of love for Jason: to help evade the ship’s pursuers,
she kills her own brother, Apsyrtus.
On the way home, the Argonauts pass more challenges, including safely navigating Scylla,
the dreaded rock; Charybdis, the whirlpool; and Talus, the giant bronze man. Upon
returning, Jason finds that Pelias has killed his father and that his mother has died of
sadness. Jason and Medea plot revenge—Medea convinces Pelias’s daughters that they will
restore Pelias to youth if they kill him, chop him up, and put the pieces into her magic pot.
Out of love for their father, they slice him to bits, but Medea leaves the city, taking her
magic pot with her after first restoring Jason’s father to life.
Medea and Jason have two children, but Jason leaves out of personal ambition to marry the
daughter of the king of Corinth, who banishes Medea and her children. Infuriated by the
unsympathetic Jason, Medea enacts a terrible revenge, sending her two sons with a
beautiful magic robe as a gift for Jason’s new bride. When the girl dons the robe, it bursts
into flame, consuming her and the king as he rushes to her. Medea then kills the two sons
she had with Jason and flies away on a magic chariot. This tragic final chapter in the story
of Jason and Medea is the subject of Euripides’ play, Medea.