And Theseus allied himself with
 Pirithous, This passage concerning the fight of Theseus with the centaurs
 at the marriage of Pirithous does not occur in our text of
 Apollodorus, but is conjecturally restored to it from
 Zenobius, Cent. v.33 , or rather from his
 interpolator, who frequently quotes passages of Apollodorus
 without acknowledgment. The restoration was first proposed by
 Professor C. Robert before the discovery of the Epitome; and it
 is adopted by R. Wagner in his edition of Apollodorus. See
 C. Robert, De Apollodori Bibliotheca ,
 pp. 49ff. ; R. Wagner, Epitoma Vaticana
 ex Apollodori Bibliotheca , p. 147 . As
 Pirithous was a son of Ixion (see above, Apollod. 1.8.2 ), the account of
 his marriage would follow naturally after the recital of his
 father's crime and punishment. As to the wedding of Pirithous,
 see further Diod. 4.70.3 ; Plut. Thes. 30 ; Paus.
 5.10.8 ; Scholiast on Hom. Od. xxi.295 ;
 Hyginus, Fab. 33 ; Ov.
 Met. 12.210-535 ; Serv. Verg.
 A. 7.304 ; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini,
 ed. Bode, i. pp. 51, 111 (First Vatican Mythographer 162;
 Second Vatican Mythographer 108) . The wife of
 Pirithous is called Deidamia by Plutarch, but Hippodamia by
 Diodorus Siculus, Hyginus, and the Second Vatican Mythographer,
 as well as by Hom. Il. 2.742 .
 Ovid calls her Hippodame. The scene of the battle of the Lapiths
 with the centaurs at the wedding of Pirithous was sculptured in
 the western gable of the temple of Zeus at Olympia ; all the sculptures
 were discovered, in a more or less fragmentary state, by the
 Germans in their excavations of the sanctuary, and they are now
 exhibited in the museum at Olympia . See Paus. 5.10.8 , with my commentary (
 Frazer, Paus. vol. iii. pp. 516ff. ). 
 when he engaged in war against the centaurs. For when Pirithous wooed Hippodamia, he feasted the centaurs because they
 were her kinsmen. But being unaccustomed to wine, they made
 themselves drunk by swilling it greedily, and when the bride was
 brought in, they attempted to violate her. But Pirithous, fully
 armed, with Theseus, joined battle with them, and Theseus killed
 many of them. Zenobius, Cent. v. 33. Caeneus was formerly a woman, but after that
 Poseidon had intercourse with her, she asked to become an invulnerable man;
 wherefore in the battle with the centaurs he thought scorn of wounds and
 killed many of the centaurs; but the rest of them surrounded him and by
 striking him with fir trees buried him in the earth. As to Caeneus, his change of sex and his
 invulnerability, see Ap. Rhod., Argon. i.57-64, with the Scholiast
 on v. 57 ; Scholiast on Hom. Il. i.264 ;
 Plut. Stoic. absurd. 1 ; Plut. De profectibus in
 virtute 1 ; Lucian, Gallus 19 ; Lucian, De
 saltatione 57 ; Apostolius, Cent. iv.19 ;
 Palaephatus, De incredib. 11 ; Ant. Lib.
 17 ; Verg. A. 6.448ff. ; Ov. Met. 12.459-532 ; Hyginus, Fab.
 14, pp. 39ff., ed. Bunte ; Serv.
 Verg. A. 6.448 ; Lactantius Placidus on Statius, Achill.
 264 ; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i.
 pp. 49, 111ff., 189 (First Vatican Mythographer 154; Second Vatican
 Mythographer 108; Third Vatican Mythographer 6.25) . According
 to Servius and the Vatican Mythographers, after his death Caeneus was
 changed back into a woman, thus conforming to an observation of Plato or
 Aristotle that the sex of a person generally changes at each
 transmigration of his soul into a new body. Curiously enough, the
 Urabunna and Waramunga tribes of Central Australia agree with Plato or Aristotle on this
 point. They believe that the souls of the dead transmigrate sooner or
 later into new bodies, and that at each successive transmigration they
 change their sex. See Sir. Baldwin Spencer and F. J. Gillen,
 The Northern Tribes of Central Australia (London,
 1904), p. 148 . According to Ov.
 Met. 12.524ff., a bird with yellow wings was seen to rise
 from the heap of logs under which Caeneus was overwhelmed; and the seer
 Mopsus explained the bird to be Caeneus transformed into that creature.
 Another tradition about Caeneus was that he set up his spear in the
 middle of the marketplace and ordered people to regard it as a god and
 to swear by it. He himself prayed and sacrificed to none of the gods,
 but only to his spear. It was this impiety that drew down on him the
 wrath of Zeus, who instigated the centaurs to overwhelm him. See the
 Scholiast on Hom. Il. i.264 ; Scholiast on Ap.
 Rhod., Argon. i.57 . The whole story of the parentage of
 Caeneus, his impiety, his invulnerability, and the manner of his death,
 is told by the old prose-writer Acusilaus in a passage quoted by a Greek
 grammarian, of whose work some fragments, written on papyrus, were
 discovered some years ago at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt . See The Oxyrhynchus Papyri , part xiii. (London, 1919),
 pp. 133ff. Apollodorus probably derived his account of
 Caeneus from Acusilaus, whom he often refers to (see Index). The
 fortunate discovery of this fragment of the ancient writer confirms our
 confidence in the excellence of the sources used by Apollodorus and in
 the fidelity with which he followed them. In his complete work he may
 have narrated the impiety of Caeneus in setting up his spear for
 worship, though the episode has been omitted in the Epitome. 
 
 Having made a compact with Pirithous that they would
 marry daughters of Zeus, Theseus, with the help of Pirithous, carried off
 Helen from Sparta for
 himself, when she was twelve years old, See above, Apollod.
 3.10.7 , with the note. Diod. 4.63.2 says that
 Helen was ten years old when she was carried off by Theseus and
 Pirithous. and in the endeavor to win Persephone as a bride for
 Pirithous he went down to Hades. And the Dioscuri, with the Lacedaemonians
 and Arcadians, captured Athens and carried away Helen, and with her Aethra, daughter of
 Pittheus, into captivity; Compare Diod. 4.63.3, 5 ; Plut.
 Thes. 32 and Plut. Thes. 34 ;
 Paus. 1.17.5 ; Paus. 2.22.6 . According to these writers, it was not Athens but Aphidna (Aphidnae) that
 was captured by the Dioscuri. but Demophon and Acamas fled. And
 the Dioscuri also brought back Menestheus from exile, and gave him the
 sovereignty of Athens . Menestheus was one of the
 royal family of Athens ,
 being a son of Peteos, who was a son of Orneus, who was a son of
 Erechtheus. See Plut. Thes. 32 ; Paus. 2.25.6 . That he was restored and
 placed on the throne by Castor and Pollux during the absence of Theseus
 is mentioned also by Paus. 1.17.6 and
 Ael., Var. Hist. iv.5 . Compare Plut. Thes. 32ff. 
 
 But when Theseus arrived with Pirithous in Hades, he was beguiled; for, on
 the pretence that they were about to partake of good cheer, Hades bade them
 first be seated on the Chair of Forgetfulness, to which they grew and were
 held fast by coils of serpents. Pirithous, therefore, remained bound for
 ever, but Hercules brought Theseus up and sent him to Athens . As to Theseus and Pirithous in hell, and the rescue
 of Theseus by Hercules, see above, Apollod.
 2.5.12 with the note. The great painter Polygnotus painted
 the two heroes seated in chairs, Theseus holding his friend's sword and
 his own, while Pirithous gazed wistfully at the now useless blades, that
 had done such good service in the world of light and life. See Paus. 10.29.9 . No ancient author, however,
 except Apollodorus in the present passage, expressly mentions the Chair
 of Forgetfulness, though Horace seems to allude to it ( Hor. Carm. 4.7.27ff. ), where he speaks
 of “the Lethaean bonds” which held fast Pirithous, and which his
 faithful friend was powerless to break. But when Apollodorus speaks of
 the heroes growing to their seats, he may be following the old poet
 Panyasis, who said that Theseus and Pirithous were not pinioned to their
 chairs, but that the rock growing to their flesh held them as in a vice
 ( Paus. 10.29.9 ). Indeed, Theseus
 stuck so fast that, on being wrenched away by Hercules, he left a piece
 of his person adhering to the rock, which, according to some people, was
 the reason why the Athenians ever afterwards were so remarkably spare in
 that part of their frame. See Suidas, s.v. Λίσποι 
 ; Scholiast on Aristoph. Kn. 1368 ; compare
 Aulus Gellius x.16.13 . Thence he was driven by
 Menestheus and went to Lycomedes, who threw him down an
 abyss and killed him. Compare Plut. Thes. 35 ; Paus. 1.17.6 ; Diod.
 4.62.4 . 
 Tantalus is punished in Hades by having a stone
 impending over him, by being perpetually in a lake and seeing at his
 shoulders on either side trees with fruit growing beside the lake. The water
 touches his jaws, but when he would take a draught of it, the water dries
 up; and when he would partake of the fruits, the trees with the fruits are
 lifted by winds as high as the clouds. Some say that he is thus punished
 because he blabbed to men the mysteries of the gods, and because he
 attempted to share ambrosia with his fellows. As to the punishment of Tantalus, see Hom. Od. 11.582-592 , who describes only
 the torments of hunger and thirst, but says nothing about the
 overhanging stone. But the stone is often mentioned by later writers.
 See Archilochus, quoted by Plutarch, Praecept. Ger. Reipub.
 6 , and by the Scholiast on Pind. O. 1.60(97) ;
 Pind. O. 1.55(87)ff. with the Scholia on
 60(97); Pind. I. 8.10(21) ; Eur. Or. 4-10 ; Plat. Crat. 395d-e ; Hyp. Fr. 176, ed.
 Blass ; Antipater, in Anth. Pal., Appendix Planudea,
 iv.131.9ff. ; Plut. De superstitione 11 ;
 Lucian, Dial. Mort. 17 ; Paus.
 10.31.10 ; Philostratus, Vit. Apollon. iii.25 ;
 Apostolius, Cent. vii.60, xvi.9 ; Nonnus, in
 Westermann's Mythographi Graeci, Appendix Narrationum 73, p.
 386 ; Athenaeus vii.14, p. 281 BC ;
 Lucretius iii.980ff. ; Cicero, De finibus
 i.18.60 ; Cicero, Tusc. Disp. iv.16.35 ;
 Hor. Epod. 17, 65ff.and Sat. i.1.68ff. ; Ov. Met. 4.458ff. ; Hyginus, Fab.
 82 . Ovid notices only the torments of hunger and thirst, and
 Lucian only the torment of thirst. According to another account,
 Tantalus lay buried under Mount Sipylus in Lydia , which had been his home in life, and
 on which his grave was shown down to late times ( Paus. 2.22.3 , 5.13.7 ). The
 story ran that Zeus owned a valuable watchdog, which guarded his
 sanctuary in Crete ; but
 Pandareus, the Milesian, stole the animal and entrusted it for
 safekeeping to Tantalus. So Zeus sent Hermes to the resetter to reclaim
 his property, but Tantalus impudently denied on oath that the creature
 was in his house or that he knew anything about it. Accordingly, to
 punish the perjured knave, the indignant Zeus piled Mount Sipylus on the
 top of him. See the Scholiast on Pind. O. 1.60(97) ;
 Scholiast on Hom. Od. xix.518, xx.66 . In his lost play
 Tantalus Sophocles seems to have introduced the theft
 of the dog, the errand of Hermes to recover the animal, and perhaps the
 burial of the thief under the mountain. See The Fragments of Sophocles , ed. A. C. Pearson, vol.
 ii. pp. 209ff.