Arethusa (Boeotia)

The fragmentary Hellenistic text attributes the story to Hesiod, though it has been identified as part of the pseudo-Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, an epic poem written around the seventh or sixth century BC.

The fragment, as restored by Reinhold Merkelbach and Martin Litchfield West, reads:[1] Ἀρέθουσα θυγάτηρ μὲν Ὑπέρ[ο]υ, Π[οσ]ει[δῶνι δὲ συν]ελθοῦσα κατὰ τὸν Βοϊκὸν Εὔρειπον [εἰς κρήνην] ἠλλάγη ἐν Χ[αλκίδι] ὑπὸ [τῆς] Ἥρας, ὡς Ἡσίοδος ἱστορε[ῖ[2]According to the damaged text, Arethusa was the daughter of Hyperes, though it does not clarify whether this is Hyperes of Troezen or Hyperes of Boeotia.

It further says that this Arethusa slept by the shore of the Euripus Strait (which separates the island of Euboea from mainland Greece) with a man whose name is not preserved, but which starts with 'P' and contains the diphthong 'ei'; it is generally accepted that this is meant to read 'Poseidon' (as Merkelbach and West restored).

[7] Following her tryst with Poseidon, Arethusa was then transformed by the goddess Hera at a place starting with chi (Chalcis, the principal city of Euboea).

Alternatively, if Hera's motivation was sympathy and mercy, perhaps she did so to save Arethusa from some hardship or threat she was facing,[10] like Athena did with Corone.