Atramyttium, a town of Mysia.
Atrăpes, an officer of Alexander, who, at the general division of the provinces, received Media. Diodorus, bk. 18.
Atrax, son of Ætolus, or, according to others, of the river Peneus. He was king of Thessaly, and built a town which he called Atrax or Atracia. This town became so famous that the word Atracias has been applied to any inhabitant of Thessaly. He was father of Hippodamia, who married Pirithous, and whom we must not confound with the wife of Pelops, who bore the same name. Propertius, bk. 1, poem 8, li. 25.—Statius, bk. 1, Thebiad, li. 106.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 209.——A city of Thessaly, whence the epithet of Atracius.——A river of Ætolia, which falls into the Ionian sea.
Atrebātæ, a people of Britain, who were in possession of the modern counties of Berks, Oxford, &c.
Atrĕbātes, now Artois, a people of Gaul, who, together with the Nervii, opposed Julius Cæsar with 15,000 men. They were conquered, and Comius, a friend of the general, was set over them as king. They were reinstated in their former liberty and independence, on account of the services of Comius. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 2, &c.
Atrēni, a people of Armenia.
Atreus, a son of Pelops by Hippodamia, daughter of Œnomaus king of Pisa, was king of Mycenæ, and brother to Pittheus, Trœzon, Thyestes, and Chrysippus. As Chrysippus was an illegitimate son, and at the same time a favourite of his father, Hippodamia resolved to remove him. She persuaded her sons Thyestes and Atreus to murder him; but their refusal exasperated her more, and she executed it herself. This murder was grievous to Pelops: he suspected his two sons, who fled away from his presence. Atreus retired to the court of Eurystheus king of Argos, his nephew, and upon his death he succeeded him on the throne. He married, as some report, Ærope, his predecessor’s daughter, by whom he had Plisthenes, Menelaus, and Agamemnon. Others affirm that Ærope was the wife of Plisthenes, by whom he had Agamemnon and Menelaus, who are the reputed sons of Atreus, because that prince took care of their education, and brought them up as his own. See: [Plisthenes]. Thyestes had followed his brother to Argos, where he lived with him, and debauched his wife, by whom he had two, or, according to some, three children. This incestuous commerce offended Atreus, and Thyestes was banished from his court. He was, however, soon after recalled by his brother, who determined cruelly to revenge the violence offered to his bed. To effect this purpose, he invited his brother to a sumptuous feast, where Thyestes was served up with the flesh of the children he had had by his sister-in-law the queen. After the repast was finished, the arms and the heads of the murdered children were produced, to convince Thyestes of what he had feasted upon. This action appeared so cruel and impious, that the sun is said to have shrunk back in his course at the bloody sight. Thyestes immediately fled to the court of Thesprotus, and thence to Sicyon, where he ravished his own daughter Pelopea, in a grove sacred to Minerva, without knowing who she was. This incest he committed intentionally, as some report, to revenge himself on his brother Atreus, according to the words of the oracle, which promised him satisfaction for the cruelties he had suffered only from the hand of a son who should be born of himself and his own daughter. Pelopea brought forth a son whom she called Ægisthus, and soon after she married Atreus, who had lost his wife. Atreus adopted Ægisthus, and sent him to murder Thyestes, who had been seized at Delphi and imprisoned. Thyestes knew his son, and made himself known to him; he made him espouse his cause, and instead of becoming his father’s murderer, he rather avenged his wrongs, and returned to Atreus, whom he assassinated. See: [Thyestes], [Ægisthus], [Pelopea], [Agamemnon], and [Menelaus]. Hyginus, fables 83, 86, 87, 88, & 258.—Euripides, Orestes; Iphigeneia in Taurus.—Plutarch, Parallela minora.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 40.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 10.—Seneca on Atreus.
Atrīdæ, a patronymic given by Homer to Agamemnon and Menelaus, as being the sons of Atreus. This is false, upon the authority of Hesiod, Lactantius [Placidus], Dictys of Crete, &c., who maintain that these princes were not the sons of Atreus, but of Plisthenes, and that they were brought up in the house and under the eye of their grandfather. See: [Plisthenes].
Atronius, a friend of Turnus, killed by the Trojans. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10.
Atropatia, a part of Media. Strabo.