Theseus

At the first site, which was , sacred to Apollo and the healer Asclepius, Theseus turned the tables on the chthonic bandit, Periphetes, the Club Bearer, who beat his opponents into the Earth, taking from him the stout staff that often identifies Theseus in vase-paintings.

Epidaurus

At the entrance to the Underworld was a robber named Sinis, often called "Pityokamptes" (Greek: Πιτυοκάμπτης, lit. "he who bends Pinetrees"). He would capture travelers, tie them between two pine trees that were bent down to the ground, and then let the trees go, tearing his victims apart. Theseus slew him by his own method. He then seduced Sinis's daughter, Perigune, fathering the child Melanippus.

Isthmian

In another deed north of the , at a place called Crommyon, he killed an enormous pig, the Crommyonian Sow, bred by an old crone named Phaea. Some versions name the sow herself as Phaea. The Bibliotheca by Pseudo-Apollodorus described the Crommyonian Sow as an offspring of Typhon and Echidna.

Isthmus

Near , a robber named Sciron forced travelers along the narrow cliff-face pathway to wash his feet. While they knelt, he kicked them off the cliff behind them, where they were eaten by a giant turtle (or, in some versions, a sea monster). Theseus pushed him off the cliff where he was eaten as well.

Megara

Another of these enemies was , king at the holy site of Eleusis, who challenged passers-by to a wrestling match and, when he had beaten them, killed them. Theseus beat Cercyon at wrestling and then killed him instead.

Cercyon

The last bandit was the Stretcher, who had two beds, one of which he offered to passers-by in the plain of Eleusis. He then made them fit into it, either by stretching them or by cutting off their feet. Since he had two beds of different lengths, no one would fit. Theseus once again employed Procrustes' own method on him, cutting off his legs and decapitating him with his axe.

Procrustes

' tragedy Oedipus at Colonus features Theseus as a major character.

Sophocles

' tragedy Hippolytus and Seneca's Phaedra revolve around the death of Theseus' son.

Euripides

In 's epic chivalric romance "The Knight's Tale", one of the Canterbury Tales, Theseus is the duke of Athens, husband of Ypolita, and protector of Emelye, Ypolita's sister, for whom the two knights of Thebes, Arcite and Palamon, do battle.

Geoffrey Chaucer

wrote the play Theseus (1618).

Jakob Ayrer

's Phèdre (1677) features Theseus as well as Hippolytus and the title character Phaedra.

Racine

Theseus is a prominent character as the Duke of Athens in 's plays, A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Two Noble Kinsmen. Hippolyta also appears in both plays.

William Shakespeare

In the 1898 short novel the mythical story of Theseus is described.

The Story of Perseus and the Gorgon's Head

's epic poem Ariadne (1932) is an epic reworking of the Labyrinth myth: Aegle, one of the sacrificial maidens who accompany Theseus to Crete, is Theseus's sweetheart, the Minotaur is Minos himself in a bull-mask, and Ariadne, learning on Naxos of Theseus's earlier love for Aegle, decides to leave him for the Ideal [Dionysus].^[21]

F. L. Lucas

's Thésée (1946) is a fictional autobiography where the mythical hero of Athens, now elderly, narrates his life story from his carefree youth to his killing of the Minotaur.

André Gide

's The King Must Die (1958) is a dramatic retelling of the Theseus legend from his childhood in Troizen until the return from Crete to Athens. While fictional, it is generally faithful to the spirit and flavor of the best-known variations of the original story. The sequel is The Bull from the Sea (1962), about the hero's later career.

Mary Renault

's historical fiction novel The Sword Is Forged (1983) chronicles the story of Theseus and Antiope.^[22]

Evangeline Walton

' 1974 novel Oreo draws heavily from the Theseus myth.^[23]

Fran Ross

wrote the poem Theseus within the Labyrinth (1986) which provides a retelling of the myth of Ariadne, Theseus and the Minotaur, in particular the feelings of Ariadne.

Stephen Dobyns

In issue No. 12 of the , entitled Bull-Whipped, Theseus and the Minotaur are resurrected by the comic's Aunt Claudia Hinault, who is the reincarnation of Ariadne.

Fright Night comic series

's 1993 book An Attempt on Theseus' Life (Russian: Покушение на Тезея) is about a plot to assassinate a man during a virtual reality tour in which he lives through Theseus' life.

Kir Bulychov

's book Theseus: The story of ancient gods, goddesses, kings, and warriors (2018) provides a retelling of the myths of Theseus, Aegeus, Minotaur, Ariadne, Pirithous and other personages of Greek mythology.^[24][25]

Aleksey Ryabinin

's 1996 novel Pages of Pain features an amnesic Theseus fighting to recover his past while interacting with some of the more colorful beings of the Planescape universe.

Troy Denning

's novel Last of the Amazons (2002) attempts to situate Theseus's meeting and subsequent marriage to Antiope, as well as the ensuing war, in a historically plausible setting.

Steven Pressfield

presents a variation of the myth in a short story, "The House of Asterion" (Spanish: "La Casa de Asterión").

Jorge Luis Borges

British comedian wrote a version of the Theseus story entitled Theseus: Super Hero.

Tony Robinson

In 's Book of the New Sun, set in a very distant future, the protagonist reads a story which appears to blend the myth of Theseus with the story of Battle of Hampton Roads – presumably because of a confusion between the Minotaur and the USS Monitor. (In this version, the Theseus character is now a student's son.)

Gene Wolfe

Pseudo-Apollodorus,

Bibliotheca

Metamorphoses

Ovid

Theseus

Plutarch

(Theoi Project) Plutarch: Life of Theseus

Pt. 2 Pt. 3 The story of Theseus in comic-strip format, by Greek Myth Comix

Greek Myth Comix: The Story of Theseus, Pt. 1

The Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (images of Theseus)