Bible Encyclopedias
Ixion

Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature

in Greek mythology, was the son of Antion and Perimela, king in Thessaly. He married Dia. the daughter of Deioneus, but refused to pay the promised wedding presents to her father, wherefore the latter took possession of a number of horses of Ixion as a substitute. Ixion promised to give Deioneus what he wanted, and caused him to fall into a cave of red-hot coals, under the pretence it was a cave of gold. It was so great a crime that no man would purify him. Jupiter did this himself, and was so pleased with Ixion that he fed him at the table of the gods. A new crime sprang up in the heart of the murderer. He longed for the love of Juno. Juno forgave him, and formed Nephele (a cloud), by whom Ixion became father of the Centaurs. Finally, Jupiter's patience becoming exhausted, he threw him into Tartarus, where he remains, tortured by the Furies, along with Sisyphus and Tantalus. His penalty is to turn a wheel which perpetually recoils.