The autochthonous Cres is mentioned in other accounts as the native king of a whole earth-born nation, the
Eteocretans ("true Cretans"),[3] and the inventor of a number of items that were crucial for the development of the human civilization.[4] He was said to be one of the
Curetes.[5]
According to a tradition recorded by Stephanus, it was during Cres' reign that
Tectaphus, son of
Dorus, migrated to Crete from
Thessaly, followed by
Dorian and
Achaean tribes, as well as by those of the
Pelasgians that had not migrated to
Tyrrhenia.[6] A daughter of Cres (or
Cretheus) was married by the foreigner and bore him a son
Asterion who later became the husband of
Europa and adopted father of her sons by Zeus.[7]
Several authors identified Cres as one of the
Curetes, possibly their king,[8] and therefore a caretaker of the young Zeus who was hidden by him in a cave on Crete.[9]
Stephanus of Byzantium, Stephani Byzantii Ethnicorum quae supersunt, edited by August Meineike (1790-1870), published 1849. A few entries from this important ancient handbook of place names have been translated by Brady Kiesling.
Online version at the Topos Text Project.
This article includes a list of Greek mythological figures with the same or similar names. If an
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