Ino

, a daughter of Cadmus and Harm on i a, who nursed Bacchus. She married Athamas king of Thebes, after he had divorced Nephele, by whom he had two children, Phryxus and Helle. Ino became mother of Melicerta and Learchus, and soon conceived an implacable hatred against the children of Nephele, because they were to ascend the throne in preference to her own. Phryxus and Helle were informed of Ino’s machinations, and they escaped to Colchis on a golden ram. See: Phryxus . Juno, jealous of Ino’s prosperity, resolved to disturb her peace; and more particularly because she was of the descendants of her greatest enemy, Venus. Tis i phone was sent, by order of the godde , to the house of Athamas; and she filled the whole palace with such fury, that Athamas, taking Ino to be a lione , and her children whelps, pursued her, and dashed her son Learchus against a wall. Ino escaped from the fury of her husband, and from a high rock she threw herself into the sea, with Melicerta in her arms. The gods pitied her fate, and Neptune made her a sea deity, which was afterwards called Leucothoe. Melicerta became also a sea god, known by the name of Palæmon. Homer , Ody ey , bk. 5 .— Cicero , Tusculanæ Dis put at i ones ; de Natura Deorum , bk. 3 , ch. 48 .— Plutarch , Convivium Septem Sapientium , ch. 5 .— Ovid , Metamorphoses , bk. 4 , fable 13, . — Pausanias , bks. 1, 2, . — Apollo dor us , bk. 2 , ch. 4 .— Hyginus , fables 12, 14, & 15.