Augeias of Elis

In Greek mythology, Augeas (or Augeias, , ), whose name means "bright", was king of Elis and father of Epicaste. Some ancient authors say that Augeas was one of the Argonauts. He is known for his stables, which housed the single greatest number of cattle in the country and had never been cleaned, until the time of the great hero Heracles. The derivative adjective augean came to signify a challenging task, typically improving or fixing something that is currently in a bad condition.

== Family == Augeas's lineage varies in the sources: he was said to be either the son of Helios either by Nausidame or Iphiboe, or of Eleios, or of Poseidon, or of Phorbas and Hyrmine. In the latter account, Augeas was probably the brother of Actor, Tiphys and Diogeneia. His children were Epicaste, Phyleus, Agamede, Agasthenes, and Eurytus. {| class="wikitable" |+Comparative table of Augeas' family ! rowspan="2" |Relation ! rowspan="2" |Names ! colspan="10" |Sources |- |Homer |Theocritus |Apollonius |Diodorus |Strabo |Apollodorus |Orphic Argo |Pausanias |Hyginus |Tzetzes |- | rowspan="7" |Parents |Helios | | | | | | | | | | |- |Phorbas and Hyrmine | | | | | | | | | | |- |Poseidon | | | | | | | | | | |- |Eleios | | | | | | | | | | |- |Helios and Nausidame | | | | | | | | | | |- |Phorbas | | | | | | | | | | |- |Helios and Iphiboe | | | | | | | | | | |- |Sibling |Actor | | | | | | | | | | |- | rowspan="5" |Children |Agasthenes | | | | | | | | | | |- |Agamede | | | | | | | | | | |- |Phyleus | | | | | | | | | | |- |Eurytus | | | | | | | | | | |- |Epicaste | | | | | | | | | | |}