With this is evidently connected the story of the robbery of the Delphian tripod, of which the common version is as follows: Hercules was visited with a severe illness, as a punishment for the murder of Iphitus; and, in consequence, he had recourse for relief to Delphi; but as the Pythian priestess refused to answer the questions of one guilty of homicide, he threatened to plunder the temple, and carry off the tripod. Apollo accordingly pursued him, till Zeus separated the combat of his two sons by lightning.(1781) The fable went on to say that a new consecration of the Delphian tripod took place, and a reconciliation of the god and hero: of this part we are only informed by works of art, these being indeed of tolerable antiquity.(1782) But it is manifest that this is not the genuine, ancient, and sacred tradition. How could this hero, who in other respects was entirely dependent on the mandates of the oracle, and who in so many ways protected and promoted the worship of Apollo,(1783) suddenly become a sacrilegious violator of his most holy and ancient temple? This carrying away of the tripod appears from other traditions to signify nothing else than a propagation of the worship of Apollo.(1784) Whither, then, is this tripod stated to have been first moved? By the Arcadians Hercules was said to have brought it to Pheneus, but was compelled again to restore it to Apollo.(1785) The hero, on his journey to Elis, is said to have built a temple to the Pythian Apollo;(1786) which, however, can scarcely be more ancient than the Doric migration. The foundation of this temple, as dependent on the Delphic oracle, was therefore by the tradition expressed under this image of the transportation of the tripod, the bearer of it being Hercules. But it is more important to our present purpose that, according to the Bœotian account,(1787) Hercules was supposed to have brought the tripod to Thebes, that is probably to the Ismenium. This fable therefore shows the connexion between the Ismenium and the great sanctuary of Apollo; and represents Hercules as the intermediate link between these two temples.
8. Several other traditions current in Bœotia are connected with the above explanation of this tradition. The Cretan colony, which, setting out from Cirrha, established the Tilphosian temple at Ocalea in Bœotia, was represented under the person of Rhadamanthus.(1788) Rhadamanthus is said to have there dwelt with Alcmene, and to have instructed the youthful hero in the Cretan art of archery.(1789) For this reason also Zeus raised Alcmene from the dead, and conducted her to the islands of the blest as the wife of Rhadamanthus. A stone remained in her tomb, which was set up in her sacred grove at Thebes.(1790)