Calydonian Boar

The Calydonian Boar is one of the many monsters in Greek mythology. Every year, the king of Calydon held sacrifices to the gods. One year, King Oeneus forgot to include Artemis in his offerings. Insulted, Artemis created the biggest, most ferocious boar imaginable, and unloosed it on Calydon. It rampaged throughout the countryside, forcing people to take refuge inside the city walls, where they began to starve.

Oeneus sent messengers out to look for the best hunters in Greece, offering them the boar's pelt and tusks as a prize. Among those who responded were some of the Argonauts, Oeneus' own son Meleager, and the huntress Atalanta. Artemis had sent the young huntress because she knew her presence would be a source of division, and so it was: many of the men refused to hunt alongside a woman. Nonetheless it was Atalanta who first succeeded in wounding the boar, although Meleager finished it off, and offered the prize to Atalanta. This outraged the massed heroes, who proceeded to attack Atalanta and Meleager, and in the ensuing scrum Meleager died. (See Meleager for more details.) Thus Artemis managed her revenge against King Oeneus.

During the hunt, Peleus accidentally killed Eurytion.

Hunters:

1. Atalanta
2. Caeneus
3. Eurypylus
4. Eurytion
5. Idas
6. Iphicles
7. Laertes
8. Lynceus
9. Meleager
10. Mopsus
11. Nestor
12. Peleus
13. Pirithous
14. Plexippus
15. Telamon
16. Theseus
17. Toxeus

Apollodorus. Bibliotheke I, viii, 2-3; Ovid. Metamorphoses VIII,267-525.