The story of Perseus begins two generations earlier. His grandfather, Acrisius, has a twin brother, Proetus, and these two are enemies even before they were born. They quarrel in the womb. They are supossedly destined to grow up ruling Argos together, but that never happens. Sibling rivalry over the kingdom is at stake. Other examples: Oedipus' two sons Polyneices and Eteocles? They kill each other in a Civil War. Romulus kills Remus, Cain kills Abel, the Wright brothers are an exception.

Acrisius, more powerful, exiles his brother Proetus, who becomes the ruler of Tiryn, a neighboring city. The race of Cyclops--renowned stone masons--build an impervious wall around Tiryn using immense blocks of stone. Only giants could move such stones. The feat would have been too much for mere normal men to manage.

Acrisius has a daughter named Danae. And like Daphne's father Acrisius, he too, wants a grandson. But the king, after consulting with the oracle, learns that any male child, his daughter's son, would grow up to kill him. So Acrisius decides to keep a daughter a virgin, but fails. Danae conceives a child. Though some rumors held that the exiled Proetus had stolen into his niece's cell and impregnated her, Danae always insisted that Zeus had fathered the child. The god appeared before her in the form of a shower of gold, which poured through the roof of her chamber and fell into her lap. Thus, Danae, despite her imprisonment, gave birth to a child, whom she called Perseus. Some storytellers insist that Acrisius, alerted by a baby's cry, discovered his grandson almost immediately after his birth. Others maintain that the mother and child spent more than a year imprisoned together-until Acrisius heard the toddler playing in the underground chamber. In any case, Acrisius acted quickly upon the discovery. He placed both Danae and Perseus in a large wooden chest and set it adrift in the Aegean Sea, consigning his daughter and his grandson to death.

This is where the 1981 film The Clash of the Titans begins.

While mother and son were living in Seriphos, King Polydectes falls in love with Danae. He askes her to marry him, but Danae rejects his offer. Polydectes might have taken her by force, but by this time, Perseus had become a formidable young man. Perhaps afraid of opposing Perseus, Polydectes pretends to accept Danae's rejection with good grace. Yet he never stopped scheming to have her.

Soon after Danae's rejection, Polydectes announced his intention to ask for the hand of Hippodameia, a daughter of King Oenomaus of Pisa, a city in southwestern Greece. Polydectes arranged for a banquet in which each invited guest must traditionally bring a present for the intended bride. Polydectes demanded that each of his subjects bring a horse as a contribution.

This demand left Perseus in quite a bind. Whether the ward of a poor fisher or the son of a slave, Perseus had no horses. In all likelihood, Polydectes hoped that Perseus would be shamed into fleeing the kingdom. Instead, Perseus offered what must have seemed to Polydectes an even better solution. The young man acknowledged that he had no horses, but rashly promised to bring to the king anything else he desired--even the head of Medusa!

Considering Medusa's frightening features, Perseus must have begun having second thoughts about his foolhardy promise almost immediately. Defeating the mighty Medusa seemed an impossible quest. To avoid the vigilant eyes of Medusa and her sisters, her slayer must approach their lair without being seen. To escape being turned to stone, the killer would have to slay her without looking at her face. Even if Perseus succeeded in killing Medusa, he would then need to flee with incredible speed to avoid the swift pursuit of her golden-winged sisters.

Perseus soon discovered, however, that he would have help in completing his quest. Athena, who hated Medusa , appeared before him and told him exactly what to do.
Athena first brought Perseus to a cave on Seriphus where some of the naiads (the nymphs of springs, brooks, and lakes) lived. These nymphs lent to Perseus virtually everything he would need to overcome the Gorgons:

1. Winged sandals, which would allow him to approach-and later escape-the lair of the Gorgons with great speed
2. The cap of darkness (or cap of Hades), which makes its wearer invisible
3. A purse or pouch in which to carry his trophy, Medusa's head.

Hermes then appeared and presented Perseus with the final tool he would need: a sword (or sickle) of adamant--a metallic stone so hard it was almost unbreakable.

With his weapons assembled, Perseus traveled to a cave on the mountain where Atlas stood. In this cave lived the Graeae ("gray women"), sisters of the Gorgons. The hair of the Graeae, three ancient witches who had just one eye and one tooth among them, had been gray from birth.

Perseus hid himself and waited until one of the sisters took out her eye and started to hand it to another. Since this was the only time when all of the Graeae were blind, Perseus surprised them and intercepted the eye. Holding the eye hostage, Perseus forced the crones to reveal the location of the Gorgons' lair. After getting the information he needed, Perseus tossed the eye into Lake Tritonis and hurried toward the Gorgons.

Swiftly, invisibly, his sword in his belt and his bag slung over his shoulder, Perseus approached the lair of the Gorgons. He found the lair at the end of the earth, in a land where neither the sun nor the moon ever shone. As he approached and entered the Gorgons' lair, he passed dozens of stone figures: the petrified bodies of both beasts and humans who had foolishly wandered into that dark and desolate land and glimpsed one of the Gorgons.

Perseus had painstakingly polished his bronze shield before approaching the Gorgons' lair. He now used this shield as a mirror to spy on the Gorgons without looking directly at them. He waited near the entrance of their lair until he could see that the Gorgons had fallen asleep.

Using his mirrored shield to reflect Medusa's image and direct his attack, Perseus cut off her head with a single blow from his mighty sword, stuffed the head into his pouch, and flew away on his winged feet. The other Gorgons awoke and flew into the air shrieking for vengeance. Medusa's in nstrous sisters could not see Perseus, though, cloaked as he was by the cap of darkness, and soon gave up their attack.

With his trophy securely in hand, Perseus flew back toward Seriphus on his winged sandals. Yet the journey back from the lair of the Gorgons was a long one. He would need to make several stops before he returned home. These layovers were by no means uneventful. As Perseus soon discovered, he had several more adventures in store for him before he reached Seriphus.

According to Ovid alone, Perseus first stopped in the land of the Hesperides. He announced himself as a son of Zeus and asked the Titan Atlas, who ruled the Hesperides, if he could rest there for a while.

Yet Atlas recalled the prophecy of the Titaness Themis, who had warned him that a son of Zeus would one day steal the Golden Apples of the Hesperides. So the Titan, who fiercely guarded these apples, insulted Perseus, denied his parentage, and rudely attempted to expel him from the land.
Perseus could not hope to match the strength of Atlas. Yet his cleverness far outshone that of the dim-witted Titan. Perseus knew that the head of Medusa, even after her death, had not lost its power to turn anyone who looked upon it to stone. So before he left, Perseus offered to show Atlas what he had in his bag. Turning his own head away, Perseus lifted the head out of the bag and turned the Titan into a mountain, known afterward as Mount Atlas.

The Rescue of Andromeda:

As Perseus flew on winged sandals over the coast of Ethiopia on his way home, he saw the figure of a beautiful woman chained to a rock below. The radiance of this figure stunned him so that at first Perseus thought her carved of marble. But when he descended for a better look, he saw that this maiden was crying. At first the girl seemed frightened of Perseus and reluctant to speak about her predicament. But using gentle persuasion, Perseus overcame this virginal beauty's shyness, and she shared with him her tragic tale. Her name was Andromeda, the daughter of Cepheus (depending on the source, the king of either Ethiopia or Joppa, a city on the Levantine seacoast), and Cassiopeia. Her mother had angered Poseidon by boasting that she was more beautiful than the Nereids, the sea nymphs who served as the sea god's attendants. To punish Cassiopeia's vanity, Poseidon had flooded the kingdom and sent a sea monster to ravage Ethiopia. Following the advice of an oracle, King Cepheus had chained the naked Andromeda to a rocky cliff as a sacrificial offering to appease Poseidon and save his kingdom.

As he listened to her tale, Perseus fell in love with Andromeda. She begged him to save her from being devoured by the sea monster and take her away from that spot as a wife or a slave. Perseus promised he would, but first convinced Cepheus to promise to reward him with Andromeda's hand in marriage and a kingdom if he rescued her. Welcoming the opportunity to save both his kingdom and his daughter, the king eagerly accepted Perseus's demands. When the sea monster surfaced, Perseus dove on top of the beast and-following a raging battle that stained the sea red with blood-killed it. (According to the people of Joppa, the spring where Perseus washed his hands after this battle ran red from that moment onward.)

Perseus then freed Andromeda from her chains and brought the girl to her parents. Having saved their daughter, Perseus now demanded that Cepheus honor his promises.

Unfortunately, Andromeda, had already been promised to Cepheus's brother Phineus--(called Agenor by some)--a detail that Cepheus had neglected to mention in his eagerness to see his daughter rescued.

Though Phineus had not lifted a hand to save his bride, he still refused to step aside for her savior. Cepheus, however, kept his promise to Perseus. With an army behind him, Phineus interrupted the wedding of Perseus and Andromeda to assert his prior claim on her. Though greatly outnumbered, Perseus emerged victorious from the battle for Andromeda's hand by using Medusa's head to turn his rival and all of Phineus 's allies to stone.

With Phineus out of the way, Perseus married Andromeda and--unlike most of the gods and heroes of classical mythology--remained faithful to her throughout his life. The couple remained with her parents for almost a year after their marriage, Andromeda giving birth to their first son, Perses.

When Perseus finally resumed his journey back to Seriphus, he and Andromeda left the infant Perses with his grandparents. Since his grandfather Cepheus had no other heirs, Perses would inherit his kingdom. (The boy's descendants would travel east and rule Persia, the land that was named after Perses.)

When Perseus returned to the island of Seriphu, he found him other taking refuge at the altar of the gods. As soon as Perseus had set out on his quest, the lustful King Polydectes had attempted to ravish Danae. The king's brother Dictys had thwarted Polydectes and led Danae to the altar, sacred ground where the king dared not violate her.

Upon hearing of Polydectes's treachery, Perseus headed straight for the palace. Bursting in upon a banquet, he surprised the king, who had no doubt presumed that Perseus was dead. Perseus announced that he had brought the promised gift for the intended bride of Polydectes. The king scoffed at this claim, challenging Perseus's word and his honor. The young hero needed no further provocation. Averting his own eyes, he held up the severed head of Medusa, which instantly turned Polydectes and his guests into stone.

Having rescued his mother, Perseus rewarded Dictys for his loyalty and protection by giving him the throne vacated by Polydectes. He then returned his borrowed Weapons to Hermes, who carried them back to the naiads. To show his gratitude to Athena, Perseus mounted his trophy, the head of Medusa, on the shield of the goddess. The head, surrounded by snakes' heads on the center of her aegis, became Athena's most distinctive emblem. His heroic quest completed, Perseus set out for Argos with Andromeda and Danae. There, in the kingdom of his birth, he hoped to make peace with his grandfather, Acrisius.

The exploits of his grandson, Perseus, had not gone unnoticed by Acrisius. Fearing that his daughter and her famed son would soon return to Argos and fulfill the prophecy he had desperately tried to avoid, Acrisius fled to Larissa, a kingdom in Thessaly. But Perseus, who apparently harbored no vengeance for his grandfather despite Acrisius's cruelty so many years before, followed the old man to Larissa. Perseus had not yet found his grandfather when he learned that the father of the king of Larissa had died.

While attending funereal games held in honor of the king's father, Perseus impulsively decided to join the discus-throw competition. Unfortunately, a discus thrown by Perseus got away from him. It accidentally struck and killed one of the spectators: his grandfather Acrisius. The prophecy had come true: Perseus had indeed caused his grandfather's death.

With the death of Acrisius, Perseus inherited the throne of Argos. Yet he felt so ashamed to have won the throne by accidentally killing his own grandfather that Perseus vowed never to return to Argos. Instead, he traded kingdoms (Argos for Tiryns) with Megapenthes, the only son of Acrisius's twin brother Proetus.

Perseus served as king of Tiryns for many years thereafter. While ruling Tiryns, he established the city of Mycenae (though some say he merely fortified it) and fortified Midea. He remained faithful to Andromeda, who bore him six more children.

One of the greatest heroes of Argos, Perseus was worshipped after his death in both Athens and Seriphus. Athena herself honored Perseus and Andromeda by making constellations in both their names after they died.

Work Cited: The Complete Idiot's Guide to Classical Mythology, Kevin Osborn and Dana L. Burgess, New York; Alpha Books, Chapter 10, 117-124.