King and eponym of Thespiae in Boeotia; son of Erechtheus in the Athenian tradition (Paus. 9.26.6; Diod. 4.29), or of Teuthras in a variant — Apollodorus gives no father. By Megamede, daughter of Arneus, he had fifty daughters (the Thespiades). Hosting Heracles for the fifty days of the hunt for the lion of Cithaeron, he sent his daughters one by one to the hero’s bed so that all might bear his children. The Thespiadae later colonized Sardinia under Iolaus — seven stayed at Thespiae, three (Apollod. 2.7.6) or two (Diod. 4.29) at Thebes, the remaining forty to Sardinia.