Objects & creatures
The Golden Fleece
GOHL-den FLEES
The hide of a flying ram, guarded by a dragon that never sleeps — and the object an entire crew was assembled to steal.
The fleece comes from a golden, flying ram sent by a god to rescue two children from being sacrificed. It carried them east; the girl, Helle, fell off into the strait now called the Hellespont after her. Her brother Phrixus reached Colchis, sacrificed the ram, and hung its fleece in a sacred grove where a dragon that never slept was set to guard it.
Jason was sent for it by his uncle Pelias, who had taken the throne that should have been Jason's and expected the quest to solve the problem permanently. Instead Jason assembled the Argonauts — Heracles, Orpheus, the sons of the north wind, and Atalanta in some versions — and sailed the Argo, the first great ship.
He did not win it by strength. The king of Colchis set tasks designed to be fatal: yoke fire-breathing bronze-hoofed bulls, plough a field, sow dragon's teeth, and defeat the armed men who spring up from them. Jason survived because the king's daughter Medea, a sorceress, fell in love with him and told him how — including the trick of throwing a stone among the sown warriors so they killed each other.
The aftermath is the ugly part. Medea betrayed her family to help him escape, and years later Jason left her to marry a princess. What she did in response is the subject of the most disturbing surviving Greek tragedy. Jason died alone, killed by a beam falling from the rotting hull of the Argo.
Gods involved
The Golden Fleece: common questions
Who really won the Golden Fleece?
Jason takes the credit, but Medea supplies every solution — the ointment against the bulls' fire, the trick with the sown warriors, and the means of getting past the sleepless dragon.
Which god is your parent?
Twelve questions and the campfire decides.