Sisyphus

Sisyphus, in Grecian mythology, was a son of Aeolus and Enarete, though authorities differ, who married Merope, the daughter of Atlas and a Pleiad, and became the father of Glaucus. He is said to have built the town of Ephyra, or Corinth. He was noted for craftiness, and numerous instances of this quality are preserved respecting him. Autolycus, the son of Mercury, the celebrated cattle stealer of Parnassus, had robbed the herds of Sisyphus among others, and defaced the marks by which they might be distinguished; but Sisyphus was able to select his own from the herds on Parnassus, because the initial of his name had been stamped under the hoof. In revenge, Sisyphus violated Anticlea, according to a later tradition, and thus became the real father of Ulysses. When Jupiter carried off Aegina, the daughter of Asopus the river god, Sisyphus informed the father who the ravisher was, and the king of gods punished him in Tartarus by compelling him to roll a stone up a hill, from which it incessantly rolls back as soon as it reaches the summit. Innumerable reasons are, however, given for the infliction of this punishment. See Vollmer, Worterb. d. Mythol. s.v.; Anthon, Class. Dict. s.v.; Smith, Dict. of Mythol. s.v.