Alipherus

Alipherus is presented in classical sources as one of the (often-cited) fifty sons of King Lycaon of Arcadia. In the common telling of the Lycaon episode, Zeus visits Lycaon's household in disguise; Lycaon's sons, described as nefarious, commit sacrilege by mixing the entrails of a child into the god's meal. In retribution Zeus overturns the table and strikes Lycaon, his sons (including Alipherus), and in some variants the house with a thunderbolt, killing them. Separately, Alipherus is named as the eponymous founder of the Arcadian town Aliphera (Alipheira), which classical geographers locate in Parrhasia on a steep hill south of the Alpheius river. Ancient authors and later reference works (e.g., Pausanias, Apollodorus, Stephanus of Byzantium; summarized in modern compilations) record these elements; maternal attributions for Lycaon's sons vary in sources (e.g., Cyllene, Nonacris, or unspecified), and Alipherus appears within that variable genealogical framework.

Ancient literary sources do not provide a physical description or iconographic attributes for Alipherus. He is treated as a mortal Arcadian prince and eponymous founder, but no details of dress, stature, or distinct visual markers survive in the cited material. Consequently there is no attested traditional portrayal or consistent depiction of his appearance in the surviving sources.

No supernatural powers or special abilities are attributed to Alipherus in the supplied sources. His role in the surviving tradition is that of a mortal actor: one of Lycaon's sons who participated in sacrilegious cruelty and thereby incurred Zeus's punishment. His primary credited deed beyond participating in the Lycaon episode is eponymy and founding of the town Aliphera; beyond these narrative and aetiological functions the sources do not ascribe magical capacities or ongoing agency.