king of Thessaly. The flood said to have happened in his time, (1500 B.C.), was no more than an inundation of Thessaly, occasioned by heavy rains, and an earthquake that flopped the course of the river Peneus where it usually discharged itself into the sea. On these circumstances the fable of Deucalion's flood is founded.—According to the fable, he was the son of Prometheus. He governed his people with equity; but the rest of mankind being extremely wicked, were destroyed by a flood, while Deucalion and Pyrrha his queen saved themselves by ascending mount Parnassus. When the waters were decreased, they went and consulted the oracle of Themis, on the means by which the earth was to be repopulated; when they were ordered to veil their heads and faces, to unloose their girdles, and throw behind their backs the bones of their great mother. At this advice Pyrrha was seized with horror: but Deucalion explained the mystery, by observing, that their great mother must mean the earth, and her bones the stones; when taking them up, those Deucalion threw over his head became men, and those thrown by Pyrrha, women.