Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Æolus
Æolus, in Heathen Mythology, the god and father of the winds, was variously represented as the son of Hippotes, or of Nepture by a daughter of Hippotes, or of Jupiter. In the Odyssey he is mentioned as the king of the Æolian isle to whom Jupiter had given the superintendence and distribution of the winds. Later poets make him the god and father of the winds, who dwelt in one of the Æolian islands—according to some in Stromboli, according to others in Lipari, while others place his residence at Rhegium in Italy. He is represented as having authority over the winds, which he confined in a vast cavern. Strabo and some other writers consider him to have had a real existence; and derive the fable of his power over the winds from his skill in meteorology and the management of ships.
Luctantes ventos tempestatesque sonoras
Imperio premit, ac vinclis et carcere frenat.
Illi indignantes mango cum murmure montis
Circum claustra fremut; celsâ sedet Æolus arce
Sceptra tenens, mollitque animos, et temperat iras:
Ni faciat, maria ac terras cælumque profundum
Quippe ferant rapidi secum, verrantque per auras.
Æncid, lib. i. 52.
With bolt and barrier fetters fast
Rebellious storm and howling blast.
They with the rock's reverberant roar
Chafe blustering round their prison door:
He, throned on high, the sceptre sways,
Controls their moods, their wrath allays.
Break but that sceptre, sea and land,
And heaven's etherial deep,
Before them they would whirl like sand,
And through the void air sweep.
Conington's Translation.
Through Hippotes, Æolus is usually represented as descended from Æolus, one of the sons of Hellen, and the mythological ancestor of the Æolian tribes.