Crinisus

thumb|Segestan Silver [[Didrachm, 475–455 BCE, possibly depicting Crinisus in the form of a dog on one side, and Segesta on the other]] Crinisus (in Virgil's Aeneid and subsequent Roman texts) or Crimisus was the god of the Sicilian river Crinisus in Greek and Roman mythology. According to most versions of the myth, Crinisus fathered Acestes with a Trojan woman while in the form of a dog. Acestes then went on to found Segesta, which he named after his mother. Segestan coins from 475–390 BCE often depict a dog on one side, and a woman's head on the other, which have traditionally been associated with Crinisus and the eponymous Segesta.

==Myth== Lycophron's Alexandra contains the first known version of this myth. When Troy was under attack from a sea monster, king Laomedon instructed mariners to take the three daughters of Phoenodamas to die of exposure and be devoured by wild beasts. They were taken to Sicily, but survived there, and built a great shrine to Aphrodite in thanks. The River Crimissus, in the likeness of a dog, took one of them (not named by Lycophron) as his bride, and had a son with her. Their son (also not named here) became the "settler and founder of three places" (generally considered to be Segesta, Eryx, and Entella), and guided Elymus from Dardanus to western Sicily. He concludes by saying that the people of Aegesta (Segesta) continue to mourn the loss of Troy long after its destruction (Alexandra, 951–977).