Herakles
A Legend of Greacia

Zeus visited Alkmene, a descendant of Perseus who was, as well as being judged most wise, one of the most beautiful women of her time, and he went to her in the guise of her husband, Amphityron, so it was easy to seduce her.  When she was great with child, king Zeus swore by the Styx that the descendant of Perseus about to born would be king of Mycenae, and this he swore by the Styx, the most sacred oath any can make.   But Hera was jealous and angry at the favour shown to this son about to be born and persuaded her daughter Eileithyiai, the bringer of childbirth, to hold back the birth of Alkmene’s child and bring forward the birth of Eurystheus, another descendant of Perseus, and make him a seven month child.  Angry with Hera, but unable to change that which he had sworn, Zeus had to allow the birthright he had set aside for his son to go to Eurystheus.  But Hera was not finished, and when he was born she sent snakes to the crib of the child that Alkmene had named Alcaeus, but he strangled with his hands, for even then he had the strength of the Ancestors within him.

As he grew older, many people taught him many things – from Amphitryon he learned to drive chariots, from Autolycus he learned the art of wrestling; Castor, his half-brother, taught him to fence, and Linus taught him to play the lyre.  His divine half-brothers and one of his divine half-sisters amongst the Olympians gave him gifts – from Hermes, a bow, and from Apollo arrows that would always fly true.  From Hephaestus he received a golden breastplate and Athene gave him a robe of fine weave and royal colouring. 

It was not just in strength that he mirrored his father though, for in Boiotia he was entertained by the king, Thespius, for fifty days, and each night gave one of his many daughters to bed with him.  By them he had many children, called by history the Thespiades.  It was just as this feasting was ending that King Erginus of the Minoans imposed a tribute on the Boiotians after his father was killed by one of Thespius’ subjects.  It happened though that Alcaeus met the king’s heralds on their way to demand this tribute and he cut off their ears, noses and hands, sending them to Erginus when he was done.  Indignant at this outrage, Erginus marched against Boiotia.  But Alcaeus had taken command and had been given by his sister Athene strong weapons, and he with ease killed Erginus and forced his people to pay double the tribute he had demanded to Boiotia.  But it was not all glory for the victorious commander, for his stepfather, whom he had loved and been loved by, was killed.   As a prize for his courage and skill in battle he was given in marriage Megara, the daughter of King Creon, and together they had four children – Therimachus, Deicoon, Creontiades and Ophites, and it was only now that Hera decided to indulge her hatred of him. 

She drove her husband’s son mad, and under this curse of insanity he killed Megara and their children, burning down their home and throwing each of them into the fire.  He turned then to kill his mother, but Athene, arriving too late to save Megara and the children, threw a stone at him, knocking him out and saving Alkmene.  Spiteful, Hera allowed that now for his sanity could return.  Horrified at his crime he exiled himself, travelling to Delphi to seek the answers for how he might atone for such a thing.  The Pythian priestesses of Apollo heard the oracle and ordered that he should dwell in Mycenae and serve Eurystheus for twelve years, performing as he did ten labours, and they told him that from his day his name would be Herakles, meaning “Glory of Hera”, to propitiate her.

And so he went to the kingdom of Mycenae and bowed to Eurystheus, who had no love for him.  He set him tasks that no ordinary mortal could accomplish.  The first was to slay a lion terrorising the land around the city of Nemea.  He tracked it down with ease and from a distance peppered it with arrows, watching with dismay as each failed to pierce the hide of the beast.  He drew his sword, and again, the hide of the beast was impervious to his weapon.  Casting aside such things, he grappled with the lion and snapped its neck.  He cut the pelt with the creature’s own claws and which ever after he wore as cloak with the gaping mouth as a helm.  The lion was lifted and put into the heavens as the constellation of Leo.

The second task that he was set was to slay the Hydra, the multi-headed monstrous offspring of Echidna and Typhon.  It lurked in the swamps near to the town of Lerna, devouring incautious travellers.  And so, Herakles tracked down this particular monster, and drawing his sword he easily lopped off all but its singular immortal head.  But no sooner had he done so, two heads grew to replace the one that was lost, and then a large crab scuttled out of the swamps to nip at his feet.  Growing angry, he stamped down hard on the crab and called his charioteer, Iolaus, to burn the stumps as he cut off the heads, and thus he was able to bring the beast to the position where he could bury the immortal head under an enormous boulder.  The body he cut and into the poisonous blood of the creature he dipped his arrows’ heads.  The crab and the Hyrda are both immortalised in the stars, as the lion was, the crab becoming the constellation Cancer.

Then there was the third task.  He was ordered to bring the Cerynitian Hind alive to Mycenae.  The elusive creature had golden horns and was sacred to Artemis, so he was reluctant to harm it in anyway, but at the end of a long and lengthy chase it was about to flee across a river and so he shot it, with an arrow free of poison, wounding the creature and allowing him to catch it.  He hastened towards Mycenae when Artemis and Apollo met with him.  Artemis rebuked him most sternly for wounding her sacred hind whilst Apollo leant to tend and cure the wounds of his sister’s animal.  Herakles, humble before his divine siblings, bowed and pleaded necessity, saying the task was not his to choose, blaming Eurystheus, and so appeased Artemis and Apollo and carried the now healthy hind to Mycenae.  The fourth labour echoed the third and he was ordered to bring alive this time the Erymanthian Boar, which ravaged the land around Psophis.  Whilst tracking the beast, he was received by Pholus the Centaur.  They opened a jar of wine that belonged in common to the all the centaurs and when the others learned that their jar had been taken, a fight broke out in the course of which Herakles repelled them.  The defeated Centaurs took refuge then with the wise centaur Chiron, who was by misadventure and accident with an arrow poisoned with the Hyrda’s blood shot by Herakles.  But because he was immortal, because he could not die, Chiron dwelt ever after in agony.

The fifth labour given to Herakles was to carry out the dung of the cattle of king Augeas, living in the city of Elis, in a single day.  So Herakles travelled to Elis and without revealing to Augeas the command of Eurystheus said that he would carry out the dung in one day if the king would give him a tenth part of the cattle.  Augeas was incredulous, but promised to do so.  Having taken Augeas’ son, Phyleus, to witness his doings, he made a breach in the foundations of the cattle-yard, and diverted the courses of two rivers, turning them into the yard and washing it clean.  However, when Augeas learned that the task was done at the bidding of Eurystheus he refused to give the aware.  Arbitrators were called and since Phyleus bore witness against his father, Augeas ordered both his son and Herakles to leave Elis. 

Now then, Herakles had little chance to rest from this labour for he was quickly set a sixth – he had to chase the man eating birds that used their feathers as arrows away from the Stymphalian Lake where they made their home.  Athene once more came to his aid, giving him brazen castanets that she herself had received from Hephaestus.  By clanging and crashing them together he scared the birds, which could not abide the sound, and they fluttered up in their fright.  He shot some few of them down and away the survivors flew, never coming back and settling anew in distant places, some of which were found by the Argonauts in later years.

For the seventh labour, he was sent to bring the bull from King Minos that Poseidon had sent and for which Pasiphae had felt her unnatural desire.  He came to the court and requested aid, but Minos said he must fight the beast alone.  And so he did, catching it with ease and bringing it before Eurystheus, who saw it and let the beast go free.

The eighth labour was to fetch the man-eating mares of Diomedes, a king in Thrace.  It was a simple matter to sail there, bringing with him volunteers, and just as simple to overcome Diomedes and the grooms.  He drove them before him and committed them to the care of Abderus, who they killed.  By the grave of his friend, Herakles founded the town Abdera, then journeyed back to Mycenae and gave the mares to Eurytheus, who let them free as he had the bull before.

The ninth task was to bring for Admete, the daughter of Eurystheus, the Belt of Hippolyte, the queen of the Amazons, which Ares had given her for being the best of her people.  When he arrived in the place of the warrior women a fight broke out and Herakles met and fought with the queen, killing her and taking the belt.  He defeated the rest of the Amazons and sailed to Troy.  He went to Paros first, where the sons of Minos lived, but on landing on the island some of his men were killed.  Indignant at this, he slew the princes of the Minoans and took the sons of Androgeus as hostages.  Continuing on he came to Mysia and thence to the court of king Lycus of the Mariandynians.  The Hero was entertained by him, and in a battle between Lycus and his great enemy, the king of the Bebrycians, he took his side and slew many, and took much land from the Bebrycians, giving it all to Lycus who called it all Heraclea. 

Whilst this was happening, Apollo and Poseidon had joined with Hera in a rebellion against Zeus and for their part were punished by being sent to labour amongst men for king Laomedon of Troy.  They were put to work fortifying the walls of the city for a pittance of wages.  But once the work was done the king refused to pay them, and Apollo sent a pestilence and Poseidon sent a sea-monster to snatch away the people of the plain.  But as oracles foretold deliverance from these calamities if Laomedon would give Hesione, his daughter, to be devoured by the monster, reluctantly he exposed her by fastening her to the rocks near the sea.  Seeing her so endangered as he approached the city, Herakles promised to save her if Laomedon would give to him the horses that Zeus had given in compensation for the abduction of his son, Ganymedes.  Well, he had lost a child to the Ancestors already, and did not wish to lose another to them, and readily agreed.  It was, for the Hero who had slain the Hydra, no difficult thing to slay to the sea-monster of Poseidon, but Laomedon would not give the reward for the return of Hesione.  Angered by this, Herakles and his companions made war on Troy.  He killed Laomedon, putting Priam on the throne of Troy, and gave Hesione as a prize to his friend Telamon.  If it was not enough to have slain the sea-monster of Poseidon, he did as he sailed away, shoot Sarpedon, the son of the same Ancestor.

He returned to Mycenae and was sent then to fetch the Cattle of Geryon, who lived in the isle of Erythia, and had the body of three men grown together and joined in one at the waist, but parted in three from the flanks and thighs.  The cattle was guarded by Orthus, a two headed hound, and by Geryon’s herdsman Eurytion, but Herakles slew them both.  However, Menoetes, who was there pasturing the cattle of Hades, reported all to Geryon who attacked the Hero, yet Herakles killed him too and too his cattle away to give to Eurystheus.  Yet more sons of Poseidon – Liguria, Ialebion and Dercynus – tried to rob him of the cattle, but again he robbed Poseidon of that which was his by killing them all.

Now, he expected that his labours were ended, that he was released from, atoned for, the sin of the murders of his family, but the deceitful Eurystheus refused to release him from his service, for he claimed that the Hydra’s death and the cleaning of the stables did not count towards the total of his labours for had he not help when fighting the Hydra, and did he not demand payment for the cleansing of the stables?  And so Eurystheus set two more tasks, both more difficult than that which had gone before.  The first was to steal from the golden apples from the Garden of Hera on the slopes of Mount Atlas.  The tree with the golden fruit had been a gift from Mother Gaia when Hera had married Zeus.  Hera set the Hesperides, the daughters of Atlas, to guard the tree, but they had stolen some of the precious fruits, and now the dragon Ladon coiled about the tree to prevent theft. 

It was a long journey, and to find the apples he sought out Nereus, the Old Man of the Seas, and though he changed himself into many fearful shapes, Herakles would not release him until he told him whereabouts of the apples.   Told, Herakles released the Old Man and journeyed on, encountering as he did Antaeus, yet one more son of Poseidon.  He was a giant who grew all the stronger when he touched the ground and who rejoiced in the slaying of travellers and using their bones to construct a temple to his father’s glory.  When Herakles found him, the giant had subdued and killed many, but Herakles, wrestling with him, lifted Antaeus from the ground, and found him then to be no stronger than an ordinary mortal, and quickly overcame and killed him.  Travelling onwards once more, he eventually encountered Prometheus, he who had been bound to a rock by Zeus to endure an eagle daily devouring his liver, which grew again by night, in punishment for stealing fire to give to men.  Prophecy said that Prometheus could only be released if a Hero cut his chains and an Immortal gave up his everlasting life.  It was Chiron, in his undying pain, willingly gave up his life in favour of Prometheus, whereupon Herakles cut his chains and killed the eagle.  Prometheus, grateful, set Herakles on the quickest path to Hera’s Garden and cautioned him not to pick the apples himself, and there, at the foot of the mountain, did he find Atlas, guarding the pillars that hold up the world.  He persuaded Atlas to climb and take the apples whilst he remained to guard the pillars and to shoot and slay Ladon, for though the distance was great, the arrows that Apollo had given could not miss.  Ladon was placed in the heavens as the constellation Draco, and Herakles made off with the golden treasure. Eurystheus was not pleased to see that Herakles had survived and triumphed, and so set for the final task a seemingly impossible labour. 

Herakles was bid to fetch from the House of Hades the great hound Cerberus, who has three heads and a back covered with snakes.  A fearsome and dangerous creature he was, set to guard the entrance to the House of Dead, but Herakles was protected from the snakes by the skin of the Nemean Lion, and he wrestled Cerberus into submission, chained him and dragged him, slavering and snarling, before the King of Mycenae, telling him to quickly acknowledge his labours complete, for Lord Haides had commanded the swift return of his hound.  Eurystheus, angry that once more Herakles had accomplished and survived a seemingly impossible task, was forced to relent and release Herakles from his servitude, whereupon Cerberus was reclaimed by his master and returned to the Underworld. 

Released and freed from servitude, Herakles travelled and came to the palace of king Admetus, whom the Morae had decreed able to avoid his death if one would willingly go in his place, a gift given him at the behest of Apollo who had striven as a punishment from his father, Zeus, as the slave of Admetus and found him to be a kind and fair master.  It was whilst Admetus was feasting with Herakles that his time arrived and neither his mother nor his father would go for him.  For her love, his wife Alcestis chose to die to in his stead – but as she did Herakles wrestled Thanatos for her soul and she was sent back from the Underworld on his victory.

Now, not long after this, some cattle were stolen by the notorious thief, Autolycus, who had been given by his father Hermes the gift of being able to transform in either shape or colour any thing that he had stole.  Herakles was held responsible, but Iphitus, whose cattle they were, did not believe it and went to Herakles, inviting him to seek the cattle with him.  He promised that he would, but once more Hera reached down and touched Herakles with a madness that caused him to hurl Iphitus from the walls whereon they stood, killing him.  To atone for this death he went to Neleus, king of Pylos, to be purified, but Neleus refused.  Instead he was purified by Deiphobus of Amyclae, but Herakles could not find peace and he went once again to Delphi and strove with the priestesses there for he was not satisfied with the answers they had given him, that the cure for his madness was to be sold in slavery, and he grew violent, causing Apollo to come in person to oppose him, and only Zeus could prevent their contention coming to bloodshed, telling Apollo to cease and ordering Herakles to accept the words of the Pythians.   They spoke the rest of the oracle, which was that he should be sold to serve for three years as a slave to pay for the death of Iphitus.  And it was Hermes who sold Herakles to Omphale, the queen of Lydia.

During his slavery he punished the Cercopes at Epheseus, killed Syleus in Aulis, buried Icarus who had flown too close to the sea, and threw a stone against a statue by Daedalus representing him.  He hunted the Calydonian Bore and set off with the Argonauts, but failed to complete the voyage for he stayed instead on an isle to seek his servant who had been taken by a nymph.

After all of this, Herakles sided with the Olympians during the revolt of the Giants, for his participation was essential if the Giants were to be defeated.  It was when that he first met Dionysus, himself still mortal, who had also been summoned to aid their divine kin. 

Now the time came to remind Augeas of his perfidy in robbing Herakles of his fee for cleaning his stables and for the exile from Elis he had imposed on both the Hero and his son. He drew together an army and marched against the king in Elis. In the war, he killed the Molionides, the generals of Elis, and also Augeas, giving the throne to Phyleus, Augeas’ son. He also slew Neleus and all his sons save Nestor who was too young to be in the fight. During the fight, he smote Hera on the right breast with a three-barbed arrow, and wounded Ares in his thigh.

It was after all this that Herakles met Deianira.  He had wrestled Achelous the hand of the daughter of Dionysus and Althaea, and wed her soon after his victory.  Travelling together, they came to the river Evenus, at which the centaur Nessus sat and ferried passengers for hire.  Herakles crossed the river by himself, but trusted his bride to Nessus.  But he, in carrying her across, pressed his attentions on her and, when she rebuffed him, became violent in his desire for her.  Hearing her cries, he shot Nessus in the heart, but at the point of death he called Deianira to him and told her to make a love-charm from the blood that flowed from his wound and the seed he had dropped on the ground, to be used on her husband if ever she feared his love was waning. 

And so, after the last of his adventures (wherein he took cities and lands, lovers, and killed a son of Ares), did Deianira hear of an affair between Herakles and Iole, and become fearful that he would put her aside in favour of this new love.  She took the potion she had made of the blood of Nessus and smeared it on a tunic which she gave to her husband, hoping to make him love her again.  When he put it on and prepared to offer sacrifices to the Ancestors, the tunic was warmed and the poison of the Hydra that had slain Nessus and so been in his blood began to eat at his skin.  Seeing that he was dying, and in such great agony, he made a pyre and lit it, casting himself into the flames.  There, his mortality was burned away and he ascended to immortality, becoming reconciled finally with Hera and marrying beautiful Hebe.   He is the Ancestor of Heroes, of heroic deeds and of great deeds and of striving and attaining.

 

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(OC Author - Gillian Smart, after the Greek Myth)