Heracles, mightiest of the heroes, was born to Alcmene at Thebes, who lay in the arms of great Zeus and bore him.1
His descent runs back to Perseus and Andromeda, who had five sons in Mycenae — Alcaeus, Sthenelus, Heleus, Mestor, and Electryon — and a daughter, Gorgophone. Alcaeus begot Amphitryon, and Electryon a daughter, Alcmene; so the houses that would meet in Heracles were both branches of the one Perseid stock.2
Before Amphitryon reached Thebes, Zeus came by night, prolonged the one night threefold, took on Amphitryon's likeness, and bedded with Alcmene. She bore two sons: Heracles, whom she had by Zeus and who was the elder by one night, and Iphicles, whom she had by Amphitryon — a double union that left his fatherhood disputed between the god and the man.3
When the child was eight months old, Hera, desiring his destruction, sent two huge serpents to the bed. Alcmene called Amphitryon to help, but the infant Heracles rose up and killed the serpents, strangling them with both his hands. Pherecydes, however, says it was Amphitryon who laid the serpents in the bed, to learn which of the two boys was his own.4
Hera's enmity reached back even to his birth. On the day Alcmene was to bring forth Heracles in fair-crowned Thebe, Zeus boasted that a child of his blood would that day be born to rule over all his neighbours; Hera bound him by oath, then hastened the birth of Eurystheus, son of Sthenelus and likewise of the Perseid line, in the seventh month, and held back Alcmene's labour — so the rule fell to Eurystheus, and Heracles was made his subject.5
He was not always called Heracles. When he came in time to Delphi and asked the god where he should dwell, the Pythian priestess then first named him Heracles; before that he had been called Alcides.6
Apollodorus numbers him among the Argonauts, though the poets disagree whether he sailed the whole way: in Mysia he lost Hylas to the nymphs and searched while the Argo put out to sea, and some say the ship herself declared she could not bear his weight, or that he was absent serving Omphale.7
After he overthrew the Minyans of Orchomenus and freed Thebes from their tribute, Creon gave him Megara, his eldest daughter, as a prize of valour. Hera drove him mad, and he slew his children by her and two sons of Iphicles; condemned to exile, he went to Delphi and was told to serve Eurystheus at Tiryns and Mycenae, performing whatever labours the king should set.8
Apollodorus numbers twelve labours, though two were later disqualified: he strangled the Nemean Lion; with Iolaus' help he cut off the heads of the Lernaean Hydra and burned the stumps; he chased the Ceryneian Hind a year and brought it back alive; trapped the Erymanthian Boar; cleansed the stables of Augeas in a day; drove off the Stymphalian Birds; captured the Cretan Bull; fed Diomedes of Thrace to his own mares; took the girdle of Hippolyta; fetched the cattle of Geryon, slaying the hound Orthrus on the way; brought back the apples of the Hesperides after holding up the sky for Atlas and killing the dragon Ladon; and last dragged Cerberus up from Hades.9
Between and after the labours he fought beside the gods at Phlegra against the Giants, sacked Troy when Laomedon twice cheated him of the mares promised for saving Hesione from the sea-monster, served Omphale in Lydia dressed in women's robes, and wrestled the river-god Achelous for Deianira, daughter of Oeneus. By Deianira he begot Hyllus and Macaria; by Auge in Arcadia, Telephus; and Tlepolemus, who would lead Rhodes to Troy.10
When Eurytus of Oechalia refused him Iole though he had surpassed the archer's trial, Heracles sacked the city and carried the princess away. Deianira, fearing a rival, sent a shirt steeped in the blood of the centaur Nessus, whom Heracles had shot for trying to ravish her; the poison ate into his flesh on Mount Oeta. He built his pyre, and Philoctetes lit it at last; then a cloud took him up, and on Olympus he was made immortal and wed to Hebe, while in Hades his shade walked among the heroes Odysseus saw.11
Hesiod says that when Heracles had finished his grievous labours he dwelt in joy with Hebe, the fair-ankled child of great Zeus and Hera, in snowy Olympus — the apotheosis that Homer sets against the hero's shade in the house of Hades, yet both traditions agree that the son of Alcmene passed from mortal agony into the company of the gods.12
⁂
the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story
