Don't Know Much About Mythology - Kenneth C. Davis [108]
On his way home, Perseus rescues a beautiful maiden, Andromeda, from a giant sea monster and marries her. Once back in Seriphus, he turns Polydectes to stone by showing him the head of the Medusa. Unfortunately, fulfilling this prophecy, Perseus accidentally kills his grandfather with a discus. Although he is entitled to become king of Argos after that, Perseus chooses instead to rule Tiryns, where he and Andromeda found a great dynasty. Among his descendants is the great hero Heracles.
What kind of hero kills his wife and children?
If you only heard of one Greek god or hero when you were a kid, it was probably Hercules, whose name in Greek legends was Heracles. The leading character in many a B-movie featuring brawny, bad actors, Heracles was a legendary figure of the Heroic Age, who probably was just as popular in ancient Greece as he is today. Heracles was born in Thebes, the son of the mortal princess Alcmene and the philandering Zeus. Because he is another of Zeus’s illegitimate offspring, Heracles incurs the wrath of Hera, who has it in for any child born from Zeus’s cheating ways.
Hera’s spite takes on some creative forms. First, she causes the birth of Heracles to be delayed so that he is not the firstborn child, cannot wear the crown, and, in fact, is made a slave. Hera then sends two snakes to kill Heracles as he sleeps, but the baby boy amazes everyone by strangling them with his bare hands. Fond of the boy, Zeus intervenes to try to put a stop to Hera’s sabotage. The Olympian places the infant Heracles at the sleeping Hera’s breast so that he will receive the mother’s milk of the gods. But Heracles bites down so hard that Hera wakes up and pushes the baby away—denying Heracles complete immortality. When her breast milk spills, it spreads across the sky as the Milky Way.
The semidivine Heracles goes on to become a warrior of great strength and skill. After helping the Thebans defeat an enemy, Heracles marries the Theban king’s daughter Megara, and has three children, who become Hera’s new targets. Seeing an opportunity to do harm, she causes Heracles to suffer a fit of madness, in which he lets fly his arrows, killing his whole family. Seeking to purify himself and atone for this crime, Heracles goes to the Oracle at Delphi and learns he must serve his cousin, Eurystheus, king of Mycenae. Over the course of twelve years, he performs twelve labors—which in the original Greek were conveyed by the word athoi. It meant “contest” and was the source of the word “athletics.”
Here are the labors of Heracles, which have been described over the centuries with many variations:
1. The Nemean Lion
Heracles takes on the fierce lion of Nemea, which has been killing all the flocks near Mycenae. At first, his arrows simply bounce off the animal’s skin, so Heracles chases the lion and kills it with his bare hands.* He keeps the lion’s impenetrable skin as a trophy and is often depicted in art with the lion’s jaws covering his head like a helmet.
2. The Lernean Hydra
Heracles takes on a many-headed snake with the body of a hound, whose mere breath can kill and whose heads grow back as soon as they are cut off. The deadly Hydra lives in the swamps of Lerna,