The
Twelve Labours of Hercules (Greek:
Δωδεκαθλος, dodekathlos) are a series of archaic episodes connected by a later continuous narrative, concerning a
penancePenance is repentance of sins as well as the proper name of the Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Orthodox Christian Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation/Confession. It also plays a part in the Lutheran Divine Service...
carried out by the greatest of the Greek heroes,
HeraclesIn Greek mythology, Heracles or Herakles , Alcides or Alcaeus , was a divine hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus...
, romanised as
HerculesHercules is the Roman name for the mythical Greek demigod Heracles, son of Zeus and the mortal Alcmena. Early Roman sources suggest that the imported Greek hero supplanted a mythic Italic shepherd called "Recaranus" or "Garanus", famous for his strength, who dedicated the Ara Maxima that became...
. The establishment of a fixed cycle of twelve labours was attributed by the Greeks to an epic poem, now lost, written by Peisander, dated about 600 BC (Burkert).
As they survive, the Labours of Hercules are not told in any single place, but must be reassembled from many sources. Ruck and Staples assert that there is no one way to interpret the labours, but that six were located in the
PeloponneseThe Peloponnese or Peloponnesus is a large peninsula and region in southern Greece, forming the part of the country south of the Gulf of Corinth...
, culminating with the rededication of
OlympiaOlympia , a sanctuary of ancient Greece in Elis, is known for having been the site of the Olympic Games in classical times, comparable in importance to the Pythian Games held in Delphi. Both games were held every Olympiad , the Olympic Games dating back possibly further than 776 BC...
. Six others took the hero farther afield. In each case, the pattern was the same: Hercules was sent to kill or subdue, or to fetch back for Hera's representative
EurystheusIn Greek mythology, Eurystheus was king of Tiryns, one of three Mycenaean strongholds in the Argolid: Sthenelus was his father and the "victorious horsewoman" Nicippe his mother, and he was a grandson of the hero Perseus, as was his opponent Heracles. He was married to Antimache, daughter of...
a magical animal or plant. "The sites selected were all previously strongholds of Hera or the 'Goddess' and were Entrances to the Netherworld".
A famous depiction of the labours in Greek sculpture is found on the
metopesIn classical architecture, a metope is a rectangular architectural element that fills the space between two triglyphs in a Doric frieze, which is a decorative band of alternating triglyphs and metopes above the architrave of a building of the Doric order...
of the Temple of
ZeusIn Greek mythology, Zeus is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky and thunder. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull, and oak. In addition to his Indo-European inheritance, the classical "cloud-gatherer" also derives certain iconographic traits from the...
at
OlympiaOlympia , a sanctuary of ancient Greece in Elis, is known for having been the site of the Olympic Games in classical times, comparable in importance to the Pythian Games held in Delphi. Both games were held every Olympiad , the Olympic Games dating back possibly further than 776 BC...
, which date to the 450s BC.
The labours
In his labours, Hercules was often accompanied by a male companion (an
eromenosIn the pederastic tradition of Classical Athens, the eromenos was an adolescent boy who was in a love relationship with an adult man, known as the erastes ....
), according to
LicymniusIn Greek mythology, Licymnius was a good friend of Heracles' and a son of Electryon. According to one story, found in the Iliad, he was murdered by Heracles' son Tlepolemus....
and others, such as
IolausIn Greek mythology, Iolaus was a Theban divine hero, son of Iphicles, Heracles's brother, and Automedusa.He was famed for being Heracles's nephew and for helping with for some of his Labors...
, his nephew. Although he was only supposed to perform ten labours, this assistance led to him suffering two more.
EurystheusIn Greek mythology, Eurystheus was king of Tiryns, one of three Mycenaean strongholds in the Argolid: Sthenelus was his father and the "victorious horsewoman" Nicippe his mother, and he was a grandson of the hero Perseus, as was his opponent Heracles. He was married to Antimache, daughter of...
didn't count the Hydra, because Iolaus helped him, or the Augean stables, as he received payment for his work, or because the rivers did the work.
A traditional order of the labours found in
ApollodorusApollodorus of Athens son of Asclepiades, was a Greek scholar and grammarian. He was a pupil of Diogenes of Babylon, Panaetius the Stoic, and the grammarian Aristarchus of Samothrace...
is:
- Slay the Nemean Lion
The Nemean lion was a vicious monster in Greek mythology that lived in Nemea. He was eventually killed by Heracles....
.
- Slay the 9-headed Lernaean Hydra
In Greek mythology, the Lernaean Hydra In Greek mythology, the Lernaean Hydra In Greek mythology, the Lernaean Hydra (Greek: was an ancient nameless serpent-like chthonic water beast (as its name evinces) that possessed 9 heads— the poets mention more heads than the vase-painters could paint—...
.
- Capture the Golden Hind of Artemis
In Greek mythology, the Ceryneian Hind , also called Cerynitis, was an enormous hind sacred to Artemis, the chaste goddess of the hunt and moon. It had golden antlers like a stag and hooves of bronze or brass, and it was said that it could outrun an arrow in flight...
.
- Capture the Erymanthian Boar
In Greek mythology, the Erymanthian Boar is remembered in connection with The Twelve Labours, in which Heracles, the enemy of Hera, visited in turn "all the other sites of the Goddess throughout the world, to conquer every conceivable 'monster' of nature and rededicate the primordial world to its...
.
- Clean the Augean stables in a single day
In Greek mythology, Augeas , whose name means "bright", was king of Elis and husband of Epicaste. Augeas was one of the Argonauts....
.
- Slay the Stymphalian Birds
In Greek mythology, the Stymphalian birds were man-eating birds with wings of bronze and sharp metallic feathers they could launch at their victims, and were pets of Ares, the god of war. Furthermore, their dung was highly toxic...
.
- Capture the Cretan Bull
In Greek mythology, the Cretan Bull was either the bull that carried away Europa or the bull Pasiphaë fell in love with, giving birth to the Minotaur.- Origin :...
.
- Steal the Mares of Diomedes
The Mares of Diomedes, also called the Mares of Thrace, were four man-eating horses in Greek mythology. Magnificent, wild, and uncontrollable, they belonged to the giant Diomedes , king of Thrace, a son of Ares and Cyrene who lived on the shores of the Black Sea...
.
- Obtain the Girdle of the Amazon Queen.
- Obtain the Cattle of the Monster Geryon
In Greek mythology, Geryon , son of Chrysaor and Callirrhoe and grandson of Medusa, was a fearsome giant who dwelt on the island Erytheia of the mythic Hesperides in the far west of the Mediterranean. A more literal-minded later generation of Greeks associated the region with Tartessos in southern...
.
- Steal the Apples of the Hesperides
In Greek mythology, the Hesperides are nymphs who tend a blissful garden in a far western corner of the world, located near the Atlas mountains in Tanger, Morocco at the edge of the encircling Oceanus, the world-ocean....
.
- Capture Cerberus
Cerberus, in Greek and Roman mythology, is a multi-headed hound which guards the gates of Hades, to prevent those who have crossed the river Styx from ever escaping...
.
Inner meaning
Walter BurkertWalter Burkert , a scholar of Greek mythology and cult, is an emeritus professor of classics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, and also has taught in the United Kingdom and the United States...
has called the labours and other myths of Hercules "a conglomerate of popular tales which was exploited only secondarily by the high art of poetry", and it was not until the fifth century that poets of the Classic age could draw the myth into "a tragic, heroic, and human atmosphere and away from its natural thrust outwards to a carefree realm beyond the human" (Burkert 1985:208). As philosophical, moral, and eventually
allegoricalAllegory is a figurative mode of representation conveying a meaning other than the literal. An allegory is a device that can be presented in literary form, such as a poem or novel, or in visual form, such as in painting or sculpture...
overlays came to be applied to his death-cheating superhuman exploits, behind their outer, literal meaning, the Hercules figure came to represent an inner mystical tradition, and thus the labors could be interpreted in terms of the spiritual path. The last three labours (10-12) of Heracles are generally considered metaphors about death. Hercules was unique among Greek heroes in that no tomb of Hercules was ever localized, and the Olympian sacrifices and chthonic libations were offered simultaneously to him everywhere.
Geographic locations
Pointing to a possible location for their origin, or at least their formalisation, is the fact that most of the geographic locations are located in, or on the borders of what was classical Arcadia (today's prefecture of
ArcadiaArcadia, Arkadía , or Arcady is a region of Greece in the Peloponnesus. It takes its name from the mythological character Arcas.-Modern times:...
is smaller).
- Town and prominent archeological site of Nemea
Nemea is an ancient site near the head of the valley of the River Elissos in the northeastern part of the Peloponnese, in Greece. Formerly part of the territory of Cleonae in Argolis, it is today part of the prefecture of Corinthia...
, southwest of Corinthos, prefecture of CorinthiaCorinthia is the area around the city of Corinth, located in the north-eastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. It is a prefecture of Greece, part of the periphery of Peloponnese...
.
- Lake Lerna at the Argolic Gulf
The Argolic Gulf is a small gulf off the east coast of the Peloponnese, Greece, opening into the Aegean Sea. Its main island is Spetses. This gulf and its islands are sometimes combined with the Saronic Gulf and Saronic Islands, with the result called the Argo-Saronic Gulf and the Argo-Saronic...
gradually silted up, its last remnants were drained. It is now a fertile alluvial bay. The strong KarstKarst topography is a landscape shaped by the dissolution of a layer or layers of soluble bedrock, usually carbonate rock such as limestone or dolomite....
springs between the villages MiliMyloi or Myli, Mili , is a village and the seat of the municipality of Lerna in the southwestern part of the prefecture of Argolis. The old GR-7 is about 100 m from the train station of Myloi and is also accessible by a rare road linking Nea Kios - Nafplio and the rest of central and eastern Argolis...
(archeological:LernaIn classical Greece, Lerna was a region of springs and a former lake near the east coast of the Peloponnesus, south of Argos. Its site near the village Mili at the Argolic Gulf is most famous as the lair of the Lernaean Hydra, the chthonic many-headed water snake, a creature of great antiquity...
) and Kefalari now irrigate fruit plantations.
- The Mountain Erymanthos, currently called Olonos, prefecture of Achaea
Achaea is an ancient province and a present prefecture of Greece, on the northern coast of the Peloponnese, stretching from the mountain ranges of Erymanthus and Cyllene on the south to a narrow strip of fertile land on the north, bordering the Gulf of Corinth, into which the mountain Panachaicus...
, PeloponneseThe Peloponnese or Peloponnesus is a large peninsula and region in southern Greece, forming the part of the country south of the Gulf of Corinth...
.
- Town Ceryneia, prefecture of Achaea
Achaea is an ancient province and a present prefecture of Greece, on the northern coast of the Peloponnese, stretching from the mountain ranges of Erymanthus and Cyllene on the south to a narrow strip of fertile land on the north, bordering the Gulf of Corinth, into which the mountain Panachaicus...
.
- Lake Stymphalia, ca. 20km northwest of Nemea. In ancient times a birds' domain. An extraordinary Karst
Karst topography is a landscape shaped by the dissolution of a layer or layers of soluble bedrock, usually carbonate rock such as limestone or dolomite....
formation. The lake is a law-protected preserve for endangered habitats and species (Natura 2000Natura 2000 is an ecological network of protected areas in the territory of the European Union. In May 1992, governments of the European Union adopted legislation designed to protect the most seriously threatened habitats and species across Europe. This legislation is called the Habitats Directive...
), prefecture of CorinthiaCorinthia is the area around the city of Corinth, located in the north-eastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. It is a prefecture of Greece, part of the periphery of Peloponnese...
.
- The River Alphaeus feeds the bay of Elis
Elis, or Eleia is an ancient district, that corresponds with the modern Ilia Prefecture...
, and drains the north western mountains.
- The City of Sparta
Sparta was a city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the River Eurotas in the southern part of the Peloponnese. From c. 650 BC it rose to become the dominant military power in the region and as such was recognized as the overall leader of the combined Greek forces during the Greco-Persian Wars...
, southern Peloponnese, prefecture of LaconiaLaconia , also known as Lacedaemonia, is a prefecture in Greece. Laconia has the legal status of a prefecture, with Sparti its administrative capital. Its main towns and cities are Amyclae, Areopolis, Gytheion, Molaoi, Monemvasia, Mystras, Neapoli and Sellasia...
.
- The Island of Crete
Crete is the largest of the Greek islands and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea at 8,336 km²...
, a sea trading nation.
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