Pausanias
observed that in his time the
tusks were shown in Apollo's temple at Cumae.
tusks were shown in Apollo's temple at Cumae.
Ovid - 1934 - Metamorphoses in European Culture - v2
In all, Ovid mentioned fifteen.
They included
the usual twelve labors* and three of the supplementary labors. Ovid
enumerated them, not in their traditional order, but according to a
rhetorical association of ideas.
First Ovid mentioned the destruction of Busiris. According to the
Egyptian author Manetho, the people of Egypt through a long period
used to sacrifice foreigners. They did this, as Diodorus noted, at a
place called Bu Asiri (the grave of Osiris). The Greeks, misinterpreting
the term, imagined that it was the name of a local king, whom they
called Busiris. The Manual explained that he began the practice of
offering human beings in order to end nine years of famine. Tradition
declared that, while Hercules was visiting Egypt, he was seized and led
to the altar but, suddenly breaking loose, killed the king and many of
his followers. The story was challenged more than once. Herodotus
denied that Egyptians had indulged in human sacrifice and pronounced
it incredible that one man should overcome thousands. Isocrates, in an
oration which was supposed to exonerate Busiris, asserted that he lived
two centuries earlier than Hercules. Nevertheless Greek authors and
artists often treated the story. It became regularly a part of the tradi-
tion of Hercules, and Vergil observed in the Georgics that it was known
to all.
Next Ovid mentioned the destruction of a Libyan king, Antaeus.
Pindar had stated that this malefactor habitually killed travelers and
*Only in the opening tale of Book Fifteen did Ovid specify the labors as twelve
in number.
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
hung their skulls on a certain temple of Neptune. He noted that Her-
cules wrestled with him and killed him. Plato observed in his Theatetus
that Antaeus compelled all travelers to wrestle with him. According to
early works of art, Hercules threw Antaeus violently to the ground. But
later the story changed. It was imagined that Antaeus, being a son of
Earth, got renewed strength from contact with the soil. Hercules, dis-
covering this fact, raised him high in air and held him up while he
weakened and died. This idea, which appeared in later Greek art and in
the Manual, was recalled in turn by Ovid.
As a third exploit of Hercules, Ovid mentioned his adventure with
Geryon. The Theogony had recorded the following circumstances.
Geryon, son of Chrysaor and Callirhoe, was a man with three heads.
He lived in an island called Erythia (Redland) and reared cattle, aided
by the herdsman Eurytion and the dog Orthus. Hercules, desiring the
cattle, slew Geryon and his herdsman and dog. Aeschylus noted in
the Agamemnon that Geryon had also three bodies. Later authors ex-
plained that his bodies were joined at the waist but separate above and
below.
Pisander and Herodotus gave a more definite account of Erythia.
It lay far to the west, in the ocean just beyond the Spanish city of
Gadira, now called Cadiz, and received its name because it continually
was reddened by the setting sun. According to Pisander, the Sun gave
Hercules valuable aid. He lent the hero an enormous bowl, which ordi-
narily was used for taking the Sun eastwards at night to his point ol
rising in the orient (cf. Phaethon, Bk. ? 2). By this means Hercules
crossed to Erythia and afterwards transported the cattle to the main-
land.
Pindar and Plato noted, with some misgivings, that Hercules took
Geryon's cattle by right of the stronger. The story appeared at some
length in the Manual and was treated in sculpture of the Athenian treas-
ury at Delphi. A number of authors, both Greek and Roman, alluded
to it briefly. About the death of Geryon they gave two accounts. Ac-
cording to Euripides, Hercules killed him with arrows, according to
Quintus Smyrnaeus, he killed him with blows of his club. Ovid seems to
have been alone in referring to Geryon as a shepherd.
The triple form of Geryon suggested the triple form of Cerberus
(SeeBk. 7).
Ovid alluded next to the adventure with the Cretan Bull. As early
as the end of the sixth century B. C. , Acusilaiis had mentioned this ex-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
ploit. He described the bull as the animal which had brought Europa to
Crete (cf. Bk. 2). But most authors identified him as the notorious
animal which had been the paramour of Pasiphae (cf. Bk. 8). Accord-
ing to the Manual, Neptune had punished Minos further by causing the
animal to be fierce and destructive. Hercules overcame the bull and
returned with him to the court of Eurystheus. Ovid spoke of Hercules
as pressing down the bull's horn. Probably he remembered the following
incident of Theocritus. When Hercules visited the Augean Stables, a
fierce bull named Phaethon attacked him. Hercules caught this bull by
the horn and with tremendous strength pushed him down on the ground.
By observing that Elis knew the toils of Hercules, Ovid recalled his
cleansing of the Augean stables. Although Pindar had alluded to the
adventure, the first surviving accounts were written in Alexandrian
times. Hercules was required to clean in one day the cattle barns of
King Augeas of Elis, which were filthy with the use of thirty years. To
do this, he turned through them the waters of the river Alpheus. Theo-
critus, telling the first part of the adventure, described the enormous
herds which gathered nightly in the barns. The Manual told the whole
story, adding that Hercules used also the Elian river Peneus.
Another exploit of Hercules was his victory over the birds of the
Stymphalian Lake in Arcadia. These creatures were armed with brazen
beaks and claws and with feathers that could be shot like arrows. They
fed on human flesh, presumably of their own killing. Athena provided
Hercules with a loud sounding rattle, which drove them into the air. He
then killed them, according to most accounts, with his arrows. Hellani-
cus mentioned this exploit, and Pherecydes and the Manual told it in
full. Apollonius declared that some of the birds escaped to an island of
the Black Sea and were found there by the Argonauts. Greek vase
painting and coins represented the birds as long-necked waterfowl of
variegated plumage.
Ovid mentioned also toil of Hercules in the Parthenian woods. By
this phrase Ovid alluded to his quest of the hind which often was called
Cerynitian, because it frequented the neighborhood of Cerynitia in
northern Arcadia. Different accounts were given of the animal's origin.
Pindar observed that a nymph Taygete presented it to Diana and that
it became sacred to the goddess. Callimachus declared that it was one
of five hinds larger than bulls that Diana discovered feeding near the
Arcadian river Anaurus. He added that she captured four, and the fifth
escaped northwards to the Cerynitian Hill.
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
Apparently the early Greeks had received some account of rein-
deer, the only species in which antlers are grown by the hind, for antlers
were attributed regularly to the hind of Cerynitia. * Pindar observed
that the quest took Hercules far north, beyond the cold blasts of Boreas.
Other authors agreed that the quest was long, for it occupied more than
a year, but they thought of it as confined to southern Greece. They
added further details to the description of the animal. Euripides re-
ferred to the antlers as made of gold, Vergil spoke of brazen hoofs,
Quintus Smyrnaeus noted the hind's breathing out fire. Euripides ob-
served also that it ravaged the crops. He remarked that Hercules killed
it, and the Manual added that he shot it near Oenoe in Argolis. The
Manual stated further that Apollo and Diana at first reproved Her-
cules for injuring the sacred animal and opposed his return but finally
were mollified.
Ovid spoke next of the gold wrought belt secured from Thermodon,
alluding to the time when Hercules obtained a girdle of the Amazon
Queen Hippolyta. This tradition grew out of the historical fact that
occasionally in times of danger women have taken part in warfare.
Sometimes they merely put to death an enemy who temporarily was dis-
armed and incapable of resistance, as Judith is said to have killed Holo-
fernes, or Jael is reported to have killed Sisera. But at other times
they appear to have faced the perils and hardships of war. This was
true of Augustina, Maid of Saragoza, who was commemorated by
Southey and Byron, and of several women who fought more recently in
the armies of Dahomey.
During historical times women such as Boadicaea and Joan of Arc
occasionally have commanded armies. Their adventures interested not
only historians but also poets and novelists, and it was natural for
authors such as Fletcher, Schiller, and Mark Twain to present them in
a manner that was partly fictitious. But many authors introduced in
their stories warlike women who were entirely imaginary. The Iliad
told of several goddesses, one of them Venus, who took part in battles
near Troy and elsewhere. Vergil introduced into the war between
Aeneas and Turnus his famous warrior heroine Camilla. Leading poets
of the Renaissance gladly followed his example: Ariosto with his Brada-
mante and Marfisa, Tasso with Clorinda, and Spenser with Brito-
mart. And in the nineteenth century Scott revived the fashion, first in
*Some authors, apparently troubled by the fact, referred to the animal as a stag.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
his poem Harold the Dauntless and then in his novel Count Robert of
Paris.
All these were examples of individual women who took part in wars.
There also have been historical instances where a company of women
organized themselves to participate in warfare. During the eighth cen-
tury A. D. , a certain Ylasta led an army of warrior women in Bohemia,
and during the Great War there appeared the Russian Battalion of
Death. Prehistoric companies of warrior women probably suggested
the famous traditions of the Valkyries in northern Europe and the Ama-
zons in Greece.
The Amazons were described as a whole nation of women who lived
in Asia Minor, somewhere near the eastern end of the Black Sea. The
Iliad spoke of them as warring first against Troy and later against
Bellerophon. Aeschylus in his Prometheus Bound declared that the
Amazons originated somewhere in the north and migrated southwards to
the valley of the river Thermodon, near the modern city of Trebizond.
Herodotus and others spoke of this country as their home and told of
their inhabiting a town called Themiscyra. Many authors and artists
treated the theme of the Amazons, associating them especially with
adventures of Theseus and Hercules. Plutarch and others even gave
them a part in the Asiatic conquests of Alexander and Pompey.
The quest for Hippolyta's girdle appeared in sculpture of the
Athenian treasury at Delphi. Not long afterwards it was mentioned by
Euripides. In the HercuJss Furens he noted that Hercules attacked and
defeated an army of mounted Amazons near Lake Maeotis (the Sea of
Azov). Quintus Smyrnaeus added that Hercules pulled Queen Hippo-
lyta out of her saddle. Other Greek authors imagined a less violent pro-
cedure. According to Apollonius, Hercules captured Melanippe, a sister
of the queen, and obtained the girdle as her ransom. According to the
Manual, Hippolyta came voluntarily to Hercules and would have yielded
the girdle peaceably, if Juno had not caused the other Amazons to
attack him. Hercules, believing their demonstration had been planned
in advance, killed the queen.
Ovid's next allusion mentioned winning apples guarded by an un-
sleeping dragon. They usually were called the golden fruit of the
Hesperides. According to the Theogony, the Hesperides were nymphs
living far west, beyond the ocean, and guarding trees which bore golden
apples. Beginning with the fifth century B. C, Greek authors gave a
different account of them. They localized the Hesperides in northern
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
Africa, at the foot of the Atlas Mountains, and spoke of one tree,
round which there coiled an unsleeping dragon. According to Sophocles,
Euripides, and Apollonius, Hercules killed the dragon and gathered the
fruit. And this idea was repeated by most ancient authors who wrote
after Alexandrian times. But Pherecydes and the Manual thought of
the dragon as immortal. They declared that Hercules persuaded Atlas
to obtain the apples for him and meanwhile he himself assumed the duty
of holding up the sky. This idea appeared often in Greek art. Ovid in
his account of Perseus and Atlas (Bk. 4) had followed the poets, for he
noted a prediction that Hercules was to plunder the golden fruit. The
tree had also golden leaves, he added, and Atlas tried to protect it with
a high wall round the garden where it grew. In the complaint of Her-
cules, Ovid alluded to the same version of the tale. His reference to
winning apples from an unsleeping dragon implied that Hercules killed
the monster. But a few lines afterwards Ovid recalled the account in
the Manual and spoke of him as holding up the sky. This idea was in-
consistent not only with Ovid's previous allusion but also with his story
of Perseus transforming Atlas into a mountain. By the time of Her-
cules, Atlas would have been unable to go in quest of the fruit. It is an
odd circumstance that, although Ovid treated the theme of the golden
apples both in his account of Perseus and in his complaint of Hercules,
he never even alluded to the Hesperides.
Still another exploit was a victory over the centaurs. Sophocles
had referred to the adventure, and Euripides had spoken of it as occur-
ring in Thessaly. The Manual told the story. While Hercules was visit-
ing a centaur named Pholus, he persuaded him to include in the enter-
tainment part of the wine which the centaurs held in common. The other
centaurs, objecting to this appropriation of their property, made an
attack but were routed with arrows. During the combat both Pholus
and Ghiron suffered wounds which resulted in their death (cf. Ocyrhoe,
Bk. 2). Ovid had mentioned this victory in his Epistle of Deianira.
Ovid referred also to a boar that ravaged Arcadia. Sophocles had
mentioned the destruction of the beast. The Manual recorded the story.
The boar inhabited Mt. Erymanthus in Arcadia. Hercules pursued him
up the mountain beyond the treeline until the animal foundered in deep
snow, then threw a net over him and brought him back alive. Presumably
he afterwards killed the boar.
Pausanias observed that in his time the
tusks were shown in Apollo's temple at Cumae. Ovid already had men-
tioned the quest of the Erymanthian boar in his Epistle of Deianira.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
He spoke again of the battle with the hydra, which he had consid-
ered at greater length in the previous tale.
Ovid alluded also to King Diomed of Thrace. This king was no-
torious for his team of bloodthirsty horses. Euripides had given two
different accounts of them. In the Alcestis he described them as mares,
an idea repeated by the Manual and by Ovid in the Epistle of Deianira.
In the Hercules Furens he described them as stallions, an idea repeated
by Lucretius and by Ovid in the complaint of Hercules. According to
Euripides, the king fed his team with human flesh, probably the bodies
of those whom he put to death. Hercules overcame and captured the
formidable animals. The Manual added that he brought them to Greece
but that meanwhile Diomed tried to recover them and perished. Dio-
dorus declared that Hercules allowed the horses to kill and devour their
former master. But, according to another Greek tradition, Hercules
killed both Diomed and the horses in the stable. This idea was repeated
afterwards by Quintus Smyrnaeus. Ovid, alluding to the same version,
added that Diomed's mangers were full of human corpses.
Ovid made his last allusion to the adventure with the Nemean lion.
During prehistoric times, wild lions probably existed in all parts of
Greece (cf. Medea's Flight to Athens, Bk. 7). Tradition gave Hercules
two adventures with them, the first with a lion of Mt. Cithaeron near
Thebes, the second with the more famous Nemean lion of southern
Greece. But the Nemean lion usually was described as a more or less
supernatural animal. According to the Theogony, it frequented the
region of Nemea in Argolis and destroyed many human lives but suc-
cumbed at last to Hercules. Pindar noted that after the victory Her-
cules made it his custom to wear the head and skin of this lion, an idea
often repeated both in literature and in art.
Bacchylides recorded a few details of the conflict. Hercules first
attacked the lion with a sword but found the beast invulnerable. The
sword encountered bronze instead of flesh and bent back. He was obliged
to grapple with his enemy. Here Bacchylides accepted an idea common
in Greek lore, that, if an animal or a human being was invulnerable by
weapons, he still might perish by strangling or smothering. Another
instance Ovid recorded in his tale of Cycnus (Bk. 12). Euripides noted
that Hercules overcame the lion in his den.
The Manual added several particulars. Hercules encountered the
animal first in the open. He shot an arrow, which bounded off the lion's
skin, then attacked the beast with his club and drove it into the den.
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
Since there were two entrances, he built up one of them and afterwards
went in by the other and strangled the lion. Theocritus gave a pictur-
esque account of the adventure, in some details of which he appears to
have differed from all others. The lion, he said, was laying waste a
region near Pisa in Elis. After a long search, Hercules observed it
approaching the place where he waited in ambush. When two arrows
failed to stop the lion, he realized that it was invulnerable. As the lion
sprang at him, he struck it so hard with his club that the animal was
dazed. Then, attacking from behind, he trod on the lion's hind paws and
threw his arms round its neck. After strangling the lion, he endeavored
to remove the hide but could make no impression on it until at last he
tried the lion's own claws. Ovid, probably recalling the Manual, spoke
of Hercules as crushing the Nemean monster with his arms.
After recording the complaint of Hercules, Ovid proceeded to
describe his wild behavior. When Apollonius had recounted the fate of
Hylas, he spoke of Hercules as rushing hither and thither, like a bull
maddened with the stings of a gadfly. Vergil had compared Dido in love
with Aeneas to a hind which a shepherd has wounded, not aware that he
has done so, and which flees through woods and glades still carrying the
deadly shaft. Combining these ideas, Ovid likened Hercules to a bull,
when a hunter has wounded him and he has fled. He rushed wildly up
the side of Mt. Oeta, after roaring in agony, often endeavoring to tear
off the fateful garment, often uprooting great trees with his hands.
At this point Ovid introduced the encounter with Lichas. Evidently
the herald had fled a long way up the mountain and taken refuge under
a hollow rock. Hercules, proceeding in the same direction, observed him
and called him to account. Following Sophocles in the earlier part of
the affair, Ovid stressed the idea that Lichas tried to excuse himself.
Following Nicander in the latter part, he declared that the herald's
body was transformed into an island. With the Manual he noted that
it lay in the Euboic Sea. But he gave the tale particular interest for
his contemporaries by alluding to a recent scientific theory, taken prob-
ably from Varro. According to this idea, water, when lifted high in
air, dries and hardens, first into snow and then into hail. In a similar
manner, said Ovid, the body of Lichas, rising high in air, dried and
hardened into a piece of flint.
Sophocles and the Manual, recording the events at Trachin, had
included a strange incident. With a number of African tribes it is
customary for the son and heir to inherit his father's wives and concu-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
bines, with the exception of his own mother. The custom appears to have
been known among the prehistoric Greeks. Tradition recorded an ex-
ample in the family of Ulysses. After the death of that hero, Tela-
machus, his son by Penelope, espoused his former mistress Circe; and
Telegonus, his son by Circe, married his former wife Penelope. In
harmony with this idea Sophocles and the Manual declared that Her-
cules ordered Hyllus to marry Iole, and the Manual noted that Hyllus
did so. Since Ovid had avoided any mention of Hyllus and had omitted
the visit to Trachin, he said nothing at this point about a marriage of
Hyllus and Iole. But in the tale which followed he observerd, incon-
sistently, that by order of Hercules it had taken place.
Following the Manual, Ovid noted that Hercules built his own
funeral pyre; and, following Sophocles, he added that he persuaded
Philoctetes to light it and gave him in return his bow, which twice vis-
ited Troy. Ovid referred to the conquest of the city by Hercules, which
he intended to record in the tale of Hesione (Bk. 11), and to the arrival
of Philoctetes in the Troad, which he afterwards mentioned in the tale
of Ajax and Ulysses (Bk. 13).
According to the Odyssey, Hercules was transformed into an
Olympian god and married Hebe, the personification of eternal youth.
This idea became one of the most popular elements in the whole tradition
of that famous hero. In the drama called Children of Hercules, Euripides
related it to the story of the funeral pyre on Mt. Oeta. Hercules, he
observed, raising his soul from the dread flame, entered the charming
couch of Hebe. Greek tradition noted also that fire separated the mortal
part of Hercules from the immortal, an idea repeated afterwards by
Lucian. Propertius observed in harmony with this that on the heights
of Mt. Oeta, Hercules first knew the joys of godhead. And Ovid, re-
calling the same tradition, had remarked that Neptune took from Ino
and Melicerta whatever was mortal before transforming them into sea
deities (Bk. 4).
The Theogony had spoken of Hebe as daughter of Jupiter and
Juno. Since the time of the Iliad, Hercules had been regarded as the
son of Jupiter and Alcmena. In espousing Hebe, he took a wife whose
father was the same as his but whose mother was different. Marriage
of this kind often was permitted by the ancient Greeks (cf. Io, Bk. 1).
Euripides, calling attention to the idea, declared that Hymenaeus
thought two children of Jupiter worthy of each other. But this was
not the only version of the story, for Ovid observed in a subsequent tale
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
of Iolaiis that Hebe was only a stepdaughter of Jupiter, meaning prob-
ably a child of Juno without a father (cf. Semele and Jupiter, Bk. 3).
The idea that Hercules married Hebe would suggest that her
mother had become reconciled to him. This was implied often by the
older Greek poets, especially by Pindar. The Manual stated that a
reconciliation with Juno occurred immediately after Hercules arrived
on Mt. Olympus. Greek artists indicated that Juno even adopted him
as her son and that she symbolized the adoption by having him drink
milk from her breast.
In the tradition of several ancient peoples great men have been
transported supernaturally to heaven. The events indicated have been
as follows. The hero at first was in some open place and in broad day-
light, plainly observed by several witnesses. Then clouds enveloped him,
sometimes without concealing him from view; a chariot descended
through the clouds; and he was transported to his new home with the
immortals. So, according to the Old Testament, Elijah was conveyed
by a chariot and horses of fire and a whirlwind to heaven.
Usually the hero was transported from high ground. According to
Roman tradition, Romulus was on the Palatine Hill, when clouds sur-
rounded him and a celestial chariot carried him away to become the
god Quirinus. This tale Ovid treated both in his Metamorphoses
(Bk. 14) and in his Fasti. Apparently following Varro, he noted that
the hero's father, Mars, descended in a chariot and that Juno welcomed
the new deity in a council of the gods. A similar event was associated
with Hercules. The Manual stated that a cloud took the hero up from
Mt. Oeta and carried him away with peals of thunder to become a
heavenly god. Greek artists pictured him ascending in a four-horse
chariot. Already the tradition of Hercules was parallel in some respects
to that of Romulus. Ovid decided to make the parallel closer.
While developing many traditional ideas of supernatural ascent
and immortality, Ovid improved his account with congenial details sug-
gested by earlier Roman poets. Spreading the lion skin on the pyre, he
said, and setting the club across it for a pillow, Hercules lay down.
Horace, when he told of Regulus departing to a death by torture, ob-
served that he acted as unconcerned as if he were leaving for a vacation
in the country. Ovid noted that Hercules lay down on the pyre as
calmly as if he were commencing a banquet. Ovid then invented an inci-
dent in the heavens. The gods, who were assembled in council, mani-
fested alarm at the fate of earth's defender. Jupiter expressed his glad-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
ness at their feeling solicitude for his son and proceeded to reassure
them. The flame should devour only the mortal portion of Hercules,
which he received from his mother. The portion that came from his
father was to be immortal, and soon he was to be received on the
heavenly shores. Jupiter expressed the hope that all would rejoice in
his rewarding Hercules with divinity and added that, even if anyone
present were to grudge the bestowal of this reward, he must admit at
least that it was deserved. Juno seemed displeased at the allusion to
her former hostility -- presumably because she now was reconciled and
shared the good will of the rest.
The flames of the pyre, Ovid continued, had now taken away the
former appearance of Hercules and given him one which was new and
better. Both Tibullus and Vergil had spoken of the snake as putting off
his old state and being new. Vergil had noted in his Georgics how the
Calabrian viper, putting off his skin, glides away new and shining with
youth. In the Aeneid he repeated the passage almost verbatim to de-
scribe Pyrrhus in his fresh armor. Ovid, recalling both Tibullus and
Vergil, used the idea more aptly to describe the transformation of Her-
cules. The hero took on new brilliance, as the snake, when it has put off
old age with its skin, becomes new, rejoices, and shines in gleaming scales.
Horace, predicting his own immortal fame, had made the following
boast. Not all of me shall die. A mighty part of me shall escape the
goddess of death, and I shall keep growing in the praise of later times.
Ovid, recalling Horace, observed that the better part of Hercules es-
caped death and grew to even more heroic size.
The hero's father, Jupiter, descended in a chariot with four horses
and conveyed him up through clouds to find a place among the stars. Al-
though this last phrase may have been merely figurative, Ovid seems to
have remembered the idea that Hercules became a constellation of that
name. He noted that Atlas felt the added weight, again forgetting that
Atlas had become a mountain. After this impressive event, it might have
been inconsistent to add the traditional marriage with Hebe. It certainly
would have been an anticlimax. Ovid ended the story with the deification
of Hercules, but afterwards in the tale of Iolaiis he spoke of Hebe as
yielding to her husband's request.
After Ovid's time the subject of Hercules continued to interest
many authors and artists. Although numerous other treatments of the
subject were available and some of them were clearer, especially in their
account of the exploits, Ovid's narrative became and remained the most
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
accessible and the best known. We always may assume that it was
familiar to men of later times and that it encouraged them when they
sought elsewhere for further details. This observation would be true
notably of Lucan in his famous account of Hercules and Antaeus, of
Boccacio in his De Natura Deorum, and of several authors who intro-
duced Hercules into medieval romances. The French poetical romance
of Alexander described Alexander's tent as adorned with designs repre-
senting exploits of Hercules. A French prose romance treated the ex-
ploits at some length*. It spoke of Hercules as acting in the service of
a Boeotian princess, and it gave many of his labors a medieval form. For
example, it presented Pluto as king of a dismal castle, which was
guarded by a giant named Cerberus. Late in the fifteenth century, Pietro
Bassi wrote an Italian prose romance called The Toils of Hercules,
which Villana translated into Spanish, and Perillos wrote an Italian
poetical romance called Twelve Labors of Hercules. Recollection of
Ovid encouraged Shakespeare's frequent allusions to Hercules as typical
of strength and valor.
Ovid's effect in these examples appears to have been merely remote
and general. But on many authors it was also direct and particular.
However much they may have taken from others, they took at least a
few details from him. This was true of Seneca in his tragedies called
Hercules Furens and Hercules on Mt.
the usual twelve labors* and three of the supplementary labors. Ovid
enumerated them, not in their traditional order, but according to a
rhetorical association of ideas.
First Ovid mentioned the destruction of Busiris. According to the
Egyptian author Manetho, the people of Egypt through a long period
used to sacrifice foreigners. They did this, as Diodorus noted, at a
place called Bu Asiri (the grave of Osiris). The Greeks, misinterpreting
the term, imagined that it was the name of a local king, whom they
called Busiris. The Manual explained that he began the practice of
offering human beings in order to end nine years of famine. Tradition
declared that, while Hercules was visiting Egypt, he was seized and led
to the altar but, suddenly breaking loose, killed the king and many of
his followers. The story was challenged more than once. Herodotus
denied that Egyptians had indulged in human sacrifice and pronounced
it incredible that one man should overcome thousands. Isocrates, in an
oration which was supposed to exonerate Busiris, asserted that he lived
two centuries earlier than Hercules. Nevertheless Greek authors and
artists often treated the story. It became regularly a part of the tradi-
tion of Hercules, and Vergil observed in the Georgics that it was known
to all.
Next Ovid mentioned the destruction of a Libyan king, Antaeus.
Pindar had stated that this malefactor habitually killed travelers and
*Only in the opening tale of Book Fifteen did Ovid specify the labors as twelve
in number.
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
hung their skulls on a certain temple of Neptune. He noted that Her-
cules wrestled with him and killed him. Plato observed in his Theatetus
that Antaeus compelled all travelers to wrestle with him. According to
early works of art, Hercules threw Antaeus violently to the ground. But
later the story changed. It was imagined that Antaeus, being a son of
Earth, got renewed strength from contact with the soil. Hercules, dis-
covering this fact, raised him high in air and held him up while he
weakened and died. This idea, which appeared in later Greek art and in
the Manual, was recalled in turn by Ovid.
As a third exploit of Hercules, Ovid mentioned his adventure with
Geryon. The Theogony had recorded the following circumstances.
Geryon, son of Chrysaor and Callirhoe, was a man with three heads.
He lived in an island called Erythia (Redland) and reared cattle, aided
by the herdsman Eurytion and the dog Orthus. Hercules, desiring the
cattle, slew Geryon and his herdsman and dog. Aeschylus noted in
the Agamemnon that Geryon had also three bodies. Later authors ex-
plained that his bodies were joined at the waist but separate above and
below.
Pisander and Herodotus gave a more definite account of Erythia.
It lay far to the west, in the ocean just beyond the Spanish city of
Gadira, now called Cadiz, and received its name because it continually
was reddened by the setting sun. According to Pisander, the Sun gave
Hercules valuable aid. He lent the hero an enormous bowl, which ordi-
narily was used for taking the Sun eastwards at night to his point ol
rising in the orient (cf. Phaethon, Bk. ? 2). By this means Hercules
crossed to Erythia and afterwards transported the cattle to the main-
land.
Pindar and Plato noted, with some misgivings, that Hercules took
Geryon's cattle by right of the stronger. The story appeared at some
length in the Manual and was treated in sculpture of the Athenian treas-
ury at Delphi. A number of authors, both Greek and Roman, alluded
to it briefly. About the death of Geryon they gave two accounts. Ac-
cording to Euripides, Hercules killed him with arrows, according to
Quintus Smyrnaeus, he killed him with blows of his club. Ovid seems to
have been alone in referring to Geryon as a shepherd.
The triple form of Geryon suggested the triple form of Cerberus
(SeeBk. 7).
Ovid alluded next to the adventure with the Cretan Bull. As early
as the end of the sixth century B. C. , Acusilaiis had mentioned this ex-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
ploit. He described the bull as the animal which had brought Europa to
Crete (cf. Bk. 2). But most authors identified him as the notorious
animal which had been the paramour of Pasiphae (cf. Bk. 8). Accord-
ing to the Manual, Neptune had punished Minos further by causing the
animal to be fierce and destructive. Hercules overcame the bull and
returned with him to the court of Eurystheus. Ovid spoke of Hercules
as pressing down the bull's horn. Probably he remembered the following
incident of Theocritus. When Hercules visited the Augean Stables, a
fierce bull named Phaethon attacked him. Hercules caught this bull by
the horn and with tremendous strength pushed him down on the ground.
By observing that Elis knew the toils of Hercules, Ovid recalled his
cleansing of the Augean stables. Although Pindar had alluded to the
adventure, the first surviving accounts were written in Alexandrian
times. Hercules was required to clean in one day the cattle barns of
King Augeas of Elis, which were filthy with the use of thirty years. To
do this, he turned through them the waters of the river Alpheus. Theo-
critus, telling the first part of the adventure, described the enormous
herds which gathered nightly in the barns. The Manual told the whole
story, adding that Hercules used also the Elian river Peneus.
Another exploit of Hercules was his victory over the birds of the
Stymphalian Lake in Arcadia. These creatures were armed with brazen
beaks and claws and with feathers that could be shot like arrows. They
fed on human flesh, presumably of their own killing. Athena provided
Hercules with a loud sounding rattle, which drove them into the air. He
then killed them, according to most accounts, with his arrows. Hellani-
cus mentioned this exploit, and Pherecydes and the Manual told it in
full. Apollonius declared that some of the birds escaped to an island of
the Black Sea and were found there by the Argonauts. Greek vase
painting and coins represented the birds as long-necked waterfowl of
variegated plumage.
Ovid mentioned also toil of Hercules in the Parthenian woods. By
this phrase Ovid alluded to his quest of the hind which often was called
Cerynitian, because it frequented the neighborhood of Cerynitia in
northern Arcadia. Different accounts were given of the animal's origin.
Pindar observed that a nymph Taygete presented it to Diana and that
it became sacred to the goddess. Callimachus declared that it was one
of five hinds larger than bulls that Diana discovered feeding near the
Arcadian river Anaurus. He added that she captured four, and the fifth
escaped northwards to the Cerynitian Hill.
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Apparently the early Greeks had received some account of rein-
deer, the only species in which antlers are grown by the hind, for antlers
were attributed regularly to the hind of Cerynitia. * Pindar observed
that the quest took Hercules far north, beyond the cold blasts of Boreas.
Other authors agreed that the quest was long, for it occupied more than
a year, but they thought of it as confined to southern Greece. They
added further details to the description of the animal. Euripides re-
ferred to the antlers as made of gold, Vergil spoke of brazen hoofs,
Quintus Smyrnaeus noted the hind's breathing out fire. Euripides ob-
served also that it ravaged the crops. He remarked that Hercules killed
it, and the Manual added that he shot it near Oenoe in Argolis. The
Manual stated further that Apollo and Diana at first reproved Her-
cules for injuring the sacred animal and opposed his return but finally
were mollified.
Ovid spoke next of the gold wrought belt secured from Thermodon,
alluding to the time when Hercules obtained a girdle of the Amazon
Queen Hippolyta. This tradition grew out of the historical fact that
occasionally in times of danger women have taken part in warfare.
Sometimes they merely put to death an enemy who temporarily was dis-
armed and incapable of resistance, as Judith is said to have killed Holo-
fernes, or Jael is reported to have killed Sisera. But at other times
they appear to have faced the perils and hardships of war. This was
true of Augustina, Maid of Saragoza, who was commemorated by
Southey and Byron, and of several women who fought more recently in
the armies of Dahomey.
During historical times women such as Boadicaea and Joan of Arc
occasionally have commanded armies. Their adventures interested not
only historians but also poets and novelists, and it was natural for
authors such as Fletcher, Schiller, and Mark Twain to present them in
a manner that was partly fictitious. But many authors introduced in
their stories warlike women who were entirely imaginary. The Iliad
told of several goddesses, one of them Venus, who took part in battles
near Troy and elsewhere. Vergil introduced into the war between
Aeneas and Turnus his famous warrior heroine Camilla. Leading poets
of the Renaissance gladly followed his example: Ariosto with his Brada-
mante and Marfisa, Tasso with Clorinda, and Spenser with Brito-
mart. And in the nineteenth century Scott revived the fashion, first in
*Some authors, apparently troubled by the fact, referred to the animal as a stag.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
his poem Harold the Dauntless and then in his novel Count Robert of
Paris.
All these were examples of individual women who took part in wars.
There also have been historical instances where a company of women
organized themselves to participate in warfare. During the eighth cen-
tury A. D. , a certain Ylasta led an army of warrior women in Bohemia,
and during the Great War there appeared the Russian Battalion of
Death. Prehistoric companies of warrior women probably suggested
the famous traditions of the Valkyries in northern Europe and the Ama-
zons in Greece.
The Amazons were described as a whole nation of women who lived
in Asia Minor, somewhere near the eastern end of the Black Sea. The
Iliad spoke of them as warring first against Troy and later against
Bellerophon. Aeschylus in his Prometheus Bound declared that the
Amazons originated somewhere in the north and migrated southwards to
the valley of the river Thermodon, near the modern city of Trebizond.
Herodotus and others spoke of this country as their home and told of
their inhabiting a town called Themiscyra. Many authors and artists
treated the theme of the Amazons, associating them especially with
adventures of Theseus and Hercules. Plutarch and others even gave
them a part in the Asiatic conquests of Alexander and Pompey.
The quest for Hippolyta's girdle appeared in sculpture of the
Athenian treasury at Delphi. Not long afterwards it was mentioned by
Euripides. In the HercuJss Furens he noted that Hercules attacked and
defeated an army of mounted Amazons near Lake Maeotis (the Sea of
Azov). Quintus Smyrnaeus added that Hercules pulled Queen Hippo-
lyta out of her saddle. Other Greek authors imagined a less violent pro-
cedure. According to Apollonius, Hercules captured Melanippe, a sister
of the queen, and obtained the girdle as her ransom. According to the
Manual, Hippolyta came voluntarily to Hercules and would have yielded
the girdle peaceably, if Juno had not caused the other Amazons to
attack him. Hercules, believing their demonstration had been planned
in advance, killed the queen.
Ovid's next allusion mentioned winning apples guarded by an un-
sleeping dragon. They usually were called the golden fruit of the
Hesperides. According to the Theogony, the Hesperides were nymphs
living far west, beyond the ocean, and guarding trees which bore golden
apples. Beginning with the fifth century B. C, Greek authors gave a
different account of them. They localized the Hesperides in northern
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
Africa, at the foot of the Atlas Mountains, and spoke of one tree,
round which there coiled an unsleeping dragon. According to Sophocles,
Euripides, and Apollonius, Hercules killed the dragon and gathered the
fruit. And this idea was repeated by most ancient authors who wrote
after Alexandrian times. But Pherecydes and the Manual thought of
the dragon as immortal. They declared that Hercules persuaded Atlas
to obtain the apples for him and meanwhile he himself assumed the duty
of holding up the sky. This idea appeared often in Greek art. Ovid in
his account of Perseus and Atlas (Bk. 4) had followed the poets, for he
noted a prediction that Hercules was to plunder the golden fruit. The
tree had also golden leaves, he added, and Atlas tried to protect it with
a high wall round the garden where it grew. In the complaint of Her-
cules, Ovid alluded to the same version of the tale. His reference to
winning apples from an unsleeping dragon implied that Hercules killed
the monster. But a few lines afterwards Ovid recalled the account in
the Manual and spoke of him as holding up the sky. This idea was in-
consistent not only with Ovid's previous allusion but also with his story
of Perseus transforming Atlas into a mountain. By the time of Her-
cules, Atlas would have been unable to go in quest of the fruit. It is an
odd circumstance that, although Ovid treated the theme of the golden
apples both in his account of Perseus and in his complaint of Hercules,
he never even alluded to the Hesperides.
Still another exploit was a victory over the centaurs. Sophocles
had referred to the adventure, and Euripides had spoken of it as occur-
ring in Thessaly. The Manual told the story. While Hercules was visit-
ing a centaur named Pholus, he persuaded him to include in the enter-
tainment part of the wine which the centaurs held in common. The other
centaurs, objecting to this appropriation of their property, made an
attack but were routed with arrows. During the combat both Pholus
and Ghiron suffered wounds which resulted in their death (cf. Ocyrhoe,
Bk. 2). Ovid had mentioned this victory in his Epistle of Deianira.
Ovid referred also to a boar that ravaged Arcadia. Sophocles had
mentioned the destruction of the beast. The Manual recorded the story.
The boar inhabited Mt. Erymanthus in Arcadia. Hercules pursued him
up the mountain beyond the treeline until the animal foundered in deep
snow, then threw a net over him and brought him back alive. Presumably
he afterwards killed the boar.
Pausanias observed that in his time the
tusks were shown in Apollo's temple at Cumae. Ovid already had men-
tioned the quest of the Erymanthian boar in his Epistle of Deianira.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
He spoke again of the battle with the hydra, which he had consid-
ered at greater length in the previous tale.
Ovid alluded also to King Diomed of Thrace. This king was no-
torious for his team of bloodthirsty horses. Euripides had given two
different accounts of them. In the Alcestis he described them as mares,
an idea repeated by the Manual and by Ovid in the Epistle of Deianira.
In the Hercules Furens he described them as stallions, an idea repeated
by Lucretius and by Ovid in the complaint of Hercules. According to
Euripides, the king fed his team with human flesh, probably the bodies
of those whom he put to death. Hercules overcame and captured the
formidable animals. The Manual added that he brought them to Greece
but that meanwhile Diomed tried to recover them and perished. Dio-
dorus declared that Hercules allowed the horses to kill and devour their
former master. But, according to another Greek tradition, Hercules
killed both Diomed and the horses in the stable. This idea was repeated
afterwards by Quintus Smyrnaeus. Ovid, alluding to the same version,
added that Diomed's mangers were full of human corpses.
Ovid made his last allusion to the adventure with the Nemean lion.
During prehistoric times, wild lions probably existed in all parts of
Greece (cf. Medea's Flight to Athens, Bk. 7). Tradition gave Hercules
two adventures with them, the first with a lion of Mt. Cithaeron near
Thebes, the second with the more famous Nemean lion of southern
Greece. But the Nemean lion usually was described as a more or less
supernatural animal. According to the Theogony, it frequented the
region of Nemea in Argolis and destroyed many human lives but suc-
cumbed at last to Hercules. Pindar noted that after the victory Her-
cules made it his custom to wear the head and skin of this lion, an idea
often repeated both in literature and in art.
Bacchylides recorded a few details of the conflict. Hercules first
attacked the lion with a sword but found the beast invulnerable. The
sword encountered bronze instead of flesh and bent back. He was obliged
to grapple with his enemy. Here Bacchylides accepted an idea common
in Greek lore, that, if an animal or a human being was invulnerable by
weapons, he still might perish by strangling or smothering. Another
instance Ovid recorded in his tale of Cycnus (Bk. 12). Euripides noted
that Hercules overcame the lion in his den.
The Manual added several particulars. Hercules encountered the
animal first in the open. He shot an arrow, which bounded off the lion's
skin, then attacked the beast with his club and drove it into the den.
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
Since there were two entrances, he built up one of them and afterwards
went in by the other and strangled the lion. Theocritus gave a pictur-
esque account of the adventure, in some details of which he appears to
have differed from all others. The lion, he said, was laying waste a
region near Pisa in Elis. After a long search, Hercules observed it
approaching the place where he waited in ambush. When two arrows
failed to stop the lion, he realized that it was invulnerable. As the lion
sprang at him, he struck it so hard with his club that the animal was
dazed. Then, attacking from behind, he trod on the lion's hind paws and
threw his arms round its neck. After strangling the lion, he endeavored
to remove the hide but could make no impression on it until at last he
tried the lion's own claws. Ovid, probably recalling the Manual, spoke
of Hercules as crushing the Nemean monster with his arms.
After recording the complaint of Hercules, Ovid proceeded to
describe his wild behavior. When Apollonius had recounted the fate of
Hylas, he spoke of Hercules as rushing hither and thither, like a bull
maddened with the stings of a gadfly. Vergil had compared Dido in love
with Aeneas to a hind which a shepherd has wounded, not aware that he
has done so, and which flees through woods and glades still carrying the
deadly shaft. Combining these ideas, Ovid likened Hercules to a bull,
when a hunter has wounded him and he has fled. He rushed wildly up
the side of Mt. Oeta, after roaring in agony, often endeavoring to tear
off the fateful garment, often uprooting great trees with his hands.
At this point Ovid introduced the encounter with Lichas. Evidently
the herald had fled a long way up the mountain and taken refuge under
a hollow rock. Hercules, proceeding in the same direction, observed him
and called him to account. Following Sophocles in the earlier part of
the affair, Ovid stressed the idea that Lichas tried to excuse himself.
Following Nicander in the latter part, he declared that the herald's
body was transformed into an island. With the Manual he noted that
it lay in the Euboic Sea. But he gave the tale particular interest for
his contemporaries by alluding to a recent scientific theory, taken prob-
ably from Varro. According to this idea, water, when lifted high in
air, dries and hardens, first into snow and then into hail. In a similar
manner, said Ovid, the body of Lichas, rising high in air, dried and
hardened into a piece of flint.
Sophocles and the Manual, recording the events at Trachin, had
included a strange incident. With a number of African tribes it is
customary for the son and heir to inherit his father's wives and concu-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
bines, with the exception of his own mother. The custom appears to have
been known among the prehistoric Greeks. Tradition recorded an ex-
ample in the family of Ulysses. After the death of that hero, Tela-
machus, his son by Penelope, espoused his former mistress Circe; and
Telegonus, his son by Circe, married his former wife Penelope. In
harmony with this idea Sophocles and the Manual declared that Her-
cules ordered Hyllus to marry Iole, and the Manual noted that Hyllus
did so. Since Ovid had avoided any mention of Hyllus and had omitted
the visit to Trachin, he said nothing at this point about a marriage of
Hyllus and Iole. But in the tale which followed he observerd, incon-
sistently, that by order of Hercules it had taken place.
Following the Manual, Ovid noted that Hercules built his own
funeral pyre; and, following Sophocles, he added that he persuaded
Philoctetes to light it and gave him in return his bow, which twice vis-
ited Troy. Ovid referred to the conquest of the city by Hercules, which
he intended to record in the tale of Hesione (Bk. 11), and to the arrival
of Philoctetes in the Troad, which he afterwards mentioned in the tale
of Ajax and Ulysses (Bk. 13).
According to the Odyssey, Hercules was transformed into an
Olympian god and married Hebe, the personification of eternal youth.
This idea became one of the most popular elements in the whole tradition
of that famous hero. In the drama called Children of Hercules, Euripides
related it to the story of the funeral pyre on Mt. Oeta. Hercules, he
observed, raising his soul from the dread flame, entered the charming
couch of Hebe. Greek tradition noted also that fire separated the mortal
part of Hercules from the immortal, an idea repeated afterwards by
Lucian. Propertius observed in harmony with this that on the heights
of Mt. Oeta, Hercules first knew the joys of godhead. And Ovid, re-
calling the same tradition, had remarked that Neptune took from Ino
and Melicerta whatever was mortal before transforming them into sea
deities (Bk. 4).
The Theogony had spoken of Hebe as daughter of Jupiter and
Juno. Since the time of the Iliad, Hercules had been regarded as the
son of Jupiter and Alcmena. In espousing Hebe, he took a wife whose
father was the same as his but whose mother was different. Marriage
of this kind often was permitted by the ancient Greeks (cf. Io, Bk. 1).
Euripides, calling attention to the idea, declared that Hymenaeus
thought two children of Jupiter worthy of each other. But this was
not the only version of the story, for Ovid observed in a subsequent tale
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
of Iolaiis that Hebe was only a stepdaughter of Jupiter, meaning prob-
ably a child of Juno without a father (cf. Semele and Jupiter, Bk. 3).
The idea that Hercules married Hebe would suggest that her
mother had become reconciled to him. This was implied often by the
older Greek poets, especially by Pindar. The Manual stated that a
reconciliation with Juno occurred immediately after Hercules arrived
on Mt. Olympus. Greek artists indicated that Juno even adopted him
as her son and that she symbolized the adoption by having him drink
milk from her breast.
In the tradition of several ancient peoples great men have been
transported supernaturally to heaven. The events indicated have been
as follows. The hero at first was in some open place and in broad day-
light, plainly observed by several witnesses. Then clouds enveloped him,
sometimes without concealing him from view; a chariot descended
through the clouds; and he was transported to his new home with the
immortals. So, according to the Old Testament, Elijah was conveyed
by a chariot and horses of fire and a whirlwind to heaven.
Usually the hero was transported from high ground. According to
Roman tradition, Romulus was on the Palatine Hill, when clouds sur-
rounded him and a celestial chariot carried him away to become the
god Quirinus. This tale Ovid treated both in his Metamorphoses
(Bk. 14) and in his Fasti. Apparently following Varro, he noted that
the hero's father, Mars, descended in a chariot and that Juno welcomed
the new deity in a council of the gods. A similar event was associated
with Hercules. The Manual stated that a cloud took the hero up from
Mt. Oeta and carried him away with peals of thunder to become a
heavenly god. Greek artists pictured him ascending in a four-horse
chariot. Already the tradition of Hercules was parallel in some respects
to that of Romulus. Ovid decided to make the parallel closer.
While developing many traditional ideas of supernatural ascent
and immortality, Ovid improved his account with congenial details sug-
gested by earlier Roman poets. Spreading the lion skin on the pyre, he
said, and setting the club across it for a pillow, Hercules lay down.
Horace, when he told of Regulus departing to a death by torture, ob-
served that he acted as unconcerned as if he were leaving for a vacation
in the country. Ovid noted that Hercules lay down on the pyre as
calmly as if he were commencing a banquet. Ovid then invented an inci-
dent in the heavens. The gods, who were assembled in council, mani-
fested alarm at the fate of earth's defender. Jupiter expressed his glad-
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
ness at their feeling solicitude for his son and proceeded to reassure
them. The flame should devour only the mortal portion of Hercules,
which he received from his mother. The portion that came from his
father was to be immortal, and soon he was to be received on the
heavenly shores. Jupiter expressed the hope that all would rejoice in
his rewarding Hercules with divinity and added that, even if anyone
present were to grudge the bestowal of this reward, he must admit at
least that it was deserved. Juno seemed displeased at the allusion to
her former hostility -- presumably because she now was reconciled and
shared the good will of the rest.
The flames of the pyre, Ovid continued, had now taken away the
former appearance of Hercules and given him one which was new and
better. Both Tibullus and Vergil had spoken of the snake as putting off
his old state and being new. Vergil had noted in his Georgics how the
Calabrian viper, putting off his skin, glides away new and shining with
youth. In the Aeneid he repeated the passage almost verbatim to de-
scribe Pyrrhus in his fresh armor. Ovid, recalling both Tibullus and
Vergil, used the idea more aptly to describe the transformation of Her-
cules. The hero took on new brilliance, as the snake, when it has put off
old age with its skin, becomes new, rejoices, and shines in gleaming scales.
Horace, predicting his own immortal fame, had made the following
boast. Not all of me shall die. A mighty part of me shall escape the
goddess of death, and I shall keep growing in the praise of later times.
Ovid, recalling Horace, observed that the better part of Hercules es-
caped death and grew to even more heroic size.
The hero's father, Jupiter, descended in a chariot with four horses
and conveyed him up through clouds to find a place among the stars. Al-
though this last phrase may have been merely figurative, Ovid seems to
have remembered the idea that Hercules became a constellation of that
name. He noted that Atlas felt the added weight, again forgetting that
Atlas had become a mountain. After this impressive event, it might have
been inconsistent to add the traditional marriage with Hebe. It certainly
would have been an anticlimax. Ovid ended the story with the deification
of Hercules, but afterwards in the tale of Iolaiis he spoke of Hebe as
yielding to her husband's request.
After Ovid's time the subject of Hercules continued to interest
many authors and artists. Although numerous other treatments of the
subject were available and some of them were clearer, especially in their
account of the exploits, Ovid's narrative became and remained the most
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? NESSUS AND THE DEATH OF HERCULES
accessible and the best known. We always may assume that it was
familiar to men of later times and that it encouraged them when they
sought elsewhere for further details. This observation would be true
notably of Lucan in his famous account of Hercules and Antaeus, of
Boccacio in his De Natura Deorum, and of several authors who intro-
duced Hercules into medieval romances. The French poetical romance
of Alexander described Alexander's tent as adorned with designs repre-
senting exploits of Hercules. A French prose romance treated the ex-
ploits at some length*. It spoke of Hercules as acting in the service of
a Boeotian princess, and it gave many of his labors a medieval form. For
example, it presented Pluto as king of a dismal castle, which was
guarded by a giant named Cerberus. Late in the fifteenth century, Pietro
Bassi wrote an Italian prose romance called The Toils of Hercules,
which Villana translated into Spanish, and Perillos wrote an Italian
poetical romance called Twelve Labors of Hercules. Recollection of
Ovid encouraged Shakespeare's frequent allusions to Hercules as typical
of strength and valor.
Ovid's effect in these examples appears to have been merely remote
and general. But on many authors it was also direct and particular.
However much they may have taken from others, they took at least a
few details from him. This was true of Seneca in his tragedies called
Hercules Furens and Hercules on Mt.
