Hera

Callisto lived in the wilds of Arcadia as a companion of Artemis, sharing the goddess’s clothing and hunting life. She had sworn to remain a virgin. Zeus desired her. He approached her in the form of Artemis, or, in another account, Apollo. Callisto was not alarmed by the familiar appearance, and Zeus had intercourse with her. Some accounts say that she resisted him. Another says that she willingly slept with him.

Callisto became pregnant and tried to conceal it. When Artemis and her companions went to bathe after hunting, Callisto held back. The others stripped her, and her pregnancy was exposed. Hera then discovered the affair. In anger, she changed Callisto into a bear. Her hands became rounded and armed with claws, her mouth became a set of jaws, and her voice became a growl. Her human nature remained, so she mourned her fate and wandered near her former haunts, frightened by the woods and by hunting dogs.

Callisto gave birth to a son, Arcas. When he had grown and was hunting, Hera brought the bear before him. Arcas was about to shoot, not knowing that the animal was his mother. Zeus seized Callisto before the shot and placed her among the stars, where she became the Great Bear. He later placed Arcas beside her as the Lesser Bear.

Hera was angered that Callisto had received this honour. She persuaded the god of the sea to prevent the two bears from descending into the ocean like the other stars. They alone among the constellations never pass below the horizon.

Hera confronted Zeus in the assembly of the gods after he gave birth to Athena without her. She condemned the act as a fresh humiliation and questioned how he had dared to produce a daughter alone. She argued that she, who was called his wife, should have been able to bear Athena herself. Then she withdrew from the gods for a year.

Hera sought revenge by appealing to Gaia, Uranus and the Titans. She asked them to give her a son stronger than Zeus. Her purpose was to produce a monster who could overthrow him. Unlike the birth of Athena, this child would come from Hera alone. She became pregnant when the ground struck her.

Hera brought forth Typhon, also called Typhaon, or Typhoeus in one passage. She gave the infant to the serpent Python to raise. Typhon grew into a powerful monster and became a major problem for mortals. His birth formed part of Hera’s attempt to answer the dishonour she believed Zeus had inflicted on her.

Other accounts describe Typhon as terrible, outrageous and anarchic. Hesiod gives him a hundred snake heads on his shoulders, with fire and many kinds of commotion issuing from them. In the account where Hera bears him, however, the central action is her angry appeal, her solitary pregnancy and her decision to place the child in Python’s care.

Zeus changed the nymph Io into a cow to hide her from Hera after pursuing her. Hera saw through the deception and obtained the animal from Zeus. She placed Io under the guard of Argus Panoptes, a watchman with a hundred eyes. Argus tethered Io to an olive tree, either at Nemea or in the grove of Hera, and watched her closely. Only two of his eyes closed at once, so he remained nearly always awake.

Zeus sent Hermes to release Io. Hermes knew that he could not take her while Argus's eyes were open. He therefore played music and spoke in a slow, monotonous manner. Some of Argus's eyes closed, but others stayed awake. At last Hermes told a story about Pan and the nymph Syrinx. Syrinx fled from Pan and was changed into reeds by her sister nymphs. Pan made a shepherd's pipe from the reeds, joining them with beeswax. Argus found the story so tiring that all his eyes fell asleep.

Hermes then killed Argus and released Io. Some accounts say that he struck Argus with a boulder and cut off his head. Hera took the eyes of her slain watchman and set them in the tail feathers of her favourite peacock. She also filled the tail with jewels in his memory. In another account, the eyes were placed there as a lasting reminder of Argus's service to her. Hera later sent a gadfly to sting Io and drive her across the world.

Poseidon dried the streams of his judges, leaving Argolis in a prolonged drought. He and Hera had disputed possession of Argos, contests that concerned the special cultic honours granted by its inhabitants. Poseidon refused to appear before his fellow Olympians. He said that they were prejudiced against him. Zeus therefore referred the dispute to the river-gods Inachus, Cephissus, and Asterion. They judged in Hera’s favour.

Poseidon had been forbidden to avenge himself with a flood, as he had done in an earlier dispute. He chose the opposite punishment. He dried the streams belonging to the judges, so that the Argive rivers no longer flowed during the summer. The effect included the Inachos, Cephissus, and Asterion. In the account, these rivers run dry while the river of Lerna continues to flow.

Danaus later found Argolis suffering from this drought. Amymone, one of his daughters and one of the Danaids, was among those distressed by the lack of water. For her sake, Poseidon caused Lerna to flow perpetually. Lerna therefore kept a lasting supply of water when the other Argive rivers did not.

After Lerna received this exception, Hera’s claim over Argos was established. Poseidon’s punishment remained upon the rivers whose divine judges had supported her. The account does not describe the judges’ exact decision or the manner in which Hera established her claim. It states that the perpetual flow of Lerna relieved Amymone, while the other streams of Argolis continued to fail in summer.

The gadfly plunged at Io after Hermes had killed Argus and released her. Hera had set the creature upon her in anger. It was larger than a crow, with a sting as long as a spur. Its buzzing filled the air as it stabbed Io’s flanks and dragged the sting through her flesh. The pain tore at the boundary of her cow’s form, and her human voice mingled with the animal’s cries. Hermes tried to drive the insect away with his lyre, but the gadfly continued its pursuit.

Io had been a priestess of Hera and was associated with Argos. Zeus desired her and changed her into a white cow when Hera discovered them. He then gave the animal to Hera, who placed her under the guard of Argus Panoptes. Argus had a hundred eyes and never closed more than two while sleeping. Hermes put all of them to sleep with music, then killed him and freed Io. Hera placed Argus’s eyes on the tail of a peacock in memory of his service.

Driven by the gadfly, Io fled across many lands. She first reached Dodona and then came to the sea that took the name Ionian from her. She turned north towards Mount Haemus, passed through the Danube delta, and travelled around the Black Sea. She crossed the Crimean Bosphorus, whose name was linked with the crossing of the cow, and followed the River Hybristes towards its source in the Caucasus. The pursuit continued until Io reached Egypt. The accounts do not describe the same place for every stage of her flight, but they agree that Hera’s gadfly forced her into a long wandering after Argus’s death.

As Hera was born, Cronus took the child and swallowed her. He feared an old prophecy that one of his children would overthrow him and take his power. The warning had come from his father, Uranus, and from Gaia, his mother. Cronus had married his sister Rhea, and each child she bore became a threat in his eyes.

Hestia and Demeter had already been consumed. Hera was the third of the children to suffer this fate. Cronus swallowed her alive, keeping her trapped within him so that she could not grow strong enough to challenge his rule. After Hera came Hades and Poseidon, whom Cronus also swallowed at birth.

Rhea was distressed by what her husband did to their children. She could not prevent him, because Cronus was stronger than she was. She had to show each infant to him, and each time he opened his mouth and swallowed the child. Rhea was left bereaved, while Cronus believed that he had secured his reign.

When Rhea later became pregnant with her sixth child, Zeus, she feared that Cronus would swallow him as well. Gaia understood Rhea’s grief and told her that she had a plan to save the child. Rhea then bore Zeus in secret, with the accounts placing his birth either on Mount Lycaeum in Arcadia or inside a cave on Mount Ida in Crete. She gave Cronus a stone wrapped in baby clothing, and he swallowed it without checking what he had been given.

Hera drove Athamas and Ino mad because they took in Dionysus, Zeus’s child by Semele. Semele died when Zeus appeared before her with lightning and thunder, but Zeus rescued the unborn child from the fire and carried him to term. Hermes took Dionysus to Athamas and Ino and persuaded them to raise him as a girl. In one telling, Persephone entrusted Dionysus to them, and they hid him in the women’s quarters. Hera saw through the disguise and sent madness upon them.

Athamas seized Learchus and cried that he saw a white stag. He shot the boy with an arrow and tore his body into pieces. Ino seized her younger son, Melicertes, and fled. Dionysus temporarily blinded Athamas, so Athamas beat a she-goat instead of Ino. Ino reached the Molurian Rock and leapt into the sea with Melicertes. She drowned, and Zeus made her the goddess Leucothea. He made Melicertes the god Palaemon.

Zeus ordered Hermes to remove Dionysus from danger. Hermes changed the child into a kid or a ram and gave him to the nymphs Macris, Nysa, Erato, Bromie, and Bacche on Mount Nysa in Helicon. They cared for him in a cave and fed him honey. In another telling, Athamas killed Learchus after he discovered that Ino had deceived him.

Each year, Hera bathed in the spring of Canathus near Argos and renewed her virginity. The water returned her to the condition she had possessed before her marriage to Zeus. After the bathing, she became a maiden again, although she had already lived as Zeus’s wife. Her return to the spring marked the passage from her married state back to maidenhood.

Hera’s womanhood remained tied to her relationship with Zeus. It included the state before marriage, the union that completed the marriage, and the state that followed separation. Her annual bathing began the cycle again. It did not happen only once at the start of her life. Each year, after her married life, she went to Canathus and regained the virginity she had possessed before the marriage.

A tradition at Stymphalos gave names to the different conditions of Hera’s life. She had three temples there. One honoured her as the Girl, another as the Fulfilled, and another as the Separated. These names marked the stages before marriage, within marriage, and after separation. The spring at Canathus returned Hera to the first of these states. After she bathed there, she was once again a maiden, and the yearly change from married womanhood to maidenhood was complete.

Hera went to find Zeus after suspecting that he was visiting one of the nymphs. She examined the nymphs to discover which one had attracted his attention. Echo diverted her with lively conversation. Hera listened, amused by Echo’s chatter, while the other nymphs quietly escaped. Hera therefore learned nothing about where Zeus had gone or which nymph he favoured.

Echo was a wood nymph who loved the woods and hills. She took part in woodland sports and, in one account, attended Artemis during the chase. She enjoyed talking, telling stories, and arguing. Her companions admired her, but she always made sure that she had the last word. Her speech held Hera’s attention while Zeus’s companions slipped away.

When Hera understood what had happened, she punished Echo. The goddess took away her power to begin a conversation. Echo could use her voice only to repeat words spoken by someone else. Hera told her that she would always have the last word, but would never have the power to speak first. Echo could still answer, but she could not address anyone in her own words.

The punishment became especially painful when Echo fell in love with Narcissus, a beautiful youth whom she saw as he hunted in the mountains. She followed him and longed to speak to him in gentle words. She could not begin a conversation, however, and could only repeat what he or anyone else said. The curse left her unable to tell Narcissus what she felt.

Zeus changed himself into a bedraggled cuckoo and fluttered into Hera’s bosom on Mount Thornax near Hermione. Hera took pity on the bird and warmed it against her breast. Zeus then resumed his true shape and ravished her. Shame drove Hera to marry him. In one telling, Zeus sought her at Knossos in Crete. In another, he found her on Mount Thornax in Argolis after Cronus had been banished, and she first refused his courtship.

Hera was born on Samos or at Argos. Temenus, son of Pelasgus, raised her in Arcadia, and the Seasons nursed her. After the wedding, all the gods brought gifts. Mother Earth gave Hera a tree with golden apples, which the Hesperides later guarded in Hera’s orchard on Mount Atlas. Hera and Zeus spent their wedding night on Samos, and it lasted three hundred years.

In another telling, Hera and Zeus first united in secret, concealed from their parents. They embraced on the peak of Mount Ida, within a sacred precinct, while a storm cloud gathered around the mountain top. Hera remained a strong and wilful partner rather than a silent bride. Their union brought together the wedding, its consummation, and the separation that later marked Hera’s story.

The marriage was later evoked during the Plataean festival of the Daidala, although the wedding did not form a complete sequence of events there. The Cretans placed the union near Knossos, beside the river Theren, at a sanctuary where sacrifices took place each year and the marriage was imitated. The closeness of that imitation was not known.