LP0053 - The Thirteenth Labor - The Life & Labors of Heracles, from Tzetzes' Chiliades

Legendary Passages #0053 - The Thirteenth Labor -
The Life & Labors of Heracles, from Tzetzes' Chiliades.

Last time we reviewed the Augean Stables, and Heracles' later attack on the kingdom. This time we hear the first half of a sort of ancient encyclopedia entry on Heracles, covering his early adventures and labors.

First, the origin of Heracles' mother Alcmene, and her encounter with Zeus. When she was about to give birth, Zeus decreed that the next born descendant of Perseus would rule as king, but that turned out to be Eurystheus instead.

Heracles grew up to be a strong young man, but when he killed his music teacher, he was sent away into the countryside. In defense of his cows, he kills the Cithaeronian Lion and wears its skin. Meanwhile, he accomplishes what some authors call his thirteenth labor, and sleeps with the fifty daughters of Thespeus.

Heracles returns to Thebes, kills King Erginus, ends the tribute to the Minyans, and marries Princess Megara. But he goes mad and kills their children, and agrees to serve King Erystheus to absolve him of this crime.

He accomplishes many labors: The Nemean Lion, The Learnean Hydra, The Ceryneian Hind, The Erymanthian Boar, The Augean Stables, The Stymphalian Birds, The Cretan Bull, The Mares of Diomedes, and retrieving The Girdle of Hippolyta from the Amazons. The passage continues, but must wait for a future episode.

Next time we review the labors of The Birds and the Boar.

http://www.theoi.com/Text/TzetzesChiliades2.html#4

The Thirteenth Labor,
a Legendary Passage,
from Tzetzes' Chiliades,
translated by Gary Berkowitz.

Book 2 [157] - [320]

2.4 CONCERNING HERACLES (STORY 36)

Heracles, the son of Alcmene, belonged to Amphitryon.

By one account, he was called Amphitryon's son,
But in truth, he was the son of Zeus, a lord, and astrologer.
With regard to how they used to call
all kings Zeuses, I spoke.
This Zeus, having mingled, even, with women that met him,
Women who they also call mortals, made offspring from them.
That they used to call the women that met him mortals,
And queens goddesses, even Ptolemy writes
In his Tetrabiblos, writing to Syrus:
"As many men as have an Aphrodite belonging to their family,
Are mingling with such divine and eminent destinies."
And so that magic astrologer king
Had, from different women, countless children.

When, because of Zeus,
both Alcmene was at the time of parturition,
And about to bear a son Heracles to Zeus then,
And Archippe was pregnant then to Zeus
Except that the child, Eurystheus,
was going to be the result of an incomplete seven-month birth,
That king Zeus, the great astrologer,
Then alone had been deceived.

For seeing the stars
All being well, and in kingly places,
And knowing that Alcmene was pregnant for nine months,
And that it was then the time for the baby's birth,
Not having considered beforehand
whether even then the baby was born,
Or Alcmene kept in the one, but the other was born incomplete,
Looking away to only the stars belonging to his family,
Gods wise and ruling,
this thing (Zeus says) I am speaking forth:
"The son who today was born mortal from my wife,
My queen, is going to take the scepter,
And rule all those born to me and to my mortal women."
In this way he spoke, thinking that Heracles was born.

But when this great-bodied son was being born,
And was surrounding all of the air of his mother,
Which they even said was the power of Hera
 that belonged to his family,
Rather, since even Iphicles
was being brought forth with Heracles,
Alcmene, in sore travail after some days
Gave birth in the tenth month.

But Archippe then
Gave birth to a seven month baby in the time of kingly stars.
His name was Eurystheus,
and for the rest of the time he was a lord over Heracles.

But in this way I allegorized rather learnedly;
And now I will speak more ethically in the manner of orators.
There was a Zeus, a king, childless because of custom,
But having mistresses, in Alcmene and Archippe,
who were pregnant.
Alcmene was to birth a nine-month baby,
but the other woman would give birth within the seventh month.
Held down by much love for Alcmene,
And knowing that in that time then,
Alcmene was going to give birth,
But that Archippe was hopeless with regard to giving birth,
Zeus wrote in dispositions under oath and namelessly:
"Whatever son that is born to me today, from whatever woman,
Must have the royal scepter and power."
And thusly, as I said before, when the births happened,
Eurystheus, who outran the months, held the scepter,
And drew Heracles into mighty slavery,
Leading, by destiny, the man who was entirely the strongest.

Pontic Herodorus says in writing that Heracles
Had a height of four fore-arms and one foot.
I think, however,
that everyone shouts out the strength attributes of the man.
For having killed someone with his lyre
while still being a boy,
He is sent,
by the hands of Amphitryon the father, to cowherds.

And while herding in Cithaeron at the age of eighteen,
He killed a lion that was devouring cows and dons the hide.
I, however, accept that wild lions are in no wise
In Thebes and Nemea and such places,
Unless, perhaps, driven mad out of some other places
as a sort of miracle they streamed in to what sort of places they speak.
And Thestius, knowing that he killed the lion,
entertains him as a guest.

Having fifty daughters from Megamede,
He made Heracles drunk
and had all of his daughters lay in bed with him
For as long as fifty nights, one daughter for each night,
In order that they might conceive with him,
and even bear children.

And after doing these things, Heracles even kills Erginus
Who had made war upon Thebes;
Heracles exacts tribute from Erginus' Minyans,
In return for which he received Megara from Creon.

Maddened and having burned Megara's children with fire,
Heracles heeded the oracular responses and went to Mycenae,
the city of Eurystheus,
Whom he serves, eventually accomplishing the twelve labors.

-

First, having shot the Nemean Lion with his bow,
he strangles it with his hands,
And brings its hide to Mycenae for Eurystheus.
Terrified at Heracles' irresistible power,
Eurystheus forbade his entrance into the city;
Instead, he bid Heracles to display all of his labors before the gates.

-

Secondly, Heracles kills the nine-headed Hydra of Lerna,
Which consisted of nine brothers
who were army-leaders and of one soul,
For whom even Crab was general, being an ally and a friend.
These men Heracles destroyed with toil and strength.
For when one was destroyed from this army,
Two others would peep out from the fortresses.
For these reasons,
most vexatiously Heracles scarcely took them,
While from another part lolaus burned the city;
Wherefore Eurystheus did not receive this labor favorably.

There is also a more true very ancient hydra,
Existing seven generations before the time of Heracles,
The fifty-headed one, and settler of Lerna.
When its head was cut off, two would appear instead.
Heracles, though not being present, destroyed it even then.
This hydra, though, is the heads of the children of Aegyptus,
Which the Danaids threw into the water of Lerna,
One after another, each woman bearing the head of another man.
They destroyed these men because of the deliberations of their father.

Later, since Lynceus alone escaped with his life
And struck together justice,
all of the women— through just reason
(Lynceus and Heracles, I say,
also obtained the glory of the land)
Had received the punishment befitting them.

Even the fifty-headed hydra is some sort of badness,
Accomplishing, many times, many occasions for deceits,
A hydra which Heracles, in the sense of reasoning,
kills with the help of lolaus,
A just man gladdening well thinking people.

But whereas these two hydras were inconvenient to Heracles,
The former was attached to the offspring of Alcmene.

-

Thirdly,
Heracles held down with his feet the hind of golden horns,
Which Taygete consecrated as a sacred hind of Artemis,
After adorning its horns with gold and epigrams.

-

Then, Heracles goes to the Erymanthian Boar.

He performed secondary work in killing all of the centaurs together.
For Pholus the centaur entertains Heracles,
Having opened up the common jar of the wine of the Centaurs.
And they, upon arriving, were grievously pressing upon Pholus,
Whence Heracles killed them with his bow.
The affairs of the Centaurs, though,
I will allegorize subtly when it is necessary.

But the boar was ruining Phocis in every way.
Having pursued it out of the thicket
to a place of excessive snow,
Heracles bound it with slip-knots
and brought it, living, to Mycenae.

-

Fifth,
Heracles was carrying out the dung of the three thousand cows
That belonged to the lord of the Eleans, Augeas, Phorbas' son
(Or the son of Poseidon, or of Helios according to others).

In any event, having been promised
that he could take a tenth of these cows alive,
and having turned the river Alpheus towards the cattle-fold,
Heracles cleaned out the dung in the shortest amount of time.

But when Augeas did not give what was promised to Heracles,
Phyleus, having dared to speak against him:
"how unjust you are, O father,"
Settled in Dulichium as he was ostracized in Augea;
But Heracles, as he was tricked, laid waste to Elis.

But later, and not in the time immediately after,
Eurystheus did not accept the cleansing of the dung,
Saying that it was for a tenth of the cows
and therefore a wage.

-

For the sixth labor,
both with a bronze rattle and his bow, Heracles kills birds,
Having shot them with feathered arrows in the marshy Stymphalian Lake.

-

For the seventh labor, after overpowering the Cretan Bull,
Heracles carries it away while it was still alive,
Whether it was the bull that carried Europa across to Crete,
Or the one Poseidon brought out from the sea,
Which grew extraordinarily wild and was damaging Crete,
And which Eurystheus sent away free.

Going through Marathon,
the bull was a thing of damage to the people of Attica.

-

The eighth labor,
involving the man-slaying horses of Diomedes,
king of the Bistonians and son of Cyrene and Ares,
led Heracles by the sea.
And the armed soldiers running together,
all of those belonging to Diomedes,
Heracles killed, including that man.

But Abderus, the son of Erinus and a friend of Heracles,
Was rent in pieces by the horses,
who ate him with their teeth.
Abderus was from Locrian Opus, and a keeper of these horses;
Heracles, after he placed the city Abdera
over the body of Abderus,
Later conveyed the horses to Eurystheus;
But dwelling in Olympus,
the horses supplied food by beasts of prey.

-

For the ninth labor,
Heracles runs after the girdle of Hippolyta
Since Admete, the daughter of Eurystheus, wanted it.

With one ship, Heracles was carried across to the Amazons,
And in the coasting voyage,
after destroying all of Bebrycia together,
Heracles gives the land to Mysian Lycus, the son of Deipylus,
But only after Heracles defeated the brothers Amycus and Mygdon.
Lycus calls the city of these people Heraclea,
Honoring Heracles, the one who cheerfully gave the place.

But Heracles, having sailed to Themiscyra itself,
Defeated the Amazons and took the girdle.

In passing, he rescues Hesione from the sea monster.
Then, the guest-slaying sons of Proteus,
Tmolus and Telegonus, Heracles kills after he wrestled them down.

http://www.theoi.com/Text/TzetzesChiliades2.html#4