Hercules

Hercules is the Roman equivalent of the Greek Divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena.

In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures.

The Romans adapted the Greek hero's iconography and myths for their literature and art under the name Hercules.

In later Western art and literature and in popular culture, Hercules is more commonly used than Heracles as the name of the hero.

Hercules is a multifaceted figure with contradictory characteristics, which enabled later artists and writers to pick and choose how to represent him.

This article provides an introduction to representations of Hercules in the later tradition.

In Roman mythology, although Hercules was seen as the champion of the weak and a great protector, his personal problems started at birth.

Juno sent two witches to prevent the birth, but they were tricked by one of Alcmene's servants and sent to another room.

Juno then sent serpents to kill him in his cradle, but Hercules strangled them both.

In one version of the myth, Alcmene abandoned her baby in the woods in order to protect him from Juno's wrath, but he was found by the goddess Minerva who brought him to Juno, claiming he was an orphan child left in the woods who needed nourishment.

Juno suckled Hercules at her own breast until the infant bit her nipple, at which point she pushed him away, spilling her milk across the night sky and so forming the Milky Way.

She then gave the infant back to Minerva and told her to take care of the baby herself.

In feeding the child from her own breast, the goddess inadvertently imbued him with further strength and power.

The Latin name Hercules was borrowed through Etruscan, where it is represented variously as Heracle, Hercle, and other forms.

Hercules was a favorite subject for Etruscan art, and appears often on bronze mirrors.

The Etruscan form Herceler derives from the Greek Heracles via syncope.

A mild oath invoking Hercules (Hercule! or Mehercle!) was a common interjection in Classical Latin.

Hercules had a number of myths that were distinctly Roman.

One of these is Hercules' defeat of Cacus, who was terrorizing the countryside of Rome.

The hero was associated with the Aventine Hill through his son Aventinus.

Mark Antony considered him a personal patron god, as did the emperor Commodus.

Hercules received various forms of religious veneration, including as a deity concerned with children and childbirth, in part because of myths about his precocious infancy, and in part because he fathered countless children.

Roman brides wore a special belt tied with the "knot of Hercules", which was supposed to be hard to untie.

The comic playwright Plautus presents the myth of Hercules' conception as a sex comedy in his play Amphitryon; Seneca wrote the tragedy Hercules Furens about his bout with madness.

During the Roman Imperial era, Hercules was worshipped locally from Hispania through Gaul.

Tacitus records a special affinity of the Germanic peoples for Hercules.

In chapter 3 of his Germania, Tacitus states:

Some have taken this as Tacitus equating the Germanic Þunraz with Hercules by way of interpretatio romana.

In the Roman era Hercules' Club amulets appear from the 2nd to 3rd century, distributed over the empire (including Roman Britain, cf. Cool 1986), mostly made of gold, shaped like wooden clubs.

A specimen found in Köln-Nippes bears the inscription "DEO HER [culi]", confirming the association with Hercules.

In the 5th to 7th centuries, during the Migration Period, the amulet is theorized to have rapidly spread from the Elbe Germanic area across Europe.

These Germanic "Donar's Clubs" were made from deer antler, bone or wood, more rarely also from bronze or precious metals.

The amulet type is replaced by the Viking Age Thor's hammer pendants in the course of the Christianization of Scandinavia from the 8th to 9th century.

After the Roman Empire became Christianized, mythological narratives were often reinterpreted as allegory, influenced by the philosophy of late antiquity.

In the 4th century, Servius had described Hercules' return from the underworld as representing his ability to overcome earthly desires and vices, or the earth itself as a consumer of bodies.

In medieval mythography, Hercules was one of the heroes seen as a strong role model who demonstrated both valor and wisdom, while the monsters he battles were regarded as moral obstacles.

One glossator noted that when Hercules became a constellation, he showed that strength was necessary to gain entrance to Heaven.

Medieval mythography was written almost entirely in Latin, and original Greek texts were little used as sources for Hercules' myths.

The Renaissance and the invention of the printing press brought a renewed interest in and publication of Greek literature.

Renaissance mythography drew more extensively on the Greek tradition of Heracles, typically under the Romanized name Hercules, or the alternate name Alcides.