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Question 1

Heracles name in latin

Answer 1

hercules

Question 2

heracles’s labors center around?

Answer 2

Argos and Mycenae

Question 3

Perseus

Answer 3

ounder and king of Mycenae, fathers Electryon, Alcaeus, Sthenelus

Question 4

Electryon

Answer 4

Perseus’s son - fathered 9
sons and a daughter named Alcmena

Question 5

who kills Electryon’s 9 sons

Answer 5

pirates

Question 6

Alcaeus’s son

Answer 6

Amphitryon (good)

Question 7

Sthenelus’s son

Answer 7

Eurystheus (bad)

Question 8

Electryon, king of Mycenae, entrusts Alcmena to his nephew to fight the pirates

Answer 8

Amphitryon

Question 9

Amphitryon there marries Alcmena, but she won’t have sex with
him until

Answer 9

he avenges her dead brothers

Question 10

Zues’s trick to sleep with Alcmena

Answer 10

disguises humself as a twin of Amphitryon

Question 11

Alcmena’s twins

Answer 11

• Heracles, son of Zeus.
• Iphicles, son of Amphitryon.

Question 12

When Alcmena is due to deliver the babies

Answer 12

Zeus boasts that a child
of his seed would be born who would rule all the surrounding
lands.

Question 13

Zeus then tricked by Hera

Answer 13

who makes him swear that a son of his
born that day would be king

Question 14

Hera then stops Alcmena’s labor

Answer 14

and induces the birth of
Alcmena’s cousin Eurystheus (grandson of Perseus, who was a son
of Zeus)

Question 15

Zeus angry but acknowledges Hera’s success

Answer 15

Eurystheus will rule
and not Heracles

Question 16

Heracles’ name also a joke:

Answer 16

“Glory of Hera”, “Glorious Hero”

Question 17

Hera sends big snakes to kill baby Heracles

Answer 17

Heracles strangles them in his crib.
– His divine parentage now realized.

Question 18

Zeus insists that Hera nurse baby Heracles.
• Baby Heracles bites her nipple, and immediately she pulls him away.

Answer 18

Her milk spray = The Milky Way (!)

Question 19

heracles’s first wife

Answer 19

Megara

Question 20

Driven mad by Hera, heracles

Answer 20

he kills his wife Megara and their three sons in a
violent spasm.
• A hero can be a danger to his own

Question 21

Heracles goes to Delphi

Answer 21

to ask the oracle how to atone for his horrible crime.
• He is told he must serve Eurystheus (whom Hera had caused to be born before
him, thereby tricking Zeus) and perform 12 labors for him.

Question 22

The Greek word for the labors

Answer 22

‘contests’ (athloi) < our word
athletics.

Question 23

First Labor:

Answer 23

Nemean Lion

Question 24

Lion’s skin

Answer 24

too tough for arrows to penetrate, his head breaks
Heracles’ club into pieces

Question 25

Strength is Heracles’ defining quality, but here he’s also clever. (lion)

Answer 25

Heracles strangles the lion with bare hands, Uses lion’s own claw to skin him, then wears the lion skin as a cape, with the head over his head as a helmet. • Cleverness allows him to utilize skin • Defensive armor, forever after part of his iconography • Makes a new club, as important as lion skin in art

Question 26

Second Labor

Answer 26

Lernaean Hydra

Question 27

Lernaean Hydra

Answer 27

Water serpent with many heads

Question 28

Iolaüs

Answer 28

Hercules nephew that accompanies him, Hero’s male companion (compare Enkidu), but important in only a few stories of Heracles

Question 29

Iolaüs, thinking fast

Answer 29

uses a blazing torch to cauterize the stump of a head before it could grow back. – Each head then cauterized in turn. – Brawn and brains needed for this labor too!

Question 30

Heracles dips his arrows in what'ss blood, so poisonous that a drop could kill a man

Answer 30

Hydra

Question 31

When hunting the boar

Answer 31

Heracles visits with Pholus the Centaur – Centaur = half-man, half-horse, usually friendly.

Question 32

Heracles insists on having some wine that Pholus says belongs to the other Centaurs

Answer 32

They smell him drinking it, and violence ensues. • Head Centaur Chiron struck with poisoned arrow (not Heracles’ enemy!) • <> • Makes Centaurs his enemies for life (will matter later). • Pholus tests the tip of one of these clever arrows and pricks his finger with it and dies! • Hero as danger to his own, again!

Question 33

Fifth Labor:

Answer 33

Augean Stables

Question 34

Augean Stables

Answer 34

Heracles diverts 2 rivers and flushes the stables in one day

Question 35

1st six labors are all in

Answer 35

Peloponnese

Question 36

First 6 labors all set in the Peloponnese, relatively close to Mycenae

Answer 36

Shows development of the story: a few labors became 6, then 10, then 12?, Shows development of Heracles from mortal hero to immortal who can overcome death. • And from local hero to Panhellenic hero.

Question 37

Seventh Labor

Answer 37

Cretan Bull

Question 38

Cretan Bull

Answer 38

Capture (but not kill?) the Cretan Bull. • Heracles has to sail to Crete (i.e., leave Greece), the beginning of his worldwide reputation. • The travel appears to be the greatest significance of this labor. • Grabs bull by the horns, throws it in the sea, rides it back to Mycenae to show to Copreus. • Bull later escapes, ends up being killed by Theseus. • Wild bulls a theme that unites Heracles with Theseus and Crete (more soon)