The Hero with a Thousand Faces

by Joseph Campbell

  The tyrant is proud, and therein resides his doom. He is proud because he thinks of his strength as his own; thus he is in the clown role, as a mistaker of shadow for substance; it is his destiny to be tricked. The mythological hero, reappearing from the darkness that is the source of the shapes of the day, brings a knowledge of the secret of the tyrant’s doom. With a gesture as simple as the pressing of a button, he annihilates the impressive configuration. The hero-deed is a continuous shattering of the crystallizations of the moment. The cycle rolls: mythology focuses on the growing-point. Transformation, fluidity, not stubborn ponderosity, is the characteristic of the living God. The great figure of the moment exists only to be broken, cut into chunks, and scattered abroad. Briefly: the ogre-tyrant is the champion of the prodigious fact, the hero the champion of creative life.

  Figure 73. The Pharaoh Narmer Slays a Defeated Foe (carved schist, Old Kingdom, Egypt, c. 3100 b.c.)

  The world period of the hero in human form begins only when villages and cities have expanded over the land. Many monsters remaining from primeval times still lurk in the outlying regions, and through malice or desperation these set themselves against the human community. They have to be cleared away. Furthermore, tyrants of human breed, usurping to themselves the goods of their neighbors, arise, and are the cause of widespread misery. These have to be suppressed. The elementary deeds of the hero are those of the clearing of the field.

  Kut-o-yis, or “Blood Clot Boy,” when he had been taken from the pot and had grown to manhood in a day, slew the murderous son-in-law of his foster parents, then proceeded against the ogres of the countryside. He exterminated a tribe of cruel bears, with the exception of one female who was about to become a mother. “She pleaded so pitifully for her life, that he spared her. If he had not done this, there would have been no bears in the world.” Then he slaughtered a tribe of snakes, but again with the exception of one “who was about to become a mother.” Next he deliberately walked along a road which he had been told was dangerous.

  As he was going along, a great windstorm struck him and at last carried him into the mouth of a great fish. This was a sucker-fish and the wind was its sucking. When he got into the stomach of the fish, he saw a great many people. Many of them were dead, but some were still alive. He said to the people, “Ah, there must be a heart somewhere here. We will have a dance.” So he painted his face white, his eyes and mouth with black circles, and tied a white rock knife on his head, so that the point stuck up. Some rattles made of hoofs were also brought. Then the people started in to dance. For a while Blood Clot sat making wing-motions with his hands, and singing songs. Then he stood up and danced, jumping up and down until the knife on his head struck the heart. Then he cut the heart down. Next he cut through between the ribs of the fish, and let all the people out.

  Again Blood Clot said he must go on his travels. Before starting, the people warned him, saying that after a while he would see a woman who was always challenging people to wrestle with her, but that he must not speak to her. He gave no heed to what they said, and, after he had gone a little way, he saw a woman who called him to come over. “No,” said Blood Clot. “I am in a hurry.” However, at the fourth time the woman asked him to come over, he said, “Yes, but you must wait a little while, for I am tired. I wish to rest. When I have rested, I will come over and wrestle with you.” Now, while he was resting, he saw many large knives sticking up from the ground almost hidden by straw. Then he knew that the woman killed the people she wrestled with by throwing them down on the knives. When he was rested, he went on. The woman asked him to stand up in the place where he had seen the knives; but he said, “No, I am not quite ready. Let us play a little, before we begin.” So he began to play with the woman, but quickly caught hold of her, threw her upon the knives, and cut her in two.

  Blood Clot took up his travels again, and after a while came to a camp where there were some old women. The old women told him that a little farther on he would come to a woman with a swing, but on no account must he ride with her. After a time he came to a place where he saw a swing on the bank of a swift stream. There was a woman swinging on it. He watched her a while, and saw that she killed people by swinging them out and dropping them into the water. When he found this out, he came up to the woman. “You have a swing here; let me see you swing,” he said. “No,” said the woman, “I want to see you swing.” “Well,” said Blood Clot, “but you must swing first.” “Well,” said the woman, “now I shall swing. Watch me. Then I shall see you do it.” So the woman swung out over the stream. As she did this, he saw how it worked. Then he said to the woman, “You swing again while I am getting ready”; but as the woman swung out this time, he cut the vine and let her drop into the water. This happened on Cut Bank Creek.[17]

  We are familiar with such deeds from our Jack-the-Giant-Killer nursery tales and the classical accounts of the labors of such heroes as Herakles and Theseus. They abound also in the legends of the Christian saints, as in the following charming French tale of Saint Martha.

  There was at that time on the banks of the Rhône, in a forest situated between Avignon and Arles, a dragon, half animal, half fish, larger than an ox, longer than a horse, with teeth as sharp as horns, and great wings at either side of its body; and this monster slew all the travelers and sank all the boats. It had arrived by sea from Galatia. Its parents were the Leviathan — a monster in the form of a serpent that dwelt in the sea — and the Onager — a terrible beast bred in Galatia, which burns with fire everything it touches.

  Now Saint Martha, at the earnest request of the people, went against the dragon. Having found it in the forest, in the act of devouring a man, she sprinkled holy water on it and exhibited a crucifix. Immediately, the monster, vanquished, came like a lamb to the side of the saint, who passed her belt around its neck and conducted it to the neighboring village. There the populace slew it with stones and staffs.

  And since the dragon had been known to the people under the name of Tarasque, the town took the name of Tarascon, in remembrance. Up to then it had been called Nerluc, which is to say, Black Lake, on account of the somber forests which there bordered the stream.[18]

  The warrior-kings of antiquity regarded their work in the spirit of the monster-slayer. This formula, indeed, of the shining hero going against the dragon has been the great device of self-justification for all crusades. Numberless memorial tablets have been composed with the grandiose complacency of the following cuneiform of Sargon of Akkad, destroyer of the ancient cities of the Sumerians, from whom his own people had derived their civilization.

  Sargon, king of Akkad, viceregent of the goddess Ishtar, king of Kish, pashishu* of the god Anu, King of the Land, great ishakku* of of the god Enlil: the city of Uruk he smote and its wall he destroyed. With the people of Uruk, he battled and he captured him and in fetters led him through the gate of Enlil. Sargon, king of Akkad, battled with the man of Ur and vanquished him; his city he smote and its wall he destroyed. E-Ninmar he smote and its wall he destroyed, and its entire territory, from Lagash to the sea, he smote. His weapons he washed in the sea....

  4. The Hero as Lover

  The hegemony wrested from the enemy, the freedom won from the malice of the monster, the life energy released from the toils of the tyrant Holdfast — is symbolized as a woman. She is the maiden of the innumerable dragon slayings, the bride abducted from the jealous father, the virgin rescued from the unholy lover. She is the “other portion” of the hero himself — for “each is both”: if his stature is that of world monarch she is the world, and if he is a warrior she is fame. She is the image of his destiny which he is to release from the prison of enveloping circumstance. But where he is ignorant of his destiny, or deluded by false considerations, no effort on his part will overcome the obstacles.*

  The magnificent youth Cuchulainn, at the court of his uncle, Conchobar the king, aroused the anxiety of the barons for the virtue of their wives. They suggested that he should be found a wife of his own. Mess
engers of the king went out to every province of Ireland, but could find no one he would woo. Then Cuchulainn himself went to a maiden that he knew in Luglochta Loga, “the Gardens of Lugh.” And he found her on her playing field, with her foster-sisters around her, teaching them needlework and fine handiwork. Emer lifted up her lovely face and recognized Cuchulainn, and she said: “May you be safe from every harm!”

  When the girl’s father, Forgall the Wily, was told that the couple had talked together, he contrived to send Cuchulainn off to learn battle skills from Donall the Soldierly in Alba, supposing the youth would never return. And Donall set him a further task, namely, to make the impossible journey to a certain warrior-woman, Scathach, and then compel her to give him instruction in her arts of supernatural valor. Cuchulainn’s hero-journey exhibits with extraordinary simplicity and clarity all the essential elements of the classic accomplishment of the impossible task.

  The way was across a plain of ill luck: on the hither half of it the feet of men would stick fast; on the farther half the grass would rise and hold them fast on the points of its blades. But a fair youth appeared who presented to Cuchulainn a wheel and an apple. Across the first part of the plain the wheel would roll just ahead, and across the second the apple. Cuchulainn had only to keep to their thin guiding line, without a step to either side, and he would come across to the narrow and dangerous glen beyond.

  The residence of Scathach was on an island, and this island was approached by a difficult bridge only: it had two low ends and the midspace high, and whenever anybody leaped on one end of it, the other head would lift itself up and throw him on his back. Cuchulainn was thrown three times. Then his distortion came upon him, and, gathering himself, he jumped on the head of the bridge, and made the hero’s salmon-leap, so that he landed on the middle of it; and the other head of the bridge had not fully raised itself up when he reached it, and threw himself from it, and was on the ground of the island.

  The warrior-woman Scathach had a daughter — as the monster so often has — and this young maid in her isolation had never beheld anything approaching the beauty of the young man who came down from the mid-air into her mother’s fortress. When she had heard from the youth what his project was, she described to him the best manner of approach to persuade her mother to teach him the secrets of supernatural valor. He should go through his hero’s salmon-leap to the great yew tree where Scathach was giving instruction to her sons, set his sword between her breasts, and state his demand.

  Cuchulainn, following instructions, won from the warrior-­sorceress acquaintance with her feats, marriage to her daughter without payment of a bride-price, knowledge of his future, and sexual intercourse with herself. He remained a year, during which he assisted in a great battle against the Amazon Aife, on whom he begot a son. Finally, slaying a hag who disputed with him a narrow path along the edge of a cliff, he started home for Ireland.

  One further adventure of battle and love, and Cuchulainn returned to find Forgall the Wily still against him. He simply carried the daughter off this time, and they were married at the court of the king. The adventure itself had given him the capacity to annihilate all opposition. The only annoyance was that uncle Conchobar, the king, exercised on the bride his royal prerogative before she passed officially to the groom.[19]

  The motif of the difficult task as prerequisite to the bridal bed has spun the hero-deeds of all time and all the world. In stories of this pattern the parent is in the role of Holdfast; the hero’s artful solution of the task amounts to a slaying of the dragon. The tests imposed are difficult beyond measure. They seem to represent an absolute refusal, on the part of the parent ogre, to permit life to go its way; nevertheless, when a fit candidate appears, no task in the world is beyond his skill. Unpredicted helpers, miracles of time and space, further his project; destiny itself (the maiden) lends a hand and betrays a weak spot in the parental system. Barriers, fetters, chasms, fronts of every kind dissolve before the authoritative presence of the hero. The eye of the ordained victor immediately perceives the chink in every fortress of circumstance, and his blow can cleave it wide.

  The most eloquent and deep-driving of the traits in this colorful adventure of Cuchulainn is that of the unique, invisible path, which was opened to the hero with the rolling of the wheel and the apple. This is to be read as symbolic and instructive of the miracle of destiny. To a man not led astray from himself by sentiments stemming from the surfaces of what he sees, but courageously responding to the dynamics of his own nature — to a man who is, as Nietzsche phrases it, “a wheel rolling of itself” — difficulties melt and the unpredictable highway opens as he goes.

  5. The Hero as Emperor and as Tyrant

  The hero of action is the agent of the cycle, continuing into the living moment the impulse that first moved the world. Because our eyes are closed to the paradox of the double focus, we regard the deed as accomplished amid danger and great pain by a vigorous arm, whereas from the other perspective it is, like the archetypal dragon-slaying of Tiamat by Marduk, only a bringing to pass of the inevitable.

  The supreme hero, however, is not the one who merely continues the dynamics of the cosmogonic round, but he who reopens the eye — so that through all the comings and goings, delights and agonies of the world panorama, the One Presence will be seen again. This requires a deeper wisdom than the other, and results in a pattern not of action but of significant representation. The symbol of the first is the virtuous sword, of the second, the scepter of dominion, or the book of the law. The characteristic adventure of the first is the winning of the bride — the bride is life. The adventure of the second is the going to the father — the father is the invisible unknown.

  Adventures of the second type fit directly into the patterns of religious iconography. Even in a simple folktale a depth is suddenly sounded when the son of the virgin one day asks of his mother: “Who is my father?” The question touches the problem of man and the invisible. The familiar myth-motifs of the atonement inevitably follow.

  The Pueblo hero, Water Jar Boy, asked the question of his mother.

  “Who is my father?” he said. “I don’t know,” she said. He asked her again, “Who is my father?” but she just kept on crying and did not answer. “Where is my father’s home?” he asked. She could not tell him. “Tomorrow I am going to find my father.” — “You cannot find your father,” she said. “I never go with any boy, so there is no place where you can look for your father.” But the boy said, “I have a father, I know where he is living, I am going to see him.” The mother did not want him to go, but he wanted to go. So early next morning she fixed a lunch for him, and he went off to the south-east where they called the spring Waiyu powidi, Horse mesa point. He was coming close to that spring, he saw somebody walking a little way from the spring. He went up to him. It was a man. He asked the boy, “Where are you going?” — “I am going to see my father,” he said. “Who is your father?” said the man. “Well, my father is living in this spring.” — “You will never find your father.” — “Well, I want to go into the spring, he is living inside it.” — “Who is your father?” said the man again, “Well, I think you are my father,” said the boy. “How do you know I am your father?” said the man. “Well, I know you are my father.” Then the man just looked at him, to scare him. The boy kept saying, “You are my father.” Pretty soon the man said, “Yes, I am your father. I came out of that spring to meet you,” and he put his arm around the boy’s neck. His father was very glad his boy had come, and he took him down inside the spring.[20]

  Where the goal of the hero’s effort is the discovery of the unknown father, the basic symbolism remains that of the tests and the self-revealing way. In the above example the test is reduced to the persistent questions and a frightening look. In the earlier tale of the clam wife, the sons were tried with the bamboo knife. We have seen, in our review of the adventure of the hero, to what degrees the severity of the father can go. For the congregation of Jonathan Edwards he became
a veritable ogre.

  The hero blessed by the father returns to represent the father among men. As teacher (Moses) or as emperor (Huang Ti), his word is law. Since he is now centered in the source, he makes visible the repose and harmony of the central place. He is a reflection of the World Axis from which the concentric circles spread — the World Mountain, the World Tree — he is the perfect microcosmic mirror of the macrocosm. To see him is to perceive the meaning of existence. From his presence boons go out; his word is the wind of life.

  But a deterioration may take place in the character of the representative of the father. Such a crisis is described in the Zoroastrian Persian legend of the Emperor of the Golden Age, Jemshid.

  All looked upon the throne, and heard and saw

  Nothing but Jemshid, he alone was King,

  Absorbing every thought; and in their praise

  And adoration of that mortal man,

  Forgot the worship of the great Creator.

  Then proudly he to his nobles spoke,

  Intoxicated with their loud applause,

  “I am unequalled, for to me the earth

  Owes all its science, never did exist

  A sovereignty like mine, beneficent

  And glorious, driving from the populous land

  Disease and want. Domestic joy and rest

  Proceed from me, all that is good and great

  Waits my behest; the universal voice

  Declares the splendor of my government,

  Beyond whatever human heart conceived,

  And me the only monarch of the world.”

  — Soon as these words had parted from his lips