Gods and Heroes of Ancient Greece

by Gustav Schwab

  EURYSTHEUS AND ALCMENE

  The victors had entered Athens, and Iolaus, who had again become an old man, brought before the mother of Heracles the humbled pursuer of a race of heroes, bound hand and foot.

  “Is it you, hateful Eurystheus?” the old woman cried exultantly. “Have the gods brought justice upon you at last? Do not bow your head to the ground but look your foe full in the eyes. So this is you, you who for many years heaped labors and disgrace upon my son, sent him forth to strangle fierce serpents and savage lions, hoping that he might die in the doing. It was you who drove him down to the darkness of Hades, certain that he would have to remain in the underworld. And then, with every device, with all the power at your beck, you hunted me, his mother, hunted his children from land to land, trying to drive us from all of Greece, and snatching us from the altars that offered asylum. But you came up against men who were not afraid of you. You came to a free city. And now you must die, and may think yourself fortunate if you suffer only instant death, for the crimes you have committed deserve torture and death many times over.”

  Eurystheus did not want to show fear before a woman. He collected himself and spoke with feigned coolness and calm. “You shall hear no word from my lips that might even seem to plead. I do not rebel against dying. But let me say this in justice to myself: it was not I, of my own free will, who faced Heracles as a foe. It was Hera, the goddess, who bade me work against him all my days. But once I had made an enemy of this mighty man, of this demigod—though it was counter to my wish—did I not have to do all I could to save myself from his anger? Even after his death, was I not compelled to persecute his sons, growing up as my foes, as the avengers of their father? Now do with me what you will. I do not long for death, but neither does it distress me to give up my life.”

  So said Eurystheus and appeared composed in the face of destiny. Hyllus himself spoke in defense of the prisoner, and the citizens of Athens invoked their city’s gentle custom of showing mercy to a defeated foe. But Alcmene was implacable, for she could not forget the sufferings her immortal son had been forced to endure as the servant of this cruel king. She remembered the death of her beloved granddaughter, who had accompanied her to Athens and died of her own free will in order to snatch the victory from Eurystheus and his overwhelming numbers. Vividly she pictured the fate she and all her grandsons would have suffered were Eurystheus standing before her as a victor instead of a captive. “No, let him die!” she cried. “No mortal man shall save this evildoer from my revenge.”

  Then Eurystheus turned to the Athenians and said: “My death will not bring misfortune upon you, who have pleaded so kindly in my behalf. If you give me worthy burial and dig my grave near the temple of Pallas Athene, where defeat overtook me, I will guard your land as a guest who means well by his host, and no enemy shall ever cross your borders. For you must know that the descendants of these youths and children you are protecting will one day fall upon you with weapons and ill repay the kindness you have shown their fathers. Then I, who am the sworn foe of the line of Heracles, will be your liberator.” With these words he went to his death unafraid, and died more nobly than he had lived.

  HYLLUS AND HIS DESCENDANTS

  The sons of Heracles vowed eternal gratitude to Demophoon and left Athens under the guidance of Hyllus, their brother, and Iolaus, their friend. Now they found allies in all quarters and journeyed to the Peloponnesus, the land which had been their father’s. For a whole year they fought from town to town until all had surrendered save Argos. During this time, a terrible plague raged throughout the peninsula and would not abate. At last an oracle revealed to the Heraclidae that they themselves were the cause of this affliction, since they had returned before the appointed time. So they left the Peloponnesus, which they had already occupied with their forces, and journeyed back to Attica. Here they settled on the plain of Marathon. Hyllus, meantime, had fulfilled his father’s wish by marrying lovely Iole, whom Heracles himself had once wooed, and pondered without ceasing how he might gain possession of his heritage. Finally he again consulted the oracle of Delphi and received this reply: “When the third harvest has been reaped, you will succeed in returning.” Hyllus took this to mean quite simply that he was to await the third year of gathering the fruits of the field. So, when the third summer had passed, he once more invaded the Peloponnesus.

  After the death of Eurystheus, Atreus, grandson of Tantalus and son of Pelops, had become king of Mycenae. When he learned of the approach of Hyllus, he joined forces with the city of Tegea and other neighboring towns and went forth to meet the sons of Heracles. On the isthmus of Corinth the armies came face to face. But Hyllus, who was always intent on saving the land of Greece from the ravages of war, again offered to decide the issue by single combat. He challenged any one in the host of the enemy who was minded to fight with him and, certain that he had fulfilled the oracle and thus gained the approval of the gods for his undertaking, set the condition that, should he win, the realm Eurystheus had governed should go to the sons of Heracles, but that if he were defeated, the descendants of Heracles should not set foot on the Peloponnesus for fifty years to come.

  When his words became known in the enemy’s camp, Echemus, king of Tegea, a warrior in the very prime of life, accepted the challenge. Both combatants fought with boldness and skill, but Hyllus was defeated. Even in death, his forehead was furrowed and his mouth bitter with brooding on the ambiguous oracle which had led him into battle. The Heraclidae kept to their agreement, desisted from further fighting, returned to Attica, and again settled near Marathon. The years passed and the sons of Heracles never thought of breaking their word. They made no new attempt to win back their heritage. In the meantime Cleodaeus, son of Hyllus, had passed his fiftieth year. Since the period for the truce had elapsed and his hands were no longer tied by a promise, he and the other grandsons of Heracles attacked the Peloponnesus at a time when the Trojan War was already thirty years past. But he too was luckless as his father before him; he perished in this campaign, and all his men with him. Twenty years later his son Aristomachus, grandson of Hyllus and great-grandson of Heracles, made another attempt. This was at the time when Tisamenus, a son of Orestes, ruled the Peloponnesus. Aristomachus too was led astray by the enigmatic words of an oracle: “The gods will grant you victory by the narrow passage.” He invaded the Peloponnesus by way of the isthmus, was beaten back, and lost his life like his father and grandfather before him.

  Thirty years passed, and for eighty years Troy had lain in ashes. And now the sons of Aristomachus, Temenus, Cresphontes, and Aristodemus, the grandsons of Cleodaeus, fared forth on their line’s ancestral quest. Despite the seeming trickery of the oracles, they staunchly held to their faith in the gods, went to Delphi, and asked the priestess concerning the outcome of their enterprise. But the two answers she gave were word for word the same their forebears had received: “When the third harvest has been reaped, you will succeed in returning,” and “The gods will grant you victory by the narrow passage.”

  Then Temenus, eldest of the three brothers, said mournfully: “My father, my grandfather, and my great-grandfather obeyed these utterances, and all met with destruction!” And at last the god took pity on these three and, through the priestess, disclosed to them the oracle’s true meaning.

  “Your forbears themselves were to blame for their misfortune,” she said. “They could not interpret the wise words of the god. What the immortals meant was not the third harvest of the fruits of the earth, but the third harvest from the seed of your race. The first was Cleodaeus, the second Aristomachus, and the third harvest, that to which victory is promised, is that of you three brothers. As for the ‘narrow passage’—there again those luckless ones, now dead, misunderstood what was implied. The gods were not speaking of the isthmus, but of a different passage: of the straits of Corinth. Now that you know the meaning of the oracle, do what you have set out to do, and embark upon your enterprise with the good fortune attending gods.”

 
When Temenus heard this explanation, it was as though scales had dropped from his eyes. Together with his brothers he rapidly equipped a great host and had ships built in Locris, at a place which, to commemorate this, was later called Naupactus, which means shipyard. But even this expedition, launched under such happy auspices, was beset with difficulties for the descendants of Heracles and cost them grave concern and many tears. When the host was assembled, Aristodemus, the youngest of the brothers, was struck by lightning. His wife Argia, the great-granddaughter of Polynices, thus became a widow and his twin sons, Eurysthenes and Procles, were left fatherless. When Aristodemus had been buried and the squadron of ships was to leave Locris, a soothsayer appeared, one who was inspired by the gods and issued oracles. But the descendants of Heracles took him for a sorcerer or a spy sent by the Peloponnesians to destroy their host. They persecuted him with suspicion and harshness, and finally Hippotes, son of Phylas and great-grandson of Heracles, hurled his lance at the old man, who was killed on the instant. This roused the anger of the gods against the Heraclidae. A tempest shattered their ships and sank them to the bottom of the sea. Their landtroops suffered long famine, and soon the entire host dissolved.

  Concerning this disaster also, Temenus sought the advice of the oracle. “Because of the seer you have killed,” so ran the answer, “all this has overtaken you. For ten years you shall banish the murderer from the land, and put the three-eyed in command of the host.” The first part of the oracle was quickly carried out. Hippotes was removed from the army and compelled to go into exile. But the second part drove the Heraclidae to the verge of despair. For how and where were they to find anyone with three eyes? Yet they looked for such a man untiringly, so great was their trust in the gods! At last they happened to find Oxylus, of the line of the kings of Aetolia, son of Haemon and descendant of Oeneus. At the very time the Heraclidae invaded the Peloponnesus, Oxylus had committed murder and been forced to flee from his native Aetolia to the little land of Elis in the Peloponnesus. Now that a year had gone by, he was on his way back to his country and met the descendants of Heracles as he was riding his donkey. This Oxylus had only one eye, for as a child he had put out the other with an arrow. So his donkey had to help him see, and man and beast together had three eyes. The Heraclidae realized that the singular oracle had been fulfilled and chose Oxylus for their leader. In this way the conditions set by Fate were satisfied. They attacked their enemies with fresh troops and a new squadron of ships and slew Tisamenus, the leader of the Peloponnesian host.

  THE HERACLIDAE DIVIDE UP THE PELOPONNESUS

  When the Heraclidae had, in this way, conquered the entire Peloponnesus, they erected three altars to Zeus, their ancestor on their father’s side, and made offerings. Then they began to distribute the cities by lot. The first city they were to cast for was Argos, the second Lacedaemon, and the third Messene. They agreed to drop their lots into an urn filled with water, and that each was to mark his own lot with his name. Thereupon Temenus, and Eurysthenes and Procles, the twin sons of Aristodemus, cast two marked stones into the water, but crafty. Cresphontes, who wanted Messene most of all, threw in a lump of earth, which dissolved almost immediately. Now they decided that he whose stone was taken from the urn first was to have Argos, and it was the stone of Temenus. Then they cast lots for Lacedaemon, and the stone of the twin sons of Aristodemus was the one to be drawn. This made it superfluous to cast lots for the third city, and Cresphontes received Messene.

  Hereupon they and their followers went to the three altars and made sacrifice to the gods, who accorded them certain strange signs. For each found an animal on his altar, and the animals were different. Those who had been allotted Argos found a toad; those who had got Lacedaemon, a serpent; and those who were to have Messene, a fox. They pondered these signs and finally asked a seer, a native of that land, to interpret them. “Those who were given a toad,” he said, “had best remain at home in their city, for the toad is vulnerable and has nothing to protect its goings. Those on whose altar the serpent is coiled will be great aggressors and need have no fear in crossing the borders of their country. And those who saw the fox shall avoid both passiveness and force; their safeguard shall be shrewdness.”

  These animals later became the emblems on the shields of the Argives, Spartans, and Messenians. And now the Heraclidae remembered Oxylus, their one-eyed guide, and granted him the kingdom of Elis in reward for the help he had given them. In all the Peloponnesus, the mountainous land of Arcadia was the sole region left unconquered by the descendants of Heracles. Sparta was the only one of the three realms they founded on the peninsula that endured for any length of time. In Argos, Temenus married his favorite daughter Hyrnetho to Deiphontes, another great-great-grandson of Heracles, and consulted his son-in-law on all matters of importance. At last rumor had it that he was planning to turn over the rule to him and Hyrnetho. This embittered his sons. They conspired against their father and slew him. The Argives did, indeed, recognize the eldest son as their king, but because they loved liberty and equality above all, they limited the king’s power so much that he and his descendants had nothing left of the kingship but the mere title.

  MEROPE AND AEPYTUS

  Cresphontes, king of Messene, was no more fortunate than his brother Temenus. He had married Merope, daughter of King Cypselus of Arcadia, and she had borne her husband many children. The youngest of these was Aepytus. Cresphontes had a stately palace built for himself and his children. But he was not to enjoy his sumptuous halls for long. Since he was a friend of the common people, he favored them wherever and whenever he could. This angered the rich in his realm, and they killed him together with his sons—all but the youngest, Aepytus, whom his mother managed to hide from the murderers and had taken to Arcadia, to her father Cypselus. In the meantime Polyphontes, also a descendant of Heracles, seized the throne of Messene and compelled the widow of the murdered king to become his wife. When he heard it whispered that one of the rightful heirs to the throne was still alive, he set a great price upon his head. But there was no one who wanted to gain it—or even could, had he wanted to—for there was no certainty to go by, only vague rumors, and no one knew where the boy really was.

  When Aepytus had grown into a youth he secretly left his grandfather’s palace and, telling no one of his purpose, set out for Messene. There he heard of the price set on his head. He whipped up his courage, went to the court of King Polyphontes, where no one recognized him, not even his mother, and said in the presence of Queen Merope: “I have come, O king, to tell you that I intend to win the reward you have offered for the son of Cresphontes, who is a constant danger to your throne. I know him as well as I know my own self and shall deliver him into your hands.”

  When his mother heard these words, the color left her face. Quickly she sent for an old and trusted servant, who had helped her save little Aepytus, and who, for fear of the new king, was now living at a distance from the palace and the court. Him she secretly dispatched to Arcadia to guard her son from possible plots, or perhaps fetch him to Messene to lead the citizens in revolt against Polyphontes, hated for his tyrannical rule, and ascend the throne of his father.

  When the old servant arrived in Arcadia he found King Cypselus and the entire palace in confusion and sorrow, for Aepytus had vanished and no one knew what had become of him. Anxiously the servant hastened back to Messene and told the queen what had happened. And now both had only one thought: that the stranger who had appeared before the king and offered to win the reward must have murdered Aepytus in Arcadia and brought his body to Messene. They did not waste time in mournful reflection. Polyphontes had given the stranger a lodging in the palace, and that very night the old servant and the queen, armed with an axe, went into his room with the purpose of killing the sleeper. The youth did not waken at her coming. A moonbeam fell on his face, quiet in gentle slumber. They leaned above him and Merope lifted her axe, preparing to strike, when the old servant, who stood closer to the couch and saw the boy’s features more
distinctly, suddenly gripped the queen’s arm with a cry of amazement. “Stop! It is your son Aepytus you are about to kill!” Merope’s arm fell to her side. She put down the axe and threw herself over her son, whom she woke with her sobs. When they had clasped each other lovingly and long, her son told her that he had not come to deliver himself up to those plotting against him, but rather to punish them, to free her from a husband she despised, and, with the help of the citizens whom he hoped to win over to his cause, to assume his father’s sceptre.

  After this, the three discussed the best means of taking revenge on wicked Polyphontes. Merope donned mourning robes, went to the king, and told him she had just received the sad news that her only remaining son was dead; that from now on she was willing to live at peace with her husband and to forget the unhappy past. The tyrant walked into the snare. He grew light of heart, since the heavy burden which had weighed upon him had been miraculously removed, and declared he would make thank offerings to the gods because now he had no more enemies in all the world. He summoned the citizens to attend these rites in the market place, but they came reluctantly and with downcast eyes, for the common people had loved good Cresphontes and now mourned his son, whom they had regarded as their last hope. When the city was assembled, Aepytus himself fell on the king as he was making sacrifice and stabbed him to the heart. Merope and her old servant swiftly proclaimed to the Messenians that the youth they had thought a stranger was, in reality, the rightful heir to the throne. At this they broke into deafening shouts of jubilation, and that very day Aepytus occupied the throne of his father. Conducted by his mother, he entered the palace as king of Messene. His first action was to punish the murderers of his father and brothers as well as all others implicated in the crime. But when the dead had been avenged, he proved so generous and so benevolent a ruler that he won over the nobles as well as the people of Messene. He was held in such esteem that his descendants were permitted to call themselves Aepytidae instead of Heraclidae.