Heroes of Olympus

by Philip Freeman

  Zeus punished Sisyphus for betraying his secret. He sent Sisyphus to Hades to forever roll a boulder up a hill, only to have it roll down again when it reached the top.

  Hera was furious at the latest woman to catch her husband’s fancy. This time, instead of changing the girl into an animal, she poisoned the water of Aegina’s island and killed her. Her son Aeacus named the island after his mother. When he grew to manhood and became king of Aegina, Hera struck again. She killed everyone on the island with a horrible plague except for Aeacus and his son, Telamon.

  King Aeacus prayed beneath an oak tree to his father, Zeus. Zeus sent a flash of lightning across the sky with a peal of thunder. Aeacus then saw a column of ants carrying grain, and he prayed again to Zeus: “O most excellent father, grant me as many subjects as there are ants here beneath your sacred oak tree.” The branches of the tree swayed even though there was no wind. Aeacus shivered and continued to wait. At last he fell asleep. He dreamed that the ants grew in size and took on human form. When he awoke he found his island full of men and women working to build homes and farms.

  Aeacus became known throughout Greece for his fairness. Kings came to him to be judged and cities asked him to help them appeal to Zeus to restore fertility to their lands. After a long life, Zeus appointed him guardian of Hades, where he kept the keys to the kingdom of the dead.

  Atlas, one of the Titans, had seven daughters known as the Pleiades. One of them, Electra, lived on the island of Samothrace. Zeus saw her there and took her to Mount Olympus. Electra clung to the Palladium, a sacred statue of Athena next to Zeus’s throne, for safety, but Zeus only cast the statue out of Olympus. He forced himself on Electra and then returned her to Samothrace. She gave birth to twin sons, Iasion and Dardanus. Some say that Iasion become a god. Dardanus became the ancestor of the Trojans.

  Electra’s sister, Taygete, was a nymph living in the mountains to the west of Sparta. Like Callisto, she was devoted to Artemis. Zeus fell in love with Taygete, but Artemis tried to protect her. She turned the nymph into a doe. Zeus wasn’t fooled. He found Taygete and fathered a son by her named Lacedaemon, who became the ancestor of the Spartans.

  Taygete was still grateful to Artemis. She dedicated a doe with golden horns to the goddess. Hercules searched for the sacred deer in one of his labors.

  Zeus placed all seven daughters of Atlas in the sky as the constellation called the Pleiades. Except for the sharpest eyes on the darkest nights, only six stars are visible. Some say that the seventh star, Electra, covered herself in mourning when the city of Troy fell to Sparta.

  As the years went by, the descendants of Taygete’s son Lace-daemon grew into the powerful kingdom of the Spartans. A son of this royal house named Tyndareus was driven from his home. He traveled to Aetolia near Mount Parnassus and married a beautiful princess named Leda. Then he returned to Sparta with Leda as his queen.

  Zeus was taken with Leda’s beauty. Hoping that Hera wouldn’t notice, he went to Leda one night in the form of a swan and left her pregnant. That same night, Tyndareus shared his wife’s bed. Some stories say that Leda then laid two eggs. From one came twins fathered by Zeus, Helen and Pollux. From the other came Clytemnestra and Castor, fathered by Leda’s mortal husband.

  Castor and Pollux grew into brave men who one day would sail with Jason on the Argo. They rescued their sister Helen from King Theseus of Athens long before Paris stole her away to begin the Trojan War. When Castor was killed in a cattle raid, his immortal brother Pollux prayed to Zeus that he might give up half his immortality so that he and Castor could spend alternate days on Olympus and in Hades. In time Zeus made them into the stars that became the twins of the constellation Gemini.

  Zeus also fell in love with a young Trojan prince named Ganymede. Ganymede was watching over his flocks on Mount Ida near Troy when Zeus first saw him. Most stories agree that Zeus came down from Olympus in a whirlwind and snatched the boy. Other stories say that the god sent an eagle to grab Ganymede, or that the eagle was Zeus himself.

  Ganymede’s father, Tros, searched everywhere for his son. Zeus took pity on the father and sent Hermes to Troy to comfort him. Hermes told Tros that he should be happy because Ganymede was now cupbearer to the king of the gods. He would live forever in the halls of Olympus. Zeus gave Tros a pair of the finest horses and a golden grapevine crafted by the god Hephaestus. Tros took comfort in these words and gifts, glad that his son had found such favor with Zeus.

  POSEIDON

  Poseidon was best known as the god of the wine-dark sea. He also ruled over earthquakes and stallions racing across the plains. An ancient hymn told his story:

  I first sing of the great god Poseidon, shaker of

  the earth and lord of the deep. The gods gave you

  two privileges—to be tamer of horses and savior of

  ships. Hail to you, Poseidon, dark-haired rider of

  the earth. Be gentle in your heart and protect those

  who sail the seas.

  The ancient Greeks prayed for Poseidon’s mercy. As a people of the sea, they knew that a peaceful voyage could suddenly turn deadly. The god who shook the land and whose horses thundered over the fields could also calm the waves and let them live another day.

  Poseidon himself cared little for the problems of men. He lived in the depths of the sea, and rose to the surface only to create terrible storms or to turn cities into ruins.

  Poseidon was jealous of his little brother, Zeus. In one of the rare uprisings against Zeus, Poseidon joined Hera and Athena and tried to overthrow his brother. The goddess Thetis called upon a hundred-armed creature from Tartarus called Briareus to end the revolt. Some said Briareus was Poseidon’s own son, but he stopped the sea god and Zeus remained king.

  After Zeus divided the world and Poseidon won control of the sea, Poseidon fought with other gods to be patron, or ruler and protector, of the most important Greek cities.

  First there was Corinth, where Poseidon had a contest with the sun god Helios for control of the town. Briareus was again called upon. He gave Poseidon the isthmus and nearby lands, but to Helios he gave the heights of the city.

  Next the sea god fought with Hera to rule Argos. Three river gods—Inachus, Cephisus, and Asterion—were called in to judge. They awarded the town to Hera. Poseidon was so angry that he dried up all three rivers.

  The most famous story was of the contest between Poseidon and Athena to see who would be in charge of Athens. Zeus told the city’s king, a man who had the tail of a snake and was named Cecrops, to judge the contest. To prove his powers to the king, Poseidon struck his trident on the top of the rocky Acropolis above the town and created a spring of salt water. Athena made an olive tree grow from the hill, bringing a new food to the city. Cecrops decided that olives were more useful than seawater, and Athena won. Poseidon was furious and flooded the countryside for revenge.

  Poseidon was married to Amphitrite, the daughter of Ocean and Tethys. At first, she wanted nothing to do with the god of the wine-dark sea. She fled to the Titan Atlas to hide. Poseidon sent spies to find her. At last, one of them named Delphinus came upon Amphitrite on an island and convinced her to marry Poseidon. Poseidon was so grateful that he placed Delphinus among the stars as a constellation shaped like a dolphin.

  After he married, Poseidon—like his brother Zeus—pursued other goddesses and mortal women. The goddess Demeter changed herself into a mare and hid in a herd of horses to escape him, but Poseidon turned himself into a stallion. Demeter was no match for the sea god. She gave birth to two children. The first was a daughter named Despoina. The second was a famous stallion called Arion.

  Poseidon also forced himself on Medusa when she was a young maiden instead of a monstrous Gorgon. The story says that Medusa was the most beautiful girl in the world and had many human suitors. Poseidon came to the girl as she worshipped at the temple of Athena and forced himself upon her. Athena, who had always been jealous of Medusa’s beauty, blamed the girl. She turned Medusa’s flowing ha
ir into snakes so horrible that they turned anyone who looked at them into stone.

  Like Medusa, the beautiful virgin Theophrane had many suitors. Poseidon kidnapped the girl and took her to an island. The suitors tried to rescue her. To confuse them, Poseidon changed Theophrane into an ewe and the rest of the people on the island into goats. The suitors searched the island, but found only goats. They began to kill the animals for food. Poseidon turned them into wolves, and the bloodshed continued. Then Poseidon changed himself into a ram and made Theophrane pregnant. She gave birth to a ram with a golden fleece. Many years later, Jason and the Argonauts would search for the remarkable ram.

  One of Poseidon’s granddaughters, Iphimedia, was in love with the sea god. She would often sit on the shore and cup the waters in her hands, then pour them into her lap. Poseidon must have been surprised to find a woman who was actually in love with him. Iphimedia bore him two sons who were also his great-grandchildren. Otus and Ephialtes were powerful and handsome. By the time they were nine years old, they were more than fifty feet tall. They ripped mountains from their roots and piled them on top of one another to build a tower to the heavens and attack the gods. They captured Ares, one of Zeus’s sons, and stuffed him into a bronze jar.

  If the giants had been full-grown, they might have conquered heaven and earth, but the gods used tricks to defeat the boys. The boys were great hunters, so Apollo sent a deer between them. Otus and Ephialtes threw their spears at the same instant and struck each other dead. Zeus punished them in Hades by binding the brothers back to back with snakes. They spent eternity facing away from each other, watched over by an owl.

  Zeus never forgot that Poseidon had once joined Hera and Athena in rebelling against him. As punishment, he sent his brother to Troy to serve King Laomedon along with Apollo. The two gods were disguised as mortals, and Laomedon put them to work. Poseidon directed the building of Troy’s walls, while Apollo herded the city’s cattle.

  At the end of a year, Laomedon sent the gods away without pay and threatened to cut off their ears. Apollo sent a plague to destroy the city while Poseidon sent a sea monster to snatch Trojans off the beach. Laomedon agreed to sacrifice his own daughter to satisfy the monster. Hercules rescued the girl and slew the sea monster just in time. Then Laomedon refused to give Hercules his reward—Laomedon’s daughter for his wife. So Hercules killed the king and took the girl.

  Poseidon swore that one day the walls of Troy would fall.

  HADES

  The Greeks feared Hades even more than Zeus and Poseidon. They tried never to say his name out loud and draw his attention. They called him “the god below,” or “the invisible one.” Mortals were frightened of him and of the end of life.

  Prayers did not move him. All mortals, good and bad, eventually went down to the house of the dead where Hades ruled.

  There are few myths about Hades. Almost all we know about him comes from descriptions of the home that shared his name. It is a dark place of endless sighs and hopeless, hazy existence. Hades ruled this land, while Death lived there along with his brother Sleep.

  Every soul that died was led by Hermes, or sometimes by Hades, to the banks of the River Styx. Souls that had not been buried properly had to stay on the far side of the river for at least a hundred years. Others were ferried across the river by the boatman Charon. Greeks were buried with a coin on their mouths to pay Charon, who charged the dead for their passage. On the other side of the Styx the souls were greeted by the three-headed dog Cerberus, wagging his tail.

  The worst of the dead were condemned to torture. A rare few were allowed into the delightful fields of Elysium. Most were left to wander the plains of the underworld for eternity.

  Some Greeks believed a soul might be reborn into a new life, or a higher existence in the world of the gods.

  A young man named Er died in a war and lay on the battlefield for ten days. His family placed his body on a funeral pyre to be burned. Just before the fire was set, Er rose up, alive.

  Er said he returned to tell what happened after death. He said that after he had died, he joined many souls in another world. At a place of judgment, he found four doors. Two lead to and from heaven. The other two lead to and from the underworld. After the judges ruled on their lives, the dead were led to the entrance to heaven or to the land beneath the earth.

  At the same time, souls were leaving heaven and the underworld after a journey of a thousand years. Those who had been to heaven had been rewarded for the good they had done in their previous lives. Those who emerged from the underworld told of terrible punishment.

  After the souls leaving heaven and the underworld rested on a plain for seven days, they continued to a shining column. This column held together the cosmos. Sirens created the music of the spheres and the Fates spun the lives of those who would be reborn. The gods allowed the souls to choose their own destinies.

  One soul wanted to be a powerful king. Others chose the life of animals. Some who were men wanted to be women, and some who were women wanted to be men. The last soul to choose, the hero Odysseus, found the life he wanted in the form of a simple, private man.

  When all the souls had chosen, they drank from the River Lethe to forget their past lives. At midnight, there was a great clap of thunder and an earthquake. The souls shot up into the sky like stars and were reborn to their lives. Er awoke on his funeral pyre, ready to tell his tale to all who would listen.

  APOLLO

  The goddess Leto, daughter of the Titans Coeus and Phoebe, became pregnant by Zeus. Leto wandered the world looking for a quiet place to give birth. Jealous Hera sent a dragon named Python after her, so Leto left the mainland and searched for an island. Then Hera warned all the islands against allowing Leto on their shores, so none welcomed her.

  At last, in great misery, Leto came to the island of Delos in the Aegean Sea. Delos was small and barren. It floated about on the waves from place to place, unfixed to the seafloor below.

  “Delos, if you would consent to be the birthplace of my children, my son will build a great temple here. Your soil will blossom with the fruits of the earth,” Leto said.

  Delos replied: “Leto, I would be honored to host you. No one ever comes to my shores. Will you swear that your son will build his temple here?”

  Leto swore by the River Styx, the unbreakable vow of the gods, that all would come to pass as she had promised.

  Leto was in labor for nine days and nights, attended by many goddesses. Hera stayed on Mount Olympus and kept Eileithyia, the goddess who brought comfort to women in childbirth, at her side. Finally, Iris, the goddess of the rainbow, brought Eileithyia to Delos secretly. The goddess eased Leto’s pain, and Leto gave birth to Apollo. The goddesses cried with joy and bathed the child in the purest water. Then, Leto gave birth to Apollo’s sister Artemis.

  Leto’s troubles were not over. Hera chased her and the newborn babies across the sea to Lycia and then to the mountains near Delphi. A giant named Tityus attacked her, and Leto called on her young children to save her. Apollo and Artemis slaughtered the giant.

  Apollo was the god of music, medicine, archery, and prophecy. When he was only four days old, he began to look for a place to build an oracle, the temple where the mortals who worshipped him could come for his advice. Beneath Mount Parnassus at the site of Delphi, Apollo built his oracle, taking over the temple of Themis and his uncle Poseidon.

  The dragon Python tried to stop Apollo, but the god of archers was eager to kill the beast that had once threatened his mother. He pierced him with a mighty arrow and killed him. Young Apollo took on the title, Pythian, after the dragon he had slain.

  When the temple was finished, Apollo had no priests to serve him. Gazing out to sea from the cliffs of Delphi, he spotted a merchant ship and flew down to it. Apollo turned himself into a dolphin and jumped onto the deck. Suddenly, the ship began to sail against the wind until it reached port. Apollo changed back into his true from and bought the sailors to his temple to be his priests. He
also chose a young woman to be the first Pythia, the priestess who would reveal his words to mortals.

  He also built a temple on Delos, as Leto had promised.

  Apollo often defended his mother. When Niobe, daughter of the king of Lydia, married Amphion of Thebes, the couple had seven handsome sons and seven beautiful daughters. Niobe refused to worship Leto as a goddess: “I too have divine blood in my veins. Aren’t I as beautiful as any goddess? And most of all, why should I worship Leto, mother of only two children, when I have seven times that many?”

  Leto heard Niobe’s words and was very angry. She called Apollo and Artemis to her side and began to tell them of Niobe’s insults.

  “Stop, Mother,” said Apollo. “To continue would only delay her punishment.”

  Apollo and his sister flew to Thebes, where the sons of Niobe were riding fine horses. Suddenly the eldest fell down dead, then the second, then the third. At last all seven lay on the ground, struck by Apollo’s arrows.

  When their father heard the news, he plunged his own knife into his heart. Niobe threw herself onto the bodies of her sons and shouted out to heaven: “Feed yourself on your revenge, Leto. Fill your bloodthirsty heart! I have lost my sevens sons, but I still have seven daughters. After so many deaths, I still win!”

  The daughters, who stood weeping above the bodies of their brothers, began to fall to Apollo’s arrows. Finally only the youngest clung to her mother’s knees. Niobe cried out to Leto: “Please, great goddess, leave me the youngest. Spare me just one, I beg you.”

  As soon as these words left her lips, her youngest daughter fell down dead. Niobe collapsed in grief. A whirlwind caught her up and carried her across the sea and back to Lydia. There on a mountaintop she sits, a weeping woman of marble, mourning for her children.