Hi everyone!
Welcome to my channel.
I’m telling you history
and mythology here.
In this video,
I’m going to tell you about Hera.
Hera is a goddess in Greek mythology
and one of the Twelve Olympians.
As the wife of Zeus,
Hera was considered
the queen of Mount Olympus.
She is most associated
as the goddess of women,
marriage, and childbirth.
Let’s begin!
In Greek mythology,
Hera was the daughter of Cronus and Rhea,
and mother of Ares (god of war),
Hebe (goddess of youth),
and Eileithyia (goddess of childbirth), all
with Zeus.
Hera was usually pictured wearing flowing
robes,
a crown, and holding a lotus scepter.
Sometimes she was shown sitting on a throne
or riding a chariot drawn by peacocks.
Most of the time, she is depicted wearing
diadem,
a jewelled ornament in the shape of a half-crown,
worn over her forehead and holding pomegranate,
a symbol for fertile blood and death, in her
hand.
She was also known to have peacock
and cow for sacred animals.
and prefered lilies from all the flowers.
Titles for Hera include "goat-eater",
"cow-eyed", and "white-armed."
It is partly on account of Hera's great beauty,
and particularly her beautiful, large eyes,
that she is linked to her sacred animal, the
cow,
and also the peacock with its iridescent feathers
having "eyes".
Strange to say, Hera, besides being a mother,
also embodied the eternal virginity,
since she was anually renewing her virginity
by bathing in the spring of Canathus in Nauplia
(Peloponnes/southern Greece).
According to the Roman poet Ovid,
the month June has been named in Juno's honor,
the latin counterpart to Hera,
because the goddess was worshipped during
that month.
Since Hera was a goddess of matrimony,
many couples considered June
as the favourable time to marry.
She was one of the few Greek gods or goddesses
that remained faithful to her spouse.
As the Queen of Olympus and a major goddess,
Hera was considered very powerful.
The women of Greece prayed to Hera
for protection during childbirth, good health,
and to aide them in their marriages.
She also had power over the skies
and could bless the people with clear skies
or curse them with storms.
In another myth,
Hera was furious at Zeus
for having birth to Athena on his own.
Therefore she, without the help of Zeus,
gave birth to Hephaestus.
But unlike Athena
who was beautiful and wise,
Hephaestus turned out to be lame
and deformed.
Hera threw Hephaistos from Mount Olympus
because of his ugliness,
and crashing to earth,
the god became lame.
In other accounts,
Hephaistos was thrown from the heavens by
Zeus
precisely because of his lameness.
However, In any case,
Hephaistos held a grudge against his mother.
However, he later forced the gods
to invite him back to Olympus
when he had sent his mother a gift.
It was a magical golden chair
with invisible feathers.
Surprised by the gift,
Hera sat on the chair and triggered the trap.
She was bound by the chair and no one,
except Hephaestus, was able to release her.
The gods were later,
with the help of Dionysus,
able to convince Hephaestus
to let her go in exchange for him
to return home
and marry Aphrodite.
Hera might have been an Olympian goddess,
but her place on Mount Olympus
was not always assured.
For instance,
once, Zeus suspended Hera
from Mount Olympus
for sending a storm against the hero Heracles
while he was on his way home
after capturing Troy.
Even though they had their happy moments,
Hera never forgot about
what had Zeus done to her.
Therefore, she chose her timing well
when Zeus was harsh on fellow Olympians.
And when they were getting fed up with him,
Hera talked them into revolt.
The plan itself, however,
was not bright at all.
Hera took the opportunity
and drugged his drink.
When Zeus fell asleep,
she called the other gods to come
and tie him to a chair.
They tied Zeus tightly,
making a hundred knots
and took his thunderbolt.
Then their successful plan was over
and they started arguing what to do next
and who would become the leader.
Briareus, one of the three Hekatoncheires,
who Zeus had freed from Tartarus,
overheard the conversation
and realised that Zeus was tied.
He immediately sneaked in
and started untying each knot
at the same time
with his hundred hands.
Trembling made Zeus to woke up,
he jumped from the chair
and grabbed his thunderbolt.
Shocked, the gods fell to their knees
and started begging Zeus to show mercy.
Zeus then grabbed Hera
and tied her wrists with golden shackles,
heavy anvils to her feet
and hung her from heavens.
She cried all night in such pain
that she could be heard from the sky.
No one from the immortals
dared to help her in fear of Zeus.
The next day,
Zeus showed mercy and agreed to let her go
in one condition though.
Hera was to swear never again to plot
and rebel against him.
She promised never to do that again
and kept her word,
but her wrath towards Zeus' mistresses
and illegitimate children
had just begun.
Hera was a very jealous and vengeful wife.
She wanted Zeus all to herself,
but Zeus cheated on her constantly
with other goddesses and with mortal women.
Hera often took out her revenge
on the women who Zeus loved
and the children they had with Zeus.
In her marriage,
she was rightfully jealous
and angered
with her husband's infidelities.
And because
she was unable to punish him,
she instead threw her wrath
at Zeus' lovers.
There are dozen of myths
about Hera's persecution.
She threw her wrath at semi-god Heracles,
where she had turned his life
upside down.
Hera was pursuing Leto,
mother of Apollo and Artemis,
in order to prevent her
from giving birth.
She had sent couple of her minions to kill
her.
She was also responsible
for destroying mortal princess Semele
who was pregnant with Dionysus.
Later Hermes helped Zeus
to stitch Dionysus into his thigh.
(After his birth)
Hera chased the god of pleasure constantly,
forcing him to wander
from place to place.
She also found out
about an affair of her servant Io and Zeus.
When approached the couple,
Zeus turned Io into cow to hide her.
But, Hera
was suspicious and demanded that
Zeus give the cow to her as a gift.
Then she put her away,
under guard by one-hundred eyed Argos.
She also stressed her wrath
at Aiakos, the king of Aigina, and his whole
country
by poisoning country's water source.
One example of Hera's revenge
is the story of the hero Heracles
who was Zeus's son
by the mortal woman Alcmene.
Hera first tried to kill Heracles as a baby
by sending two serpents to his bed,
but this
failed when Heracles killed the serpents.
One legend explains
how the Milky Way was created
by Heracles when he was a baby.
His father, Zeus, was fond of his son,
who was born of the mortal woman Alcmene.
He decided to let the infant Heracles
suckle on his divine wife Hera's milk
when she was asleep,
an act which would endow the baby
with godlike qualities.
When Hera woke and realized that
she was breastfeeding an unknown infant,
she pushed him away
and the spurting milk
became the Milky Way.
She later caused Heracles to go mad
and kill his wife and children.
As punishment for killing his family,
Heracles was forced to perform
the Twelve Labors.
Hera made these labors
as difficult as possible,
hoping that Heracles would be killed.
In various versions,
a very popular myth
involved Hera, Zeus, and Io.
In some accounts,
the queen of the gods turned Io,
who was one her own priestesses
and a former princess of Argos, into a cow
to deter Zeus’ advances,
but in other versions,
it was Zeus
who turned the girl into a white cow,
either to secretly rendezvous with her
or to persuade Hera that
he was not really interested in Io.
However,
Hera discovered their courting,
took custody of the cow.
and set the one- hundred-eyed Argos
to guard her.
Zeus then employed Hermes
to lull Argos to sleep and kill him.
In memory, Hera then set his 100 eyes
on the wings of a bird - the peacock.
Finally, not to be outdone,
Hera sent a gadfly
to continually pester the unfortunate Io.
Lamia was a queen of Libya, whom Zeus loved.
Hera turned her into a monster
and murdered their children.
Or, alternatively, she killed Lamia's children
and Lamia's grief and rage turned her into
a monster.
Lamia was cursed with the inability to close
her eyes
so that she would always obsess
over the image of her dead children.
Zeus gave her the gift to be able to take
her eyes out
to rest, and then put them back in.
Lamia was envious of other mothers
and ate their children.
A nymph named Echo
was given the job of distracting Hera
from Zeus's affairs.
When Hera discovered what Echo was doing,
she cursed Echo into only repeating the last
few words
that others said to her
(this is where the modern word "echo" comes
from).
Just like most of the other Greek goddesses,
when it came to her beauty,
Hera was easily offended.
Once, Orion’s wife Side
which means “pomegranate”
boasted that she was as beautiful as Hera,
so the goddess sent her to the Underworld.
When Laomedon’s daughter Antigone did the
same,
Hera turned her into a stork.
Finally, after Paris chose Aphrodite instead
of her,
she became a sworn enemy of Troy.
Gerana was a queen of the Pygmies
who boasted she was more beautiful than Hera.
The wrathful goddess turned her into a crane
and proclaimed that her bird descendants
should wage eternal war on the Pygmy folk.
Hera is mostly famous for her vendettas
but the goddess was also kind
to those who gave her the proper respect.
Cydippe was a priestess of Hera,
who was devoted to the goddess.
One day when there was a problem with the
oxen
required to pull the cart of Cydippe,
her two sons, Biton and Cleobis,
placed themselves in the yoke of the cart,
and pulled it 8km
so their mother could attend a festival for
Hera.
Cydippe asked Hera for a reward for her sons,
and Hera taken by the respect of the sons
to their mother,
and also for Cydippe’s devotion to the goddess,
gave them the highest reward she could think
of.
The two brothers were allowed to die in their
sleep at the festival
where Hera was being worshipped,
so that they would be remembered,
alongside Hera, for all time.
What a reward huh?
In the generation before she helped the Achaean
heroes,
Hera had also assisted the Greek hero Jason
in his quest for the Golden Fleece.
Hera would offer guidance to Jason and the
Argonauts
on their way to Colchis,
and would also plot for Medea
to fall in love with the hero,
allowing Jason to complete his quest.
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