Hera(Juno)Ancient Greek Goddess of Women, Marriage, and Childbirth
Hera is the daughter of the Titans, Cronus and Rhea. She is the sister/wife of Zeus and queen to the other Olympian Gods. She is a goddess of marriage and childbirth and the rights of legitimate heirs. Which means she spends a lot of time trying to get rid of all of her husbands love affairs. She has little of her own mythology. Mainly she appears as Zeus' jealous wife doing whatever she can to punish her husbands infidelities. She is an Earth goddess like her mother, Rhea, before her, but she is associated more with being a fertility goddess in dealing with marriage and childbirth. Her daughter, Eileithyia, is the goddess of childbirth and their roles sometimes tend to mesh into one. The animal the peacock is associated with Hera. And her cult center is at Argos, where there was a great temple built in her honor. I have already mentioned her daughter, Eileithyia, but she has three other children with Zeus. Hebe is literally the goddess of youthful bloom. She acts as a cupbearer and a servant for the other deities on Mt. Olympus. Hephaestus is known as the divine artisan. He is a skilled artisan in the craft of metal work and is the blacksmith to the other gods. One of most famous pieces of work is the shield of Achilles. Ares is the their last child, the god of brutal warfare. Epithets Hera has two main epithets. One is white-armed, referring to her status as queen of the gods. In Greek society the lighter a woman's skin color was the higher her social class. This is because upper class women didn't have to work or even go outside, they had slaves for that, and they would stay inside, possibly practicing their weaving. Her other epithet is ox-eyed. Although this initially doesn't sound attractive, if we misinterpret it as doe-eyed you can get a better sense of how this is referring to the goddess' beauty. Story of IoThis myth is a great example of the lengths this goddess goes to in punishing her husband's mistresses. It is found in Aeschylus' play, Prometheus Bound. Io was a mortal priestess of Hera and had unwillingly attracted Zeus' attention. Zeus tried to hide his affair from his wife, but was once again unsuccessful. In retaliation the goddess turned Io into a white cow and sent the monster, Argus, to watch over her. Argus has many eyes and never has them all closed at once. Zeus, in trying to protect his mistress, sent, swift-footed, Hermes to kill Argus. He was able to lull the monster to sleep by playing music and telling stories and then he cut off his head. Hera took the eyes from Argus and put them in the peacock's tail. Still jealous of her husband's mistress, she sent a gadfly to follow Io wherever she went, driving her to go mad and roam all over the world. Eventually she came to Egypt and Zeus transformed her back to her human form. There along the Nile, she gave birth to his son Epaphus. The Jugement of ParisMost of the gods were invited to the wedding festival of Peleus to the nymph, Thetis. During the feast the uninvited Eris, goddess of Discord, makes her appearance and tosses a golden apple with the words "For the most beautiful" written on it among the Greek goddesses Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena. Each goddess tries to claim it as their own. Zeus decides that he can't judge the matter since he loves each goddess equally and so he decides that the mortal prince of Troy, Paris, should be the judge. Hermes led the three goddesses to Paris and explained to the mortal the decision he had to make. Each goddess promised him a gift in return for his favorable decision. Hera said that she would give him royal power, Athena promised him that he would have victory in war, and Aphrodite told him that if he chose her, she would give him the most beautiful woman in the world, Helen, queen of Sparta, as his wife. Paris chose to give the golden apple to Aphrodite, which led to the rape of Helen and the beginning of the Trojan War. Aphrodite sided with the Trojans during the war and Hera and Athena sided with the Greeks to bring destruction upon Troy because of Paris' decision. LinksHera Experience Ancient Greece Home Page Ancient Greek Gods Jenny Ervin Contact Me
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