Hercules Killing the Hydra at The Louvre, Paris

myminifactory

The twelve labors of Hercules are a series of daring feats accomplished by Heracles, the most renowned Greek hero, whose name was later Romanized as Hercules. These heroic exploits were carried out over 12 years at the service of King Eurystheus. The episodes were later woven together into a continuous narrative. The establishment of a fixed cycle of twelve labors is attributed to an epic poem, now lost, written by Peisander around 600 BC. Driven mad by Hera's wrath, Hercules slew his six sons and his wife Megara. After recovering his sanity, Hercules deeply regretted his actions; he was purified by King Thespius, then traveled to Delphi to inquire how he could atone for his sins. Pythia, the Oracle of Delphi, advised him to go to Tiryns and serve his cousin King Eurystheus for twelve years, performing whatever labors Eurystheus might set before him; in return, he would be rewarded with immortality. Hercules despaired at this, loathing to serve a man whom he knew to be far inferior to himself, yet fearing to oppose his father Zeus. Eventually, he submitted himself to Eurystheus's authority. Eurystheus ordered Hercules to perform twelve labors. Hercules accomplished these tasks, but Eurystheus refused to acknowledge two: the slaying of the Lernaean Hydra, as Hercules' nephew and charioteer Iolaus had assisted him; and the cleansing of the Augeas, because Hercules accepted payment for the labor. Eurystheus set two more tasks (fetching the Golden Apples of Hesperides and capturing Cerberus), which Hercules also performed, bringing the total number of tasks to twelve. The second labor was to slay the Lernaean Hydra, which Hera had raised just to destroy Hercules. Upon reaching the swamp near Lake Lerna, where the Hydra dwelt, Hercules covered his mouth and nose with a cloth to protect himself from the poisonous fumes. He fired flaming arrows into the Hydra's lair, the spring of Amymone, a deep cave that it only came out of to terrorize neighboring villages. He then confronted the Hydra, wielding a harvesting sickle (according to some early vase-paintings), a sword or his famous club. Ruck and Staples (1994: 170) have pointed out that the chthonic creature's reaction was botanical: upon cutting off each of its heads he found that two grew back, an expression of the hopelessness of such a struggle for any but the hero. The weakness of the Hydra was that only one of its heads was immortal. The details of the struggle are explicit in the Bibliotheca (2.5.2): realizing that he could not defeat the Hydra in this way, Hercules called on his nephew Iolaus for help. His nephew then came upon the idea (possibly inspired by Athena) of using a firebrand to scorch the neck stumps after each decapitation. Hercules cut off each head and Iolaus cauterized the open stumps. Seeing that Hercules was winning the struggle, Hera sent a large crab to distract him. He crushed it under his mighty foot. He cut off the Hydra's one immortal head with a golden sword given to him by Athena. Hercules placed it under a great rock on the sacred way between Lerna and Elaius (Kerenyi 1959:144), and dipped his arrows in the Hydra's poisonous blood, and so his second task was complete. The alternative version of this myth is that after cutting off each head he found that two grew back, an expression of the hopelessness of such a struggle for any but the hero. Both Strabo and Pausanias report that the stench of the river Anigrus in Elis, making all the fish of the river inedible, was reputed to be due to the Hydra's poison, washed from the arrows Hercules used on the centaur. This bronze sculpture was originally held in the gardens of Rueil under the appointment of Louis XIV of Marly and Napoleon of Saint-Cloud. This object is part of "Scan The World". Scan the World is a non-profit initiative introduced by MyMiniFactory, through which we are creating a digital archive of fully 3D printable sculptures, artworks and landmarks from across the globe for the public to access for free. Scan the World is an open source, community effort, if you have interesting items around you and would like to contribute, email stw@myminifactory.com to find out how you can help.