That is likely the reason the labrys was depicted as the instrument used by Hephaestus ( who much earlier had been a consort of the Earth goddess ) to release Athene.

Because of her beauty, other gods feared that jealousy would interrupt the peace among them and lead to war, and so Zeus married her to Hephaestus, who was not viewed as a threat.

The third, as described by Pindar, was created by the gods Hephaestus and Athena, but its architectural details included Siren-like figures or ' Enchantresses ', whose baneful songs eventually provoked the Olympian gods to bury the temple in the earth ( according to Pausanias, it was destroyed by earthquake and fire ).

The other gods begged Hephaestus to return to Olympus to let her go, but he repeatedly refused.

As a smithing god, Hephaestus made all the weapons of the gods in Olympus.

Hephaestus also created the gift that the gods gave to man, the woman Pandora and her pithos.

In some myths, Hephaestus built himself a " wheeled chair " or chariot with which to move around, thus helping him overcome his lameness while demonstrating his skill to the other gods.

Zeus ordered Hephaestus to mold her out of earth as part of the punishment of mankind for Prometheus ' theft of the secret of fire, and all the gods joined in offering her " seductive gifts ".

As before, she is created by Hephaestus, but now more gods contribute to her completion ( 63 – 82 ): Athena taught her needlework and weaving ( 63 – 4 ); Aphrodite " shed grace upon her head and cruel longing and cares that weary the limbs " ( 65 – 6 ); Hermes gave her " a shameful mind and deceitful nature " ( 67 – 8 ); Hermes also gave her the power of speech, putting in her " lies and crafty words " ( 77 – 80 ) ; Athena then clothed her ( 72 ); next she, Persuasion and the Charites adorned her with necklaces and other finery ( 72 – 4 ); the Horae adorned her with a garland crown ( 75 ).

The main Greek gods were the twelve Olympians, Zeus, his wife Hera, Poseidon, Ares, Hermes, Hephaestus, Aphrodite, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Demeter, and Hades.

At the wedding, whether celebrated at Samothrace or at Thebes, all the gods were present ; Harmonia received as bridal gifts a peplos worked by Athena and a necklace made by Hephaestus.

Bia is one of the characters named in the Greek tragedy Prometheus Bound, written by Aeschylus, where Hephaestus is compelled by the gods to bind Prometheus after he was caught stealing fire and offering the gift to mortals.

For example, Hephaestus, Hermes, and Prometheus represented the fool character as " jesters to the gods.

Hephaestus ( Latin: Vulcan ) was the blacksmith of the gods in Greek and Roman mythology.

In Greek Mythology, the deadly monster Typhon was trapped under this mountain by Zeus, the god of the sky and thunder and god of gods and creator of mankind, and the forges of Hephaestus were said to also be located underneath it.

The story centres around John Keats first visit to see the Elgin Marbles, as the guest of Haydon, where they unexpectedly encounter the Greek gods Athena, Hephaestus, and Apollo.

Many Greek people recognized the major gods and goddesses: Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, Apollo, Artemis, Aphrodite, Ares, Dionysus, Hephaestus, Athena, Hermes, Demeter, Hestia and Hera though philosophies such as Stoicism and some forms of Platonism used language that seems to posit a transcendent single deity.

The Greek gods were equated with the ancient Roman deities ; Zeus with Jupiter, Hera with Juno, Poseidon with Neptune, Aphrodite with Venus, Ares with Mars, Artemis with Diana, Athena with Minerva, Hermes with Mercury, Hephaestus with Vulcan, Hestia with Vesta, Demeter with Ceres, Hades with Pluto, Tyche with Fortuna, and Pan with Faunus.

In Greek text, the names of gods are Hephaestus and Helios.

In the Greek text, the names of gods are Hephaestus and Helios.

Herodotus, for example, refers to the ancient Egyptian gods Amon, Osiris and Ptah as " Zeus ," " Dionysus " and " Hephaestus.

They were said to be made by the god Hephaestus of imperishable gold and they flew the god as swift as any bird.

The most important deities were: Zeus, the supreme god and ruler of the sky ; Hera, his wife and goddess of marriage ; Athena, goddess of wisdom ; Poseidon, god of the sea ; Demeter, goddess of the earth ; Apollo, god of the sun, law, reason, music and poetry ; Artemis, goddess of the moon, the hunt and the wilderness ; Aphrodite, goddess of love ; Ares, God of war ; Hermes, god of commerce and medicine, and Hephaestus, god of fire and metalwork.

Virgil imagines the Cyclopes in Hephaestus ' forge, who " busily burnished the aegis Athene wears in her angry moods — a fearsome thing with a surface of gold like scaly snake-skin, and he linked serpents and the Gorgon herself upon the goddess's breast — a severed head rolling its eyes.

Hera was jealous of Zeus ' giving birth to Athena without recourse to her ( actually with Metis ), so she gave birth to Hephaestus without him.

Hera was then disgusted with Hephaestus ' ugliness and threw him from Mount Olympus.

Hephaestus had his own palace on Olympus, containing his workshop with anvil and twenty bellows that worked at his bidding.

In later accounts, Hephaestus worked with the help of the chthonic Cyclopes — among them his assistants in the forge, Brontes, Steropes and Pyracmon.

However, in the account of Attic vase-painters, Hephaestus was present at the birth of Athena and wields the axe with which he split Zeus ' head to free her.

Other " sons of Hephaestus " were the Cabeiri on the island of Samothrace, who were identified with the crab ( karkinos ) by the lexicographer Hesychius.

Pandora was fashioned by Hephaestus out of clay and brought to life by the four winds, with all the goddesses of Olympus assembled to adorn her.

Prometheus ' association with fire is the key to his religious significance and to the alignment with Athena and Hephaestus that was specific to Athens and its " unique degree of cultic emphasis " on honoring technology.

When Hephaestus was thrown from Olympus, whether cast out by Hera for his lameness or evicted by Zeus for taking Hera's side, the Oceanid Eurynome and the Nereid Thetis caught him and cared for him on the volcanic isle of Lemnos, while he labored for them as a smith, " working there in the hollow of the cave, and the stream of Okeanos around us went on forever with its foam and its murmur " ( Iliad 18. 369 ).

Clotho, one of the three Fates, ordered by Zeus, brought the boy to life again ( she collected the parts of the body and boiled them in a sacred cauldron ), rebuilding his shoulder with one wrought of ivory made by Hephaestus and presented by Demeter.

Temple of Hephaestus, a Doric order | Doric Greek temple in Athens with the original entrance facing east, 449 BC ( western face depicted ).

Because of his associations with smithing and skill, Aulë is similar in thematic role to the Greek god Hephaestus, the Roman god Vulcan and the Norse god Thor.

* Palaemon, one of the Argonauts, son of Aetolus-not to be confused with Palaemonius, son of Hephaestus and also an Argonaut

The earth-born son was sired by Hephaestus, whose semen Athena wiped from her thigh with a fillet of wool cast to earth, by which Gaia was made pregnant.

According to the Bibliotheca, when Hephaestus unsuccessfully attempted to rape Athena, she wiped his semen off her leg with wool and threw it on the ground, impregnating Gaia.

* Mimas: Slain by grandnephew Hephaestus with a volley of molten iron, or slain by Ares and robbed of his armor.

Cadmus presented the bride with a robe and necklace, which he had received either from Hephaestus or from Europa.

Talos is described by Greeks as either a gift from Hephaestus to Minos, forged with the aid of the Cyclopes in the form of a bull or a gift from Zeus to Europa.