Bacchylides begins his ode with the tale of Heracles fighting the Nemean lion, employing the battle to explain why pancration tournaments are now held during the Nemean games.

Heracles fighting the Lernaean Hydra | Hydra of Lerna on a hydria by the Eagle Painter, c. 525 BC, now in the Getty Villa, Malibu, California

Occasionally there are scenes which are not a part of Greek mythology, such as Heracles fighting Juno Sospita (" the Savior ") by the Paris Painter, or a wolf demon by the Tityos Painter.

Between Hera and his father Zeus, Heracles is fighting, identified only by a frieze fragment showing a paw of his lion pelt.

Heracles fighting Geryon ( amphora, Painter of Munich, 540 BC )

When Heracles took the cattle of Geryon, he shot Hera in the right breast with a triple-barbed arrow: the wound was incurable and left her in constant pain, as Dione tells Aphrodite in the Iliad, Book V. Afterwards, Hera sent a gadfly to bite the cattle, irritate them and scatter them.

On his way back to Mycenae from Iberia, having obtained the Cattle of Geryon as his tenth labour, Heracles came to Liguria in North-Western Italy where he engaged into battle with two giants, Albion and Bergion or Dercynus, sons of Poseidon.

Alcyoneus was in possession of the Isthmus of Corinth at the time when Heracles drove away the oxen of Geryon.

Chrysaor, married to Callirrhoe, daughter of glorious Oceanus, was father to the triple-headed Geryon, but Geryon was killed by the great strength of Heracles at sea-circled Erytheis beside his own shambling cattle on that day when Heracles drove those broad-faced cattle toward holy Tiryns, when he crossed the stream of Okeanos and had killed Orthos and the oxherd Eurytion out in the gloomy meadow beyond fabulous Okeanos.

In the fullest account in the Bibliotheke of Pseudo-Apollodoros, Heracles was required to travel to Erytheia, in order to obtain the Cattle of Geryon as his tenth labour.

He pursued Heracles at the River Anthemus but fell victim to an arrow that had been dipped in the venomous blood of the Lernaean Hydra, shot so forcefully by Heracles that it pierced Geryon's forehead, " and Geryon bent his neck over to one side, like a poppy that spoils its delicate shapes, shedding its petals all at once ".

Geryon then had an interview with his mother Callirrhoe, who begged him not to confront Heracles.

The gods met in council, where Athena warned Poseidon that she would protect Heracles against Poseidon's grandson Geryon.

Orthrus dead at the feet of Geryon and Heracles, red-figure kylix ( drinking cup ) | kylix, 510 – 500 BC, Staatliche Antikensammlungen ( Inv.

Heracles eventually slew Orthrus, Eurytion, and Geryon, before taking the red cattle to complete his tenth labor.

He, and the two-headed dog Orthrus, were the guardians of the cattle of Geryon and were killed by Heracles.

Both were slain, along with Geryon, when Heracles stole the red cattle.

He told Geryon when Heracles stole Geryon's herd.

Heracles and Geryon on an Attic black-figured amphora with a thick layer of transparent gloss, c. 540 BC, now in the Staatliche Antikensammlungen | Munich State Collection of Antiquities.

One of his pictures on a hydria is the first known Attic representation of the fight between Heracles and Geryon.

Thus several amphoras of this group show Heracles with Geryon or the Nemean Lion, and increasingly Theseus and the Minotaur, as well as the birth of Athena.

In the fullest account in the Bibliotheke of Pseudo-Apollodoros, Heracles was required to travel to the far-off western Mediterranean island of Erytheia, in order to obtain the Cattle of Geryon as his tenth labour.

He pursued Hercules at the River Anthemus but fell victim to an arrow that had been dipped in the venomous blood of the Lernaean Hydra, shot so forcefully by Heracles that it pierced Geryon's forehead, " and Geryon bent his neck over to one side, like a poppy that spoils its delicate shapes, shedding its petals all at once ".

In addition, Gemini ( in combination with Canis Major, Orion, Auriga, and the deserted area now called Camelopardalis ) may form the origin of the myth of the Cattle of Geryon, one of The Twelve Labours of Heracles.

Heracles and Athena, black-figure side of a belly amphora by the Andokides Painter, c. 520 / 510 BC, from Vulci, now in the Munich State Collection of Antiquities

Heracles kills the Nemean Lion, front side of a pseudo-Chalcidian neck amphora by the Polyphemus Group, c. 560 / 540 BC, found in Reggio di Calabria, now in the Louvre, Paris.

Heracles and the hind, with Athena and Artemis looking on ( Pottery of ancient Greece | Attic amphora, 540 – 530 BCE )

Heracles presenting the boar to the cowering Eurystheus ( black-figure pottery | black-figure amphora, ca.

Upon his assumption into immortality on Olympus, Heracles is given ambrosia by Athena, while the hero Tydeus is denied the same thing when the goddess discovers him eating human brains.

Birth of Heracles by Jean Jacques Francois Le Barbier

This resulted in the fulfilment of Zeus's oath by Eurystheus rather than Heracles.

In Pausanias ' recounting, Hera sent witches ( as they were called by the Thebans ) to hinder Alcmene's delivery of Heracles.

The Heracleidae fell into disagreement about where to take Alcmene's body, with some wishing to take her corpse back to Argos, and others wishing to take it to Thebes to be buried with Amphitryon and Heracles ' children by Megara.

More purely Hellenic myth would have Amathus settled instead by one of the sons of Heracles, thus accounting for the fact that he was worshiped there.

One of the tasks imposed upon Heracles by Eurystheus was to obtain possession of the girdle of the Amazonian queen Hippolyta.

Diodorus Siculus enlists nine Amazons who challenged Heracles to single combat during his quest for Hippolyta's girdle and died against him one by one: Aella, Philippis, Prothoe, Eriboea, Celaeno, Eurybia, Phoebe, Deianeira, Asteria, Marpe, Tecmessa, Alcippe.

In The Frogs ( 405 BC ) by Aristophanes, Dionysus descends to Hades and announces himself as Heracles.

Capturing Cerberus, without using weapons, was the final labour assigned to Heracles ( Hercules ) by King Eurystheus, in recompense for the killing of his own children by Megara after he was driven insane by Hera, and therefore was the most dangerous and difficult.

A statue in the Galleria Borghese depicts Cerberus with three heads sitting by the side of Hades, while a bronze sculpture depicting Heracles ' twelfth labour shows the demi-god leading a two-headed Cerberus from the underworld.

The arena for the actions that would bring about this deep change are the Twelve Labors imposed on Heracles by Eurystheus.

The immediate necessity for the Labours of Heracles is as penance for Heracles ' murder of his own family, in a fit of madness, which had been sent by Hera ; however, further human rather than mythic motivation is supplied by mythographers who note that their respective families had been rivals for the throne of Mycenae.

When, shortly before his son Heracles was born, Zeus proclaimed the next-born descendant of Perseus should get the kingdom, Hera thwarted his ambitions by delaying Alcmene's labour and having her candidate Eurystheus born prematurely.

Eurystheus was so scared by Heracles ' fearsome guise that he hid in a subterranean bronze winejar, and from that moment forth all labors were communicated to Heracles through a herald, Copreus.

After Heracles died, Eurystheus attempted to destroy his many children ( the Heracleidae, led by Hyllus ), who fled to Athens.

Macaria, one of the daughters of Heracles, and her brothers and sisters hid from Eurystheus in Athens, ruled by King Demophon.

In Greek mythology, Zeus places his son born by a mortal woman, the infant Heracles, on Hera's breast while she is asleep so that the baby will drink her divine milk and will thus become immortal.

When Alcmene was pregnant with Heracles, Hera tried to prevent the birth from occurring by tying Alcmene's legs in knots.