50 Fun Facts About Hera

Hera is the Greek goddess of what?

She presides over weddings and protects women in childbirth, and is queen among the twelve Olympians.

Who are Hera's parents?

That makes her Zeus's sister as well as his wife; her siblings are Hestia, Demeter, Hades and Poseidon.

What did Cronus do to the newborn Hera?

He was fated to be overthrown by a child; Rhea saved only Zeus with a swaddled stone, and Zeus later made his father vomit up the rest.

According to the Iliad, who raised Hera after her mother handed her over?

Pausanias offers a different version, with the three daughters of the river Asterion as her nurses.

Which of these is NOT one of Hera's sacred animals?

The owl belongs to Athena; Hera is also often shown holding a pomegranate as a symbol of immortality.

Into what bird did Zeus transform himself to seduce Hera?

Near Hermione there were paired temples on Mount Cuckoo for Zeus and Mount Pron for Hera.

According to Callimachus, how long did the wedding feast of Zeus and Hera last?

The nymph Chelone snubbed the party and was turned into a tortoise; Gaia's wedding gift was the golden apples of the Hesperides.

What did Gaia give Zeus and Hera as a wedding present?

Heracles was later ordered by Eurystheus to steal those very apples as one of his labours.

Which god was Hera said to have produced on her own, without Zeus?

She threw the lame smith-god off Olympus in some accounts; his cult was based on Lemnos.

Which monster did the Homeric Hymn to Apollo say Hera bore by herself and gave to Python to raise?

She whelped it in a cave in Cilicia, a monstrous echo of her solo birth of Hephaestus.

Which Greek city was Hera's special tutelary home, called in literature 'the house of Hera'?

In the Iliad she names Argos, Sparta and Mycenae as the three cities she loves best; Homer calls her Argeiē.

On which island did the Greeks build perhaps the first enclosed roofed temple, for Hera around 800 BC?

It was later replaced by the Heraion of Samos, one of the largest of all Greek temples.

What happens at the altar of the Temple of Hera at Olympia every Olympiad since 1936?

A parabolic mirror concentrates the sun's rays; the Heraion is the oldest temple at Olympia and was once shared with Zeus.

Who competed in the Heraean Games held every four years at Olympia?

Sixteen women organised them, wove a peplos for Hera and arranged the choral dances.

At which spring near Nauplia was Hera said to renew her virginity every year?

Stymphalia even had a triple shrine to Hera as Girl, Adult Woman and Separated.

Homer's common epithet for Hera, boōpis, means what?

One proposed etymology for her name is 'young cow, heifer', matching the epithet.

Which priestess of Hera was turned into a heifer and guarded by Argus Panoptes?

After Hermes killed Argus, Hera sent a gadfly to sting her all the way to Egypt, where she bore Epaphus.

What did Hera do with the hundred eyes of Argus after Hermes killed him?

Ovid gives the number as a hundred; another version has the whole giant turned into a peacock.

What insect did Hera send to torment Io on her flight into Asia and Egypt?

The Greek word oistros is the root of 'oestrus'; Zeus restored Io to human form in Egypt.

Disguised as her nurse, Hera persuaded Semele to demand what of Zeus?

Bound by an oath on the Styx, his lightning destroyed her; Zeus sewed the unborn Dionysus into his thigh.

How did Hera punish the nymph Echo for distracting her while Zeus's lovers escaped?

Unable to speak for herself, Echo could only watch as Narcissus fell in love with his own reflection.

Into which animal did a furious Hera transform Callisto, later placed among the stars as Ursa Major?

Some versions credit Artemis with the change; Zeus set Callisto in the sky as her son was about to kill her.

Which Libyan queen, robbed of her children by Hera, became a monster that hunted other people's children?

Torment disfigured her; her name became a byword for child-devouring bogeywomen.

Hera turned Gerana, a queen of the Pygmies who boasted of her beauty, into which bird?

She decreed that cranes would wage eternal war on the Pygmy folk.

Zeus tricked the lustful Ixion with a cloud shaped like Hera. What was the cloud later named?

Their union produced Centaurus, and Ixion was bound to a spinning fiery wheel for eternity.

Why did Hera strike Tiresias blind?

Having lived seven years as a woman, he said women got more pleasure; Zeus compensated him with prophecy.

What does the name Heracles mean?

Ironically, Hera was his lifelong stepmother-enemy, and other names like Heraclitus and Herodotus also derive from hers.

How did Hera cheat Heracles out of the kingship Zeus had promised to that day's child?

She had first made Zeus swear the oath, then delayed Heracles's birth by sitting at the door.

According to one myth, how was the Milky Way created?

Zeus had tricked her into nursing him; a few drops that fell to earth became the lily.

What creature did Hera send to bite Heracles's feet while he fought the Lernaean Hydra?

She tried to make almost every one of the twelve labours harder for him.

Which daughter did Hera finally give Heracles as a bride after he saved her from the giant Porphyrion?

Some myths say the two were reconciled after the Gigantomachy; Etruscans showed a bearded Heracles at Hera's breast as her adopted son.

Whom did Hera detain to stop Leto going into labour with Apollo and Artemis?

The other goddesses on Delos sent Iris to fetch the birth-goddess, and the twins were born as she set foot on the island.

Which goddess, uninvited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, threw the golden apple?

It was inscribed kallistēi, 'to the fairest', and Hermes had barred her from the door on Zeus's orders.

Who helps Hera seduce Zeus and put him to sleep in Book 14 of the Iliad?

The episode is called the Deception of Zeus; Hera backs the Achaeans throughout the war.

Which hero of the Argonauts did Hera protect on the quest for the Golden Fleece?

She hated King Pelias for killing his step-grandmother in her temple, and got Aeolus to calm every wind but the west for the crew's return.

In Hellenistic art, Hera's chariot is drawn by which birds, unknown to Greeks before Alexander took Persia?

Aristotle called the peacock 'the Persian bird'; the motif was revived when the Renaissance merged Hera and Juno.

What is the name of Hera's Roman counterpart?

Juno was daughter of Saturn and Ops, wife of Jupiter, and her Etruscan equivalent was Uni.

Which of these Roman epithets belonged to Juno?

Others included Caprotina, Fluonia and Februalis, tied to February's rites of purification and fertility.

How is Hera usually crowned in ancient art?

She appears as a dignified matron, often veiled as a married woman and sometimes enthroned.

In which ancient script is Hera's name first attested, on tablets from Pylos and Thebes?

One Pylos tablet records offerings 'to Zeus-Hera-Drimios', suggesting a Mycenaean origin for her cult.

Per Diodorus Siculus, who was the last mortal woman Zeus ever slept with?

After the birth of Heracles he stopped fathering humans altogether.

Which festival on Samos treated Hera as an ancient fertility goddess, according to Walter Burkert?

Burkert saw a Mediterranean nature goddess becoming bride of the Greek sky-god, with parallels in her disappearance-and-return myths.

How were the Corinthian Heraia rites for Hera Acraea characterised?

Each year seven boys and seven girls with shorn hair and black clothes were dedicated, a rite linked to Medea's children.

How does Hera get her way in the Iliad's Book 21 fight between the river Scamander and Achilles?

The river begs her to stop and promises not to help the Trojans; Artemis then rashly challenges Hera to a duel.

Which nymph did Zeus turn into a tortoise for snubbing his wedding to Hera?

According to Callimachus every god and mortal was invited to the 300-year feast.

In the Daedala festival at Plataea, what happened to the wooden statue of Hera at the end of the procession?

The rite re-enacted Zeus's fake wedding to a statue, which lured a jealous Hera back to him.

Why did Hera hate Pelias, king of Iolcus?

She later convinced his nephew Jason to kill him.

What was the prize in the contest at Hera's Argive festival, the Hecatombaia?

The festival's name means 'one hundred oxen', and its priestess rode a cart drawn by white heifers.

In Stymphalia, Arcadia, Hera was said to have a triple shrine as Girl, Adult Woman and what?

The three aspects were called Pais, Teleia and Chere.

According to Pausanias, why does a cuckoo sit on Hera's sceptre?

Zeus wooed her in the form of a cuckoo, and she caught it and made it her pet.