The story of the twelve labors tells the tale of Heracles’s journey from a sinful pariah to the ancient world’s most revered hero. To atone for a crime he committed while under the curse of his stepmother Hera, Heracles undertook twelve seemingly impossible tasks from his cousin King Eurystheus. He defeated unkillable monsters, captured the uncapturable, traveled to the world’s edge, and descended into the land of the dead. Read on to learn about the twelve labors of Heracles, one of the most well-known stories of ancient Greek mythology.
The Cause of the Labors of Heracles: The Curse of Being Born
Heracles was the son of the mortal princess Alcmene and Zeus, King of the gods. Zeus disguised himself as Alcmene’s husband, Amphitryon, and slept with her, which resulted in her becoming pregnant with twins. One of the twins was the son of Zeus, while the other was Amphitryon’s. When Hera, Queen of Olympus, learned of the affair, she was furious and decided to torment Zeus’s child.
The twins were named Alcides and Iphicles, and Hera tried to prevent their birth by prolonging Alcmene’s labor but failed. Unsure which twin was Zeus’s son, Hera sent two snakes to kill them. The following day, Alcides was found strangling the two snakes in his crib, revealing him to be the son of Zeus. Alcides’s parents changed his name to Heracles to appease Hera, meaning “Hera’s pride or glory.”
As a young adult, Heracles became a protector of Thebes. He married his love, Princess Megara, and they had several children. However, Hera refused to let Heracles be happy and cursed him. In a fit of madness, he unknowingly killed his wife and children, which was a tragic turn in his otherwise happy existence.
Heracles, burdened with guilt, shunned by society, and facing the wrath of the vengeful Erinyes, sought advice from the Oracle of Delphi. The Oracle proclaimed that he must serve his cousin, King Eurystheus of Mycenae, without complaint, assistance, or pay for ten years to atone for his blood guilt. Eurystheus, a devout follower of Hera, devised ten impossible tasks to punish Heracles for the crime of being born as a child of Zeus.
1. The Slaying of the Nemean Lion
Heracles’s first labor was to kill the Nemean lion, a beast that was terrorizing the people of Nemea. This lion was believed to be the offspring of Typhon and Echidna, the parents of some of ancient Greece’s most infamous monsters. The Nemean lion had a thick coat of impenetrable golden fur, razor-sharp claws, and mighty jaws that could cut through rock. Heracles spent weeks tracking the lion and tried slaying it with arrows, but they bounced off its impenetrable golden fur. Realizing his weapons were ineffective, he changed tactics and devised a plan to overpower the beast with his strength and bare hands.
Heracles crept in as stealthily as a man his size could into the lion’s den to take it by surprise while it slept. Once the beast was in sight, Heracles attacked the lion and wrestled it to the ground. The lion was caught entirely off-guard. Heracles grappled with it and refused to yield to any of its attacks. The fierce fight between the hero and the monstrous lion raged for hours as Heracles gradually tightened his grip around the lion’s throat.
The Nemean Lion’s impenetrable golden fur proved useless against Heracles’s powerful grip. After a grueling struggle, the supposedly invincible lion began to gasp and finally breathed its last breath, dying at the hands of Heracles.
With Athena’s help, Heracles skinned the lion and turned its impenetrable golden fur into a cloak, which, along with his olive tree club, would become his iconic look and brand.
2. Slaying the Multi-headed Lernaean Hydra
Heracles’s second labor was to slay the Lernaean Hydra, a monstrous creature believed to be impossible to kill. The Hydra, the terrifying offspring of Typhon and Echidna, contaminated Lake Lerna and began killing all the nearby inhabitants. It had a massive water snake’s body with six to nine snakeheads. One of the heads was immortal and undying.
The Hydra’s venom was the deadliest poison in the known world, and contact with it was a death sentence. The venom was infused in the monster’s blood and breath and could be spat like ranged missiles. However, the real danger was its regenerative abilities; two new heads would regrow whenever the Hydra lost a head.
Heracles wrapped his face in cloth to protect himself from the toxic fumes before attacking the massive serpent outside its den. Each time Heracles cut off a head, two more grew in its place. Hera sent a giant crab named Carcinus to hinder Heracles. Hera hoped the crab would distract Heracles long enough for the Hydra to land the killing blow. Heracles quickly crushed Carcinus, but the Hydra had grown to over 50 heads, so he retreated to devise a new strategy.
Heracles met with his squire, charioteer, and nephew, Iolaus, to discuss how to defeat the Hydra. Guided by Athena’s wisdom, Iolaus developed a new strategy. Iolaus suggested he accompany Heracles and that they launch a coordinated attack against the Hydra. Heracles would cut off a head, and Iolaus would cauterize the wound with a flaming torch to prevent new heads from growing. The plan worked, reducing the Hydra from 50 heads to one. The remaining immortal head refused to die, so Heracles buried it deep underground and placed a boulder over it, trapping it forever.
After defeating the Hydra, Heracles dipped all his arrows in the Hydra’s venom. These venom-coated arrows became one of the hero’s signature weapons in future labors. After returning, Eurystheus accused Heracles of breaking the rules of his atonement by receiving assistance from Iolaus. As a result, he declared the second labor null and void. To make up for Heracles’s alleged cheating, Eurystheus increased the number of tasks from ten to eleven.
3. Capturing the Ceryneian Hind
Heracles’ third labor was to capture the Ceryneian Hind. The Ceryneian Hind was a mythical female deer with golden horns, dapple hide and bronze hooves. It was as big as a bull and was said to be one of the fastest animals in the world. However, its speed was only part of the challenge. The main issue was that the Ceryneian Hind was sacred to the goddess Artemis, and any attempt to harm the deer would bring down the goddess’s divine wrath.
Located in the Ceryneia forests, the Ceryneian Hind was easy to spot thanks to its glittering golden horns. However, Heracles could not rely on his strength for once. If he injured the beast, Artemis might kill him instantly or transform him into an animal and hunt him down. Heracles had only one option: approaching the creature and gently restraining her. However, whenever Heracles got too close, the Hind would dart away. Due to the creature’s speed and Heracles’s caution, an intricate game of cat and mouse ensued, lasting for over a year.
Heracles pursued the Ceryneian Hind across mainland Greece, all the way to the mythical land of Hyperborea in the far north and then back south to Mount Artemisium in the Peloponnese. Despite its speed, the Hinds grew exhausted after the year-long chase, while Heracles, known for his supernatural endurance, never tired. When the Hind started to cross the Ladon River, Heracles saw his chance and shot an arrow in front of the Hind. This caused her to trip, enabling him to grab her horns and wrestle the Ceryneian Hind to the ground.
Not long after capturing the Hind, Artemis and her brother Apollo appeared. Rather than fight two Olympians, Heracles surrendered and apologized. He explained that Eurystheus and Hera had forced him to capture the Hind. The divine twins could empathize with Heracles’s situation. Hera had tormented their mother, the Titaness Leto, when she became pregnant with them after having an affair with Zeus. Hera cursed the land, trying to deny Leto a sanctuary in which to give birth. To foil Hera, Artemis allowed Heracles to take the Hind on the condition that he release her after his labor. Despite King Eurystheus’s wish to keep the Hind as a pet, Heracles managed to outsmart the King and free the Hind as he had promised Artemis.
4. Capturing the Erymanthian Boar
Heracles’s fourth labor was to capture and deliver the Erymanthian Boar, causing havoc near Mount Erymanthos to Eurystheus. The Erymanthian Boar was not a mythical monster but a colossal mundane animal with unmatched aggression, a thick, shaggy hide, and tusks that could pierce through armor. The boar’s immense weight and aggressive behavior made it a formidable adversary. Killing the boar would have been easy, but Heracles had to capture it alive and trap it without directly confronting it. Heracles knew a confrontation would likely result in only one survivor due to the boar’s ferocity.
To capture the boar unharmed, Heracles sought advice from his friend, Pholus the Centaur, who lived on Mount Pelion. While centaurs were traditionally impulsive and wild creatures, exceptions such as Pholus and Chiron were renowned as wise mentors of heroes. Pholus suggested that Heracles drive the boar toward the snowy peaks of Mount Erymanthos by shouting and throwing stones from a distance. This strategy would allow Heracles to exhaust the boar by making it run through deep mountain snow until it got stuck, enabling Heracles to capture it using thick metal chains.
Heracles loved the idea and suggested drinking wine that Pholus had had blessed by Dionysus. The wine belonged to all the local centaurs, and Pholus was hesitant to drink it, but Heracles ignored him. The aroma of the wine intoxicated all the nearby centaurs, leading them to stampede into Pholus’s cave, looking for it. The commotion confused an intoxicated Heracles, who lost his temper and attacked the centaurs, killing many of them with his Hydra arrows.
As Heracles fought, Pholus examined one of the poisonous arrows and accidentally killed himself. Afterwards, Heracles buried Pholus and left Mount Pelion. Nessus, a surviving centaur, became a ferryman on the Euenos River. Years later, driven by revenge, he orchestrated a plan that led to the death of Heracles.
Heracles used Pholus’s strategy to trap the boar in the deep Erymanthos Mountain snow. He then bound it in heavy chains. When Heracles presented the Erymanthian Boar to King Eurystheus, the King was terrified and hid in a large storage jar. When Heracles asked what to do with the boar, Eurystheus commanded him to remove it. So, Heracles hurled the boar into the sea, and some say the boar swam to Italy and lived there.
5. Cleaning the Augean Stables in a Single Day
Heracles’s fifth labor was to clean the stables of King Augeas of Elis in a single day. The Augean Stables housed over 3,000 cattle, gifted to the King by his father, the sun god Helios. The cattle were immortal but produced an abnormally large amount of waste that had not been cleaned in decades, resulting in an enormous mountain of stinking dung. Clearing out all the manure in one day was impossible, even for Heracles. When Heracles arrived in Elis, he made a deal with King Augeas to clean the stables in exchange for a tenth of his divine cattle.
Heracles is often depicted as a simple-minded hero of brute force, but he was anything but foolish. Despite not being renowned for his cunning, Heracles devised a remarkably straightforward and innovative plan. Rather than clearing the stables by hand, Heracles diverted the local Alpheus and Peneus rivers, creating a primitive toilet that flushed away the mountains of dung that had haunted the stables for decades. The plan was simple but relied on the supernatural strength and endurance that only Heracles possessed.
After completing the impossible task, Heracles demanded payment from King Augeas. However, the King refused, claiming that the task was part of the labors set by King Eurystheus. Heracles took Augeas to court, where Augeas’s son, Phyleus, defended Heracles. Despite this, the court, comprised of Augeas’s subjects, ruled in favor of their King, and Phyleus and Heracles were banished from Elis.
As he left, Heracles vowed to return and seek revenge against Augeas for breaking their agreement. According to the rules of Heracles’s atonement, he must complete all labors without complaint, assistance, or pay. Heracles’s deal with Augeas broke this rule, so Eurystheus imposed another labor, increasing the total from eleven to the titular twelve.
6. Slaying the Stymphalian Birds
Heracles’s sixth labor was to exterminate the man-eating Stymphalian birds. Considered sacred to Ares, these birds were as large as cranes and had razor-sharp talons, metallic feathers, and elongated bronze beaks, earning them the nickname “bronze birds.” The predatory birds could shoot metallic feathers like arrows, and their beaks were sharp enough to pierce through armor. They numbered in the thousands and functioned as an organized army, strategically coordinating their attacks to maximize devastation, and annihilating entire communities in a single deadly assault.
Before Heracles could face the birds, he first had to get to them. The birds made their nests in the inhospitable swampy marshlands around Lake Stymphalia. Heracles found himself unable to navigate the swamps due to his hulking frame, which caused him to sink into the soft swamp ground. This forced him to retreat and devise a better plan to confront the birds.
As Heracles struggled to formulate a plan, Athena, the goddess of wisdom, appeared to offer her assistance and a gift. The gift was not a weapon but a crotalum, a percussion musical instrument consisting of finger cymbals. This was no ordinary instrument. Athena had requested that Hephaestus, the god of the forge and fire, create it and imbue it with magical properties that amplified its sound. Athena instructed Heracles to climb the nearby mountain and play the cymbals. Their booming sound would reverberate across the land and draw the Stymphalian birds out of their swampy sanctuary.
Upon reaching the mountain peak, Heracles began to play the cymbals, sending reverberations echoing through the air. In moments, a black mass rose from the swampy trees as the birds attempted to escape from Heracles’s thunderous symphony. With the birds now in sight, Heracles drew his bow and unleashed a volley of arrows, eradicating nearly all of them over the next few hours. However, a few hundred birds escaped to the island of Aretias, where they caused chaos until the Argonauts eventually eliminated them.
7. Capturing the Cretan Bull
Heracles’s seventh labor was to help King Minos of Crete by capturing the Cretan Bull and delivering it to Eurystheus. This task marked the halfway point of Heracles’s twelve labors and the beginning of his non-Peloponnesian labors. During this time, the hero traveled to various locations across the Mediterranean and beyond.
King Minos was a legendary and influential ruler who, with the help of his father Zeus, established the first known constitution and legal system. However, he was also directly responsible for the appearance of the Cretan bull, causing devastation throughout his kingdom.
After the King of Crete died, his son Minos prayed to Poseidon to prove his right to the throne instead of his brothers, Sarpedon and Rhadamanthys. Poseidon sent a snow-white bull to show that Minos should be King. Minos became King but did not thank Poseidon by sacrificing the bull as promised. In retaliation, Poseidon cursed Minos’s wife, Queen Pasiphae, with an unnatural lust for the bull. Pasiphae ordered the inventor Daedalus to create a contraption that allowed her to mate with the bull, resulting in the birth of Asterion the Minotaur. Afterwards, Poseidon lifted the curse on Pasiphae and sent the bull mad, unleashing devastation across the island.
By Heracles’s arrival, the mad bull had been wreaking havoc for months, causing untold death and destruction. Although sent by Poseidon, the bull did not have an impenetrable hide, immortality, or supernatural strength and speed; it was simply a creature of untamed fury. When Heracles found the bull, he started yelling and throwing rocks, provoking it to charge him. As the bull charged, Heracles ran toward it head-on. Heracles had to capture and bring the bull back to Eurystheus unharmed and devised a simple strategy: charge and grab the bull by the horns.
After their thunderous collision, Heracles wrestled the Cretan bull into submission and carried it back to King Eurystheus. Once Heracles delivered the bull, he let it go, and it settled near Marathon in Attica, where it continued its rampage until the hero, Theseus, stopped it.
8. Stealing the Mares of Diomedes
Heracles’s eighth labor was to steal the mares of Diomedes. Diomedes was a cruel Thracian King of the Bistones who fed his adversaries to his four mad, fire-breathing horses, believed to be a gift from his father, Ares. The horses’ names were Podargos (swift), Lampon (shining), Xanthos (yellow), and Deinos (terrible). They were tall, almost gigantic creatures with snow-white coats and manes of yellow and brown. Their madness was the result of being forced to eat human flesh, which made them extraordinarily aggressive. They had to be restrained with iron chains to a bronze trough and would only calm down once they ate human flesh.
As Heracles traveled to Diomedes’s capital by the Black Sea, he visited his friends, the King and Queen of Pherae in Thessaly, Admetus and Alcestis. This seemingly innocent visit led to one of his most impressive feats.
Years earlier, Zeus executed Apollo’s son, Asclepius, for creating an elixir that cured death. To punish Zeus, Apollo killed the Cyclops responsible for creating Zeus’ thunderbolts. Zeus disciplined Apollo by making him serve as King Admetus’s herdsman for a year. Apollo and Admetus became friends and lovers, and the god not only helped Admetus find his wife, Alcestis but also decided to try to make him immortal. Apollo asked the sisters of fate for help, and they agreed to make Admetus immortal if a willing volunteer died in his place. Despite Admetus’s search, no one volunteered until Alcestis eventually did. Obsessed with immortality, Admetus accepted Alcestis’s sacrifice.
Shortly after Alcestis’s sacrifice, Admetus realised how unbearable life would be without her. Heracles arrived soon after, and Admetus, known for his hospitality, hosted a lavish banquet for Heracles while keeping Alcestis’s death a secret. However, Heracles soon discovered the truth and decided to rescue Alcestis from the underworld. At Alcestis’s tomb, Heracles encountered Thanatos, death personified, taking Alcestis to Hades. Heracles managed to wrestle Alcestis from the hands of death and reunite her with Admetus before continuing his journey.
On the long road to Thrace, Heracles befriended Abderus, a son of Hermes, and the pair became lovers. As the son of the god of thieves, Abderus offered to help Heracles steal the horses and helped him devise a simple plan: first, secure the horses; second, lead the mares out of the palace; and finally, defeat any Thracians who tried to stop steps one and two. With Abderus’s help, Heracles located and quickly stole the horses, but not without alerting Diomedes.
Eurystheus neglected to tell Heracles that the horses ate human flesh and breathed fire and Heracles unwittingly left them with Abderus while he confronted Diomedes. While Heracles fought Diomedes, the horses killed and devoured Abderus. After capturing Diomedes, Heracles found what was left of Abderus and, enraged, fed Diomedes to his horses.
After eating Diomedes, the horses became permanently calm, allowing Heracles to deliver them to Eurystheus without trouble. Eurystheus went on to breed Diomedes’s mares, creating a line of thoroughbreds. Supposedly, one of the descendants of this line of horses was Bucephalus, the much-loved steed of Alexander the Great.
9. Obtaining the Girdle of Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons
Heracles’s ninth labor was to obtain the Belt of Hippolyta for Eurystheus’s daughter, Princess Admete. Queen Hippolyta, the daughter of Ares, ruled the Amazons, an all-female warrior society known for their military prowess and horse-riding skills. Hippolyta, a formidable military leader, wore a leather belt or girdle gifted by Ares, which granted her supernatural strength and invincibility in battle.
Heracles sailed with a crew to the Amazonian capital, Themiscyra, located on the northern coast of Anatolia. Heracles’s crew consisted of renowned heroes such as Peleus, the father of Achilles, and Theseus of Athens. They expected a tough battle to obtain Hippolyta’s belt, as the Amazons usually forbid men from entering Themiscyra. However, when Heracles and his crew reached Themiscyra, they were welcomed as honored guests. Word of Heracles’s labors had reached the Amazons, who respected and admired his exploits enough to invite him and his crew into their city despite their distrust of men.
The Amazons held a grand feast, and Heracles and Hippolyta’s mutual respect quickly evolved into a passionate romance. After spending several days with the Amazons, Heracles told Hippolyta why he had come to see her. Hippolyta, who now greatly respected Heracles, willingly gave him her belt to complete his labor.
Heracles’s ninth labor seemed like his easiest mission yet. However, Hera refused to allow Heracles’s life to be easy. The goddess disguised as an Amazon snuck into the city and began spreading rumors among the Amazons that Heracles was about to abduct Hippolyta. Hera used magic to rile the Amazon into attacking Heracles’s crew while they slept. When Heracles found out, he believed Hippolyta had betrayed him and killed her in a rage. Heracles then rallied his remaining crew and escaped Themiscyra with the belt. In some versions, Hippolyta is not killed by Heracles but is captured by Theseus. The Amazonian Queen or, in most cases, her sister Antiope, would go on to play a significant role in the myth of Theseus.
On the way back to Eurystheus, Heracles stopped at the city of Troy and rescued the Trojan princess Hesione from a sea monster. The greedy Trojan King, Laomedon, was forced to sacrifice his daughter to appease Apollo and Poseidon for not paying them after they built Troy’s walls. Laomedon hired Heracles to rescue his daughter but refused to pay him afterwards. Heracles continued his voyage to Eurystheus but vowed to return to get revenge.
10. Obtaining the Cattle of the Three-Bodied Giant Geryon
Heracles’s tenth labor was to steal the cattle of the three-headed giant Geryon, the King of Erytheia. The exact location of Erytheia was debated. Ancient writers thought it resided near the world’s western edge, beyond the Iberian Peninsula and modern-day Morocco in the Atlantic Ocean. Heracles decided to travel west from Egypt, across the Libyan desert, to find the fabled island.
The scorching desert heat frustrated Heracles, causing him to fire his lethal Hydra venom arrows at the sun. Helios, the sun god, appeared before Heracles, demanding he stop. However, Heracles refused to do so unless Helios lessened the sun’s heat or agreed to help him on his journey. Helios allowed Heracles to travel in his golden cup, a fast vessel that the sun god used to journey across the ocean every night to restart the sun’s cycle. With this vessel, Heracles quickly reached the island of Erytheia.
Geryon was a formidable giant with three heads and, in some depictions, three torsos sprouting out of one pair of legs. He was famous for his prized cattle, a unique red color reminiscent of the dusk sky. Many desired the uniquely colored cattle, and Geryon ensured they were well-guarded. To protect them, Geryon hired Eurytion, Ares’s giant son and Cerberus’s brother Orthus, a two-headed guard dog with a snake for a tail.
After reaching Erytheia, Heracles found the red-coated cattle and easily defeated their guardians, Orthus and Eurytion, using his mighty club. As he drove the cattle back to the shore, Geryon confronted him. Geryon was equipped in shining armor, but Heracles fired a barrage of venom-coated arrows, killing Geryon before he could rescue his beloved cows.
After defeating Geryon, Heracles brought the cattle back to the mainland, where the Mediterranean Sea meets the Atlantic Ocean. There, he erected two pillars, called the Pillars of Heracles, to memorialize his journey to the westernmost edge of the known world.
As Heracles drove the cattle east back to Eurystheus, he encountered several challenges. He fought a cannibalistic, fire-breathing giant in Italy named Cacus, who tried to steal the cattle. Afterwards, he chased an escaped cow across Italy to Sicily. Just before Heracles entered Greece in Thrace, Hera released an army of gadflies to torment him and the cattle. Heracles had not lost any cattle on the long journey, but the gadflies caused the cattle to panic and scatter. Although he could not find all the scattered cattle, Heracles eventually delivered most of them to King Eurystheus.
11. Stealing Three of the Golden Apples of the Hesperides
Heracles’s eleventh labor was to steal three golden apples of the Hesperides. The golden apples that grew in Heras’s garden could grant immortality and were guarded by the Hesperides, nymphs of the evening, and a hundred-headed dragon named Ladon. The apple’s location was a mystery, with some claiming it was in the far north and others claiming it was on an island at the world’s western edge.
Heracles eventually obtained directions from the elusive sea god Nereus, who attempted to evade Heracles by transforming into various sea creatures. Nereus informed Heracles that the apples were on an island near Erytheia, where Heracles stole Geryon’s cattle.
Heracles decided to go west across the Libyan desert, searching for the island. Along the way, he defeated the cruel Egyptian King Busiris, who sacrificed strangers to Osiris. He also encountered a giant named Antaeus, who challenged travelers to deadly wrestling matches. Heracles fought Antaeus and almost lost until he realized that the giant drew strength from his mother, Gaia, every time he touched the ground. With this knowledge, Heracles lifted Antaeus above his head, crushing him and ending the fight.
The myths do not detail how Heracles reached the island of the Hesperides, but some claim he used Helios’s cup again. Heracles quickly found Hera’s garden, which contained an orchard of glittering golden apples. Although the Hesperides were nowhere to be seen, standing between Heracles and the apples was Ladon, the immortal hundred-headed dragon.
Heracles shot a barrage of Hydra venom arrows to slay Ladon rather than confront the dragon at close range. However, when Heracles tried to pick an apple, it would vanish and reappear out of his reach. Only immortals could pluck the apples, forcing Heracles to leave and find an immortal to help him steal the apples.
Heracles’s search for an immortal accomplice led him across the Mediterranean to the Caucasus Mountains. He heard a voice calling his name and followed it to Mount Elbrus. At the summit, he found a giant eagle attacking a man bound to the mountain in iron chains. The man pleaded for help, and Heracles killed the eagle with an arrow. The man was the Titan Prometheus, the trickster hero who stole fire from the gods for humanity. As punishment, Zeus bound Prometheus to Mount Elbrus, where an eagle would torment him by tearing out his liver every day.
Heracles freed Prometheus, and as a gesture of gratitude, the Titan instructed Heracles to seek out his brother Atlas and ask him to retrieve the apples. After the Titanomachy, the war between the Titans and Olympians, Zeus punished Atlas by making him hold up Ouranos—the personification of the sky—for eternity. Atlas was friendly with the Hesperides and would not hesitate to steal from an Olympian like Hera. However, Prometheus warned Heracles that Atlas would inevitably try to trick him.
Heracles found Atlas in the mountain range that now bears his name in northwestern Africa. Atlas agreed to help Heracles, but he could not leave because if he let go of the sky, it would fall onto the earth. Atlas asked Heracles to take his place while he fetched the golden apples. Without much choice, Heracles agreed. Nothing tested Heracles’s strength more than the burden of holding up the sky. After several days, Atlas reappeared with three golden apples and then offered to deliver them to King Eurystheus and switch places with Heracles afterward.
Thanks to Prometheus’s warning, Heracles was prepared for Atlas’s trickery. Heracles agreed to Atlas’s request but asked Atlas to briefly take back the sky so he could use his cloak to pad his neck and make the burden more comfortable. Atlas agreed to switch places for a moment, and as Atlas shouldered the weight of the sky once more, Heracles snatched the apples and ran.
After Heracles delivered the apples, King Eurystheus placed them in Hera’s temple so Athena could return them to the Hesperides. The apples belonged to Hera, Eurystheus’s patron goddess, and could not be kept by mortals.
12. Capturing and Bringing Back Cerberus
Heracles’s twelfth labor was to go to the Underworld and bring back Cerberus, the three-headed guard dog of Hades. In Greek mythology, the underworld was a physical place accessible through unique entryways. Journeying to the underworld was known as a Katabasis, and gaining entry was relatively simple. Hades, the god of the dead and riches, welcomed all new souls, whether living or deceased. What Hades did not appreciate was letting souls leave. Unlike an average guard dog, Cerberus only attacked those who attempted to leave the Underworld.
Entering the Underworld meant being at Hades’s mercy. Rather than attempt to abduct Cerberus from under Hades’s nose, Heracles decided to ask Hades for permission to take the dog. While not unheard of, persuading Hades to release anything from his realm was incredibly difficult. Heracles decided to gain favor with Hades’s wife, Persephone, Queen of the underworld, by joining the Eleusinian Mysteries. The Mysteries commemorated the cycle of death and renewal by reenacting Persephone’s seasonal descent to the underworld and her return. Heracles gained favor with Persephone and insight into his descent into the Underworld by participating in the Mysteries.
Heracles entered the Underworld through a cave at Cape Tainaron, the southernmost point of mainland Greece, now called Cape Matapan. At the cave entrances, Heracles met Hermes, who offered to guide him through the Underworld. Hermes was the ideal guide, the supreme psychopomp, the conductor of souls who guided the dead through the Underworld.
As Heracles and Hermes descended into the underworld, they encountered the hero Theseus and his friend Pirithous. Persephone imprisoned the pair on the chair of forgetfulness as punishment for attempting to abduct her to marry Pirithous. Heracles managed to free Theseus, who fled to the surface, but Persephone refused to release Pirithous. Heracles then encountered the spirit of his friend Meleager, who died at the end of the Calydonian boar hunt. Meleager asked Heracles to marry and care for his sister, Deianira. Heracles agreed, but this marriage ultimately contributed to his demise.
When Heracles arrived at Hades’s palace, he convinced Hades, with the support of Persephone, by arguing that helping him would upset Hera. Persephone’s approval and the satisfaction of annoying an Olympian were enough for Hades to allow Heracles to take Cerberus under certain conditions: Heracles had to capture Cerberus on his own without using weapons and return Cerberus to the Underworld once his task was completed.
Cerberus, the offspring of Echidna and Typhon, was a colossal three-headed dog with the claws of a lion, a mane of snakes, and a snake’s tail. Although Heracles could not use weapons, Hades said nothing about him using his clothes. Heracles used his lion skin cloak to deflect Cerberus’s attacks, allowing him to leap onto Cerberus’s central head and wrestle the three heads into a chokehold. Despite Cerberus’s fierce resistance, Heracles never relented and eventually subdued the creature, achieving the impossible once again.
Heracles bound Cerberus in chains and toured Greece with the hound before delivering it to King Eurystheus. The King was terrified and demanded that Heracles dispose of Cerberus immediately. Heracles refused and would only release Cerberus when the king officially absolved him of his crime. After the king proclaimed that Heracles was cleansed of guilt, Heracles returned Cerberus to the Underworld and completed his twelve labors, finally freeing himself from servitude.
Hera designed the labors to punish Heracles for being the son of Zeus. Nevertheless, Heracles resisted Hera at every turn; he accomplished the impossible, journeyed to the ends of the earth, outsmarted immortals, and made the world safer by defeating many of its most dangerous monsters.
Despite Hera’s opposition, Heracles became the revered champion of ancient Greece, honored as its greatest hero. However, Heracles’s story was far from over, as the hero still had a lifetime of adventure, love, and tragedy ahead of him. The twelve labors only offer a glimpse into the eventful and legendary life of ancient Greece’s most virtuous hero, Heracles.
