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From Manual of Mythology, by Alexander S. Murray; Revised Edition, Philadelphia: David McKay, Publisher, 1895; pp. 100-105.

[100]

DEITIES OF THE HIGHEST ORDER.

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HEPHÆSTUS, or VULCAN,


Black and white photograph of artwork of Hephaestus [Hephæstus] or Vulcan, seated and bearded, looking at a shield on his lap.  He has a pointed cap. The shield has a picture of a face on it.  He is partially draped, with one of his legs completely covered.

Fig. 18. Hephæstus or Vulcan.





Was the divine personification of the fire that burns within the earth and bursts forth in volcanic eruptions — fire which has no connection with the sun or the lightning of heaven; and such being his character, we can readily understand the mutual dislike which existed between him and the god of the light of heaven.

                  “Those who labor
The sweaty forge, who edge the crooked scythe,
Bend stubborn steel, and harden gleaming armor,
Acknowledge Vulcan’s aid.””

PRIOR.

101

He was indeed the son of Zeus and Hera, the supreme deities of heaven; but he was born to be a cause of quarrel between them, and alternately at enmity with both. [He was born lame.] Once, when he took his mother’s part, Zeus seized him by the heels and tossed him out of Olympus (Iliad i. 560). Through the air he fell for one whole day, and at evening, as the sun when down, reached the island of Lemnos, where he was found by some Sintian people, and taken under friendly care.

“From morn to noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve
  A summer’s day; and with the setting sun
  Dropped from the zenith, like a falling star,
  On Lemnos, the Ægean isle. .”

MILTON.

The place where he was found, and where in after times was the principal centre of his worship, was the neighborhood of the burning mountain Mosychlos.

Another version of the myth has it that Hera, ashamed of the decrepit form which he presented at his birth threw him with her own hands from Olympus. Falling into the sea, he was picked up by Thetis and Eurýnomē, was cared for by them, remained for nine years in the abode of the sea-gods, none but they knowing his whereabouts, and executed there many wonderfully clever examples of handiwork. It may be that this belief originated in observing the nearness of volcanic mountains to the sea-shore, and the fact of whole islands, like the modern Santorin, being suddenly thrown up from the sea by volcanic force. Among the works which he fashioned in the palace of the sea-gods was a cunningly devised throne, which he presented to Hera, as a punishment for casting him out of heaven, knowing that when she sat down on it she would be locked within its secret chains so firmly that no power but his could free her. This happened, and Ares [Mars] went to bring him by force to her assistance, but was compelled to retreat in fear of the fire-brand with which 102 Hephæstus assailed him. At last Dionysus {Bacchus), the god of wine, succeeded by his soft conciliatory speech in restoring friendship between mother and son, and her bonds were forthwith undone. Perhaps it is from this intimacy with Dionysus that he is said to have once appeared as cup-bearer in Olympus, on which occasion the assembled deities could not contain themselves with laughter at the droll figure limping from couch to couch. It seems to be the unsteady flicker of flame that is represented in the lameness of the fire-god, and it may have been the genial influence of the hearth which was the source of the quaint stories about him.

From being originally god of fire, Hephæstus naturally developed into god of those arts and industries dependent on fire, especially the arts of pottery and working in metal. He was the artist god who worked in a smoky smithy down in 103 the heart of burning mountains, and produced clever works of dazzling beauty, which he gave away freely to gods and to favorite heroes. For Zeus he made the dreaded ægis and a sceptre; for Achilles and Memnon their armor; for himself two wonderful handmaidens of gold, who, like living beings, would move about and assist him as he walked; and when Homer has to describe any bronze work of great beauty, his highest praise is always that it was the work of Hephæstus. The throne which he made for Hera, and the net in which he caught Venus and us, have already been mentioned.

From being god of the warmth within the earth — of volcanic fire, Hephæstus came also, when the fertility of a volcanic soil became known by experience, to be looked on as one who aided the spread of vegetation, this function of his being recognized most in the spread of the vine, which thrives and bears its best fruit on volcanic soil. It as from knowledge of this fact, no doubt, that the idea arose of the close friendship between him and the wine god Dionysus [Bacchus], which we find exemplified partly in the joint worship of these two deities, and partly in the story already told, of how Dionysus led Hephæstus back to Olympus, and smoothed his differences with the other gods.

His worship was traceable back to the earliest times, Lemnos being always the place most sacred to him. There, at the foot of the burning mountain Mosychlos, which is now extinct, stood a very ancient temple of the god — on the very spot, it was said, where Prometheus stole the heavenly fire, and for the theft was taken away among the Caucasus mountains, there nailed alive to a rock by Hephæstus, and compelled to permit every day an eagle sent by Zeus to gnaw his liver, which daily grew afresh. A somewhat gloomy ceremony of expatiating this theft of fire took place annually in the island, all fires being put out, and forbidden to be relit 104 until the return of the ship that had been despatched to the sacred island of Delos to fetch new fire. Then, after being nine days extinguished, all the fires in dwelling-houses and in workshops were rekindled by the new flame.

Next to Lemnos, perhaps the most important seat of his worship was Athens, where the unusually large number of persons employed in the potteries and in metal-working recognized him as their patron god, and, associating him with Athene, held annually in October a festival called Chalkeia, in honor of both. In the same month occurred the festival Apaturia, at which, by the side of Zeus and Athene, a prominent place was assigned to Hephæstus in his capacity of god of the hearth and protector of the domestic life which gathered round it. On this occasion sacrifices were offered at the hearth, and a public procession took place of men clad in festival garments, carrying lighted torches and singing songs in his praise. Again, the torch race, which formed part of the Panathenaic games, was intended to commemorate the theft of fire by Prometheus. In connection with this community of worship existing between Athene and Hephæstus at Athens, it was said that he once endeavored to obtain the love of the goddess, and that even though this failed she had devoted special care to Erichthonius, the offspring of his intercourse with Gæa, the goddess of the earth.

In Sicily Hephæstus had a temple on Mount Ætna, which was watched by dogs possessed of the faculty of distinguishing the pious from the impious and profane, whose approach they fiercely resisted. His worship had also spread to lower Italy and the Campania.

In Rome it was said that Vulcan had a temple as early as the time of Romulus, who, in fact, caused it to be erected, and instituted the festival called Vulcanalia, which was wont to be held on the 23d of August, the ceremony consisting of a sacrifice for the purpose of averting all the mishaps 105 that arise from the use of fire and lights; for he days were then beginning to be noticeably shorter, and the necessity of light to work by in the evenings to be felt.

The wife of Hephæstus, according to the Iliad, was Charis, but the popular belief in later times assigned that place to Aphroditē [Venus]. By neither had he any children.

In works of art Hephæstus is represented as an aged bearded man, with serious furrowed face, wearing a short chiton or exomis, and a pointed cap or pilos, the mark of workmen or fishermen (which Odysseus also wears), hammering at an anvil, his attitude showing the lameness of which the myth speaks. On the early coins of Lemnos he appears without a beard. One of the favorite subjects both of poets and artists was the story of his catching Hera in the throne which he gave her, the ludicrousness of it making it an attractive subject for the ancient comedy. On a painted vase in the British Museum is a scene from a comedy in which Hera appears sated on the throne, while Ares and Hephæstus are engaged in combat before her. Another scene which frequently occurs on the painted vases is that in which Hephæstus appears on his way back to Olympus in a state of intoxication, riding on a mule, or walking, and accompanied by Dionysus, Sileni, and nymphs. At the birth of Athene it was he who split open the head of Zeus to let the goddess come forth, and in the frequent representations of this scene on the vases he appears hammer in hand. At other times we find him fashioning the armor of Achilles or fastening Prometheus to the rock.






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