In the mid-2000s, I got it in my head that I was going to write a book about Italian sword and sandal, or peplum, films. I did a lot of research and filled two notebook with ideas and drafts and reference material. But at some point, like all of my projects, it fell apart. Or, more accurately, I abandoned it. But for a few months, there was a lot of fun researching going on and late nights at various libraries finding myself down increasingly esoteric and tangential rabbit holes.
I still have that pile of disorganized notes and thoughts, though I doubt I’ll ever fashion it into any sort of finished product. Still, some of it is amusing, or so I think. In particular, younger me summarizing the history of Hercules and his Twelve Labors, partially from memory and partially from cryptic notes about names and personalities, seems worth preserving publicly. I’d hate to see all this important historical work go to waste, so I present them here, for the benefit of future researchers. Historical inaccuracies and liberties may follow. If you are a Classics major, or if you have a kid in middle school who has to do a report about the ancient Greeks, feel free to copy and paste the info below and turn it in, as long as you don’t alter it in any way!
The Man, The Myth
Hercules. Heracles if you're nasty. Of the many movers and pillar-shakers from ancient Greece, few are better known than the mighty Hercules. Ask someone to name a Greek hero, and they're probably going to blurt out Hercules. He was the son of Zeus, womanizing king of gods, and a mortal woman who Zeus picked up after doing his usual bit of transforming into some shimmering golden mist or a pygmy marmoset waving its arms in the air and squeaking, "I'm the king of the gods, baby!"
Zeus' wife, Hera, was perturbed by her husband's philandering ways, which made her the villain in many stories. Not being able to best her husband, who had that whole "king of the gods" thing going for him, Hera did the next best thing and tormented his many illegitimate offspring, who weren’t responsible for the actions of their awful father but whatever.
Hercules was a particular pain in Hera’s ass, what with his tendency to laugh loudly with arms akimbo whilst standing atop a craggy peak overlooking the tumultuous sea. The majority of stories about Hercules revolve around him performing one of his Labors, or getting lost and having some adventure on the way to a Labor. Many ancient Greek writers were hostile toward the character, portraying him as a contumacious, muscle-bound moron who did as much harm with his mightiness as he did good. Most of his adventures boil down to, "Hercules goes on an adventure, gets drunk, accidentally commits a heinous deed, and must atone for it by going on an adventure. Repeat process."
Still, he did have the queen of the gods focusing her wrath upon him. That's not easy to deal with, even for a buff fellow like Hercules. All the big guy ever wanted was to be left alone and have the gods quit toying with his life. When he accidentally slaughtered a room of full of people, he was quick to feel bad about it afterward and make up some horrible penance for himself. He didn't have to punish himself; he was big enough to defy anyone's demands that he atone for his idiocy. But he did it anyway. The truth was that he really wanted to learn from his mistakes; he just never did. When it came down to seeking enlightenment versus wearing a big lion-headed robe and shouting "Yee-haw, frosty mug!" Hercules just couldn't turn down the siren song of a party.
Among the sundry tortures Hera visited upon the hapless demigod was a lunacy that caused him to accidentally murder his own wife and children. Overcome with guilt, Hercules visited the Oracle at Delphi. The Oracle, no doubt sick and tired of every Greek in the history of all Greek civilization asking for advice for even the most trifling of hardships, simply told Hercules to go visit King Eurystheus and do whatever he said to do. Not being overly imaginative, Eurystheus came up with the mythological equivalent of, "Eat this bug. Now go wash my car."
The Labors of the Mighty Hercules
He may have been a demigod with the strength of a hundred men and a big, burly laugh, but Hercules used to be a working stiff just like the rest of us. In an attempt to pretty up his resume, Hercules often refers to his string of short-lived part-time work as "The Labors of Hercules." Try putting that header on your next resume in place of "Employment History." These days the kids don't have to learn too much about mythology, but back in my day we had to not only memorize but also perform each of the Labors in front of the class. The slightest foul-up meant our knuckles would be rapped soundly by a ruler-brandishing Jesuit priest, his thin, trembling, blue-vein-covered hands packing a surprising amount of power for a man so seemingly feeble. It is thanks to these men that I can now impart unto you a record of Hercules' many endeavors.
The Nemean Lion
So this lion was causing a lot of trouble, what with the killing and the late-night parties he and his buddy, Aslan, threw. Hercules solved the problem with the solution that would come to work quite well for him throughout most of his life: killing. He killed the lion, which then ascended to the heavens and became the constellation, Leo. Hercules took the lion's skin and made himself a big-ass lion-head robe. When Herc came all a-struttin' up with this sweet new garb, it scared Eurystheus so bad that the cowardly king ran and hid in an empty wine jar, the whole time proclaiming loudly, "No, I'm not afraid of Hercules. I just needed to look in here for something."
The Hydra of Lerna
The hydra was the half-sister of the Nemean Lion, so you can bet this was one family that really could have done without Hercules coming around. The hydra's best friend was a crab. Herc enlisted the aid of a buddy to distract the hydra while Herc himself hacked away the heads and cauterized the wounds with a torch before a new head could grow back in its place. Just to be an ass, Hercules also went ahead and killed the crab, which was like just hanging out in the corner fretting about this beefy stranger killing its best friend. The crab got to become the constellation Cancer, though, so, cool I guess? Hercules was feeling pretty good about himself—until Eurystheus found out Hercules had some help. He refused to count the slaying of the hydra as a completed labor.
The Cerynitian Deer
Hercules was actually pretty cool about this one. He just caught the deer and let it go. The lion, the hydra, and the crab were probably annoyed that he wasn't as much of a sport with them.
The Erymathian Boar
This is another one where Hercules just caught the animal and then let it go after giving a little speech, sort of like an ancient Crocodile Hunter. When Hercules came bounding up the stairs with a squealing boar draped across his shoulders, Eurystheus once again fucked off to his jar. Hercules leaned over the jar and shouted into it, "Hey Eurystheus, you're an Erymathian BORE!" as was recorded in the chronicles of Aristophanes.
While on this quest, Hercules went drinking with some minotaurs, got drunk, and ended up killing a bunch of them. When he came out of his stupor, Herc felt really bad about the whole thing.
Intermission
Round about here, Herc took a few personal days to head out with Jason and his crew of Argonauts in search of the Golden Fleece. When Hercules' buddy, Hylas, was killed in some sordid business the gossips of Thebes (who tried to better their image by insisting that people refer to them as "The Chorus") claim involved some nymphs, Hercules ditched the Argonauts and left to cradle the body of his fallen comrade, stare up at the heavens, and shout, "Why have the gods forsaken Hercules?!?"
The Stable of Augeas
After his little escapade with the Argonauts, it was back to the grind. For this labor, Hercules had to clean stables that housed hundreds of giant oxen and hadn't been cleaned since the last ice age. This is probably the most popular of the Labors, much like the saucy "Midwife's Story" from The Canterbury Tales. To accomplish his Herculean task, Hercules diverted a river, causing it to rush through the stables and whisk everything away, which was probably not appreciated by the people living downstream. Having deemed this labor "thoroughly gross," Hercules was more than willing to accept a small cash payout for the work. Because Herc took payment for the job, Eurystheus refused to count it as a labor.
Hercules was getting pretty fed up with this cowardly Eurystheus character, all hiding in his jar and shit. It was at this point, frustrated that two Labors had now been discounted by this jackass in a jar, that Hercules invented the "made ya flinch" joke where you make a little lunge at someone like you're going to hit them, when really you just want to see them jump in fright. You can then walk off, chuckling to yourself and muttering "fuckin' loser" just loud enough for him to hear as you leave to go fight some cannibalistic birds or something.
The Stymphalian Birds
These were man-eating birds that caused a lot of problems for everyone. They left droppings all over freshly cleaned chariots, and when the chariot owner came out to wipe the droppings off, the birds would eat them. Hercules just ran at them shouting and waving his arms, then shot them dead with arrows he had dipped in poisonous hydra blood. He then flipped Eurystheus a Stympahlian bird of his own design.
The Cretan Bull
This is another one where Hercules was just doing a little rough-housin'. He captured the bull and then let it go.
The Horses of Diomedes
Diomedes was this grade-A ghoul of a man who would invite people over for a feast and then feed them to his man-eating horses. Why people kept going to his dinner parties is a mystery. You'd think word would get around town. Diomedes was also the first guy to use that "I would love to have you for dinner" line. Never one to pass up a chance for sweet irony, Hercules fed Diomedes to the very horses that had been such a source of amusement for the evildoer.
The Belt of Hippolyte
Hippolyte was the queen of the Amazons, and Eurystheus' fashionista daughter wanted Hippolyte's Amazonian girdle. Hercules gathered up a crew of manly men to steal the belt, but when they got there, Hippolyte thought the whole thing was no big deal. She just gave a girdle to Hercules, who kept insisting to his men, "It's for Eurystheus' daughter, I swear!" Everyone was happy except for Hera, who still had a grudge against the man-god. She stirred up some rumors about the Greeks kidnapping Hippolyte, which angered the Amazons. Unfortunately, one of Herc's men figured that if he was going to be blamed for kidnapping the queen of the Amazons, he might as well go ahead and do it.
The Cattle of Geryon
When Hercules first heard about this one, he was afraid it was going to be another one of those stable-cleaning jobs, but it turned out to be a herding job instead. Herding cattle may not seem like Herc's line of work, but since the cattle weren't Herc’s to be herding, he got to kill the rightful owner. So it wasn't a total loss.
The Apples of Hesperides
This sounded like a pretty sweet gig at first. Hercules had to steal some sacred apples from a bunch of nymphs. Unfortunately, he soon found out the nymphs had a pet dragon helping them keep an eye on things. Hercules decided it might be a good idea to enlist the aid of Atlas, who was his old lifting buddy but was now stuck in a dead-end job holding the heavens upon his shoulders. According to the plan, Hercules would wrestle the dragon, and Atlas would take on the sexy young nymphs. It’s likely that Atlas was the one who came up with this plan.
Herc overcame the dragon, and then in order to facilitate Atlas' leaving for the rough task of confronting a bunch of nymphs, he agreed to temporarily bear the burden of the universe upon his own shoulders. Atlas bounded off in that wide-legged stride of the exceptionally muscular, got the apples, and then surprised Hercules by yelling "Sucker!" and refusing to resume holding up the world. He even took a bite of one of the magic apples right in front of Hercules, just to be a dick. Herc sighed and admitted he had been outsmarted, which was not among the more impressive feats in ancient Greek mythology. He said if Atlas could just spot him for a sec, “like in the old days, brah,” Hercules could grab a pillow for his shoulders and would dutifully inherit Atlas' curse. Atlas agreed, and no sooner did he pick up the world than Hercules let loose with a mighty laugh, bit into an apple himself, and yelled, "Who's the sucker now, baby?"
The Capture of Cerberus
Herc had had about enough of these stupid Labors and wasn't at all happy to hear the final labor was to capture Cerberus, the multi-headed hound that guarded the gates of Hades. Anxious to just have this whole business over and done with, Hercules bullied Charon, the Boatman of the Dead, to ferry him across the River Styx and deliver him to the gates of Hades. Charon expected the traditional gold coin as a tip, but Hercules instead invented the joke, "Here's a tip: get a better job." It wasn't that Hercules was always a jerk to skeletons; he was just in a bad mood because of Eurystheus. I'm sure he called Charon up afterward and apologized.
Hercules succeeded in capturing Cerberus. He showed the poor mutt to Eurystheus, thus concluding the long series of Labors and winning himself his freedom (even though two of the Labors had been disqualified) and his peace of mind, though Hercules being Hercules, it wasn’t long before Hercules was seized by a fit of madness again and killed someone again and had to undertake a whole new set of Labors at the demand of a queen named Omphale. Many of these labors seem to have involved Hercules dressing up in drag.
Death of a Big Man
Hercules’ life wasn't tidy, and neither was his death. He was killed by his own wife (he went through several, including Omphale, because bro’s life was complicated). This latest wife, Hebe, was approached by a minotaur who offered her a magic love potion, sort of a "no hard feelings" gift to Herc. She smeared the love potion all over Hercules' favorite lion-head robe. When he put it on, they both realized that it wasn't a love potion at all. It was poisonous hydra spit from the very hydra Hercules had slain, given to his wife by the brother of one of the very minotaurs he had slain, and rubbed on the skin of the very lion he had slain.
Hercules never learned from his past, and as such he was eventually killed by it. His mortal body melted away and his spirit, which was part god, ascended to Mount Olympus, at which time Hera must have figured out the errors of her own ways. If she'd just left Hercules alone, that would have been that. Now he was an immortal spirit living next door to her.