The Greeks, until to the testimonies of Arato, did not have
idea of who were the personage behind the constellation: in fact they called
it simly Engonasin, "who is knelt down". Eratostene but to the end
recognized in it the biggest of the Greek heroes, Eracle, or Ercole for
the Roman, in the attempt to overhang the dragon, whose constellation in fact
is found to its feet, in memory of its penultimate hard work. Fruit of one
of the usual extramarital relations between Zeus and the tricked Alcmene,
Eracle came called initially Alcide or Palemone: only subsequently it
acquired its legendary name. The goddess Era, wife of Zeus, was angered
for all this, but having Ercole sucked milk of a goddess, he bacame immortal.
The mother of the gods therefore sweared of follow in eternal and, like first
result of her intentions, she induced the hero to kill his sons. Depressed
from the pain, he went to Delo to ask to the oracle like to espiate his fault:
it was answered to put hisself to disposition of the king of Micene,Euristeo,for
twelve years. The oracle same moreover it attributed to the hero the name
"Eracle", who in Greek it means "Gloria of Era". Arrived to Micene, Euristeo
assigned 10 hards work to him to accomplish for dismiss itself definitively
from he.
1) To kill the hungry lion of the city of Nemea:
Ercole, unable to the use of the arms, had to strangle with his hands
the most feracious animal in its den after killed it, wore its
fur a nantle and its head as a helmet.
2) To kill Idra, the monster from numerous heads who devoured anyone:
Eracle noticed that cutting one of the heads he obtained only the
result to make to be born two, therefore, with the aid of coachman Iolao,
made in way to immediately heal the wound at once after the cut
of the head, therefore to prevent the growth. After to have cut all
them and after it are gotten rid of a big crab called to render the
enterprise more arduous, the body fell without life. The hero, before to
conclude the successive hard work, putted his arrows in the venomous blood
of the monster to render them more effective in the successive missions.
3-4) To capture a deer from gold horns and a feracious wild boar.
5) To clean the stables of the King Augia of Elide, full of dung: in this
hard work, one of most famous, the hero succeeded in the enterprise converging
the flow of two rivers in the stables. The King, than previously had promised
to Eracle a tenth one of the cattle if he had reached the objective, considered
himself itself tricked and he hunted him without recompense.
6) To remove a flight of birds from the feathers shape of arrows, than flyed
on the inhabitants of Stinfalo.
7) To defeat the flaming Taurus that devastate the zone of Creta.
8) To remove to the King Diomede of Tracia the devour horses of human meat and
to carry them to Euristeo.
9) To bring to the king of Micene the belt of Ippolita, Queen of the Amazons.
10) To steal the cattle of Gerone, a monster from the three bodies that
lived in Eritrean: during the travel towards the island, Eracle was
stopped in the strait of Gibilterra, where, on the two sides, he erected
the columns that took his name, the columns of Ercole, exactly. Arrived in
front of the monster, he killed it with a single arrow and loaded in its boat
the cattle to carry to Micene. During the travel, to the height of Genoa,
he had to face the belligerent populations of the place: being these much
numerous, the hero finished the arrows very soon and had to face them to hands bare.
Thrown in knee exausted to pray his father, Eracle received from
this last a rain of stone with which beated the enemies. Arrived to Micene with
the cattle finally, the freedom from Euristeo was not granted to him,
to have received aid from Iolao against Idra and to have asked to Augia the
compensation for the cleaning for the stables.
Consequently the King imposed to him two further substitutive hards work.
11) To steal the golden apples from the garden of Era (see constellation
of Drago).
12) To capture Cerbero, the terrible dog that was of guard to the reign
of the dead men: he faced to hands bare, with the aid of the arrows
poisoned and the mantle of the lion,he succeeded, after a debilitating and bloody
battle, to drag the animal in front of the incredulous Euristeo, than
unwillingly he had to finally free of the all Eracle from his dependencies.
The hero, finally free, married Deianira, daughter of the King Eneo.
Subsequently, during a travel, in the attempt to cross the Eveno river,
Deianira took advantage of the passage of centauro Nesso, while
instead Eracle passedexceeded the course of water to swim. During the travel,
the centauro it tried of rape the woman and it immediately came
killed from a poisoned arrow of the husband: in point of dead,
the centauro offered to the woman its poisoned blood, pushing it for
love filter. When various time after Deianira suspected an infidelity of
the husband, she made drink to his unknown the blood of Nesso, than
corroded little little the meats. Exausted from the incessant pain, he decided
definitively to abandon own mortal body, on the Mount Eta.
Eracle so, left his body to join to gods of Mount Olympus
and Zeus made him to become one constellation. The star more luminous present
in the constellation is Rasalgethi, that in Arab it means "head of the
knelt down one".