The Historians' History of the World 03

This, as a poetical or religious fiction, is very happily conceived; but when we are seeking for a historical thread to connect the Bœotian legends of Hercules with those of the Peloponnesus, it must be set entirely aside; and yet it is not only the oldest form of the story, but no other has hitherto been found or devised to fill its place with a greater appearance of probability. The supposed right of Hercules to the throne of Mycenæ was, as we shall see, the ground on which the Dorians, some generations later, claimed the dominion of Peloponnesus. Yet, in any other than a poetical view, his enmity to Eurystheus is utterly inconsistent with the exploits ascribed to him in the peninsula. It is also remarkable, that while the adventures which he undertakes at the bidding of his rival are prodigious and supernatural, belonging to the first of the two classes above distinguished, he is described as during the same period engaged in expeditions which are only accidentally connected with these marvellous labours, and which, if they stood alone, might be taken for traditional facts. In these he appears in the light of an independent prince, and a powerful conqueror. He leads an army against Augeas, king of Elis, and having slain him, bestows his kingdom on one of his sons, who had condemned his father’s injustice. So he invades Pylus to avenge an insult which he had received from Neleus, and puts him to death, with all his children, except Nestor, who was absent, or had escaped to Gerenia. Again he carries his conquering arms into Laconia, where he exterminates the family of the king Hippocoön, and places Tyndareus on the throne. Here, if anywhere in the legend of Hercules, we might seem to be reading an account of real events. Yet who can believe, that while he was overthrowing these hostile dynasties, and giving away sceptres, he suffered himself to be excluded from his own kingdom?

It was the fate of Hercules to be incessantly forced into dangerous and arduous enterprises; and hence every part of Greece is in its turn the scene of his achievements. Thus we have already seen him, in Thessaly, the ally of the Dorians, laying the foundation of a perpetual union between the people and his own descendants, as if he had either abandoned all hope of recovering the crown of Mycenæ, or had foreseen that his posterity would require the aid of the Dorians for that purpose. In Ætolia too he appears as a friend and a protector of the royal house, and fights its battles against the Thesprotians of Epirus. These perpetual wanderings, these successive alliances with so many different races, excite no surprise, so long as we view them in a poetical light, as issuing out of one source, the implacable hate with which Juno persecutes the son of Jove. They may also be understood as real events, if they are supposed to have been perfectly independent of each other, and connected only by being referred to one fabulous name. But when the poetical motive is rejected, it seems impossible to frame any rational scheme according to which they may be regarded as incidents in the life of one man, unless we imagine Hercules, in the purest spirit of knight-errantry, sallying forth in quest of adventures, without any definite object, or any impulse but that of disinterested benevolence. It will be safer, after rejecting those features in the legend which manifestly belong to Eastern religions, to distinguish the Theban Hercules from the Dorian, and the Peloponnesian hero. In the story of each some historical fragments have most probably been preserved, and perhaps least disfigured in the Theban and Dorian legends. In those of Peloponnesus it is difficult to say to what extent their original form may not have been distorted from political motives. If we might place any reliance on them, we should be inclined to conjecture that they contain traces of the struggles by which the kingdom of Mycenæ attained to that influence over the rest of the peninsula, which is attributed to it by Homer, and which we shall have occasion to notice when we come to speak of the Trojan war.

THE FEATS OF THESEUS

The name of Hercules immediately suggests that of Theseus, according to the mythical chronology his younger contemporary, and only second to him in renown. It was not without reason that Theseus was said to have given rise to the proverb, another Hercules; for not only is there a strong resemblance between them in many particular features, but it also seems clear that Theseus was to Attica what Hercules was to the rest of Greece, and that his career likewise represents the events of a period which cannot have been exactly measured by any human life, and probably includes many centuries. His legend is chiefly interesting to us, so far as it may be regarded as a poetical outline of the early history of Attica [where it will be recounted in detail].