god
Hercules
also: Erymanthian boar
The hero-god Heracles, son of Jupiter, famed for his twelve labours. His celebrated bronze statue at Agrigentum, whose lips and chin were worn by the kisses of worshippers, was the object of a night assault by Verres's slaves repelled in arms by the Agrigentines (In Verrem 2.4).
Reading notes
- Ad Atticum 4.16 §7 By Hercules
Me hercule, a common Roman asseveration invoking Hercules; a mild oath of emphasis rather than a religious appeal.
- Ad Familiares 5.10a §1 by Hercules
Mehercule ("by Hercules"), a common colloquial oath invoking the hero-god Heracles; Vatinius reaches for it repeatedly to underline his sincerity to Cicero.
- On the Ends of Good and Evil §2.118 to endure even the labors of Hercules
Hercules, the demigod whose Twelve Labors were undertaken for the benefit of mankind, is the archetype of toil endured for others rather than for pleasure. Cicero notes the Romans even called such hardship aerumnae, a word of bleak gravity, when describing what a god endured.
- On the Ends of Good and Evil §3.66 Hercules and of Liber
Hercules and Liber (Bacchus/Dionysus) are cited as heroes who, having the power, devoted themselves to preserving the human race and were rewarded with divinity. They exemplify the Stoic ideal of using strength for the common good.
- On the Nature of the Gods §3.42 which Hercules above all we ought to worship
Cotta opens his catalogue of doublets by listing six distinct figures called Hercules: the most ancient (son of Jove and Lysithoe), the Egyptian, the Idaean Dactyl, the son of Jove and Asteria, the Indian Belus, and the famous son of Alcmena. The point is that Stoic theology cannot say which is the god.
- Against Verres, Second Hearing, Book IV §95 Erymanthian boar
The Sicilian witticism: just as the Erymanthian boar was a labour of Hercules, so this monstrous "verres" (boar) defeating Hercules's own temple-robbers must be reckoned a labour of the god. The pun on Verres's name (verres = "boar") is the standing joke of the trial.
- Twelfth Philippic §4 By Hercules
Mehercule, a common Roman oath invoking Hercules, used here for emphatic indignation at the idea of preserving Antony's dignity at the cost of the Senate's.
- Tusculan Disputations §2.19 Hercules himself on Oeta
Mount Oeta in Thessaly, where the dying Hercules, in agony from the poisoned robe, built his own pyre and was burned alive before being received among the gods. Philoctetes lit the pyre and received Hercules' bow and arrows in return.
- Tusculan Disputations §4.50 he closed with the Erymanthian boar or the Nemean lion in anger
Two of the Labors of Hercules: the capture of the Erymanthian boar and the slaying of the Nemean lion. Cicero asks whether Hercules performed them out of anger or out of courage.