A Little Quiz on Hera

Answer: a sister

Their father was Cronos, who ate his first five children. Only Zeus avoided the misfortune and later slew his father, thus freeing the first five siblings.

Answer: Athena

Ares became the god of war, Hephaestus was the god of smiths, and Eris was the goddess of discord. Athena was Zeus' child by Metis, his first wife. Some sources say that Hephaestus was born from Hera alone (by parthogenesis), but the general feeling is that he was the son of both of them.

Answer: a bird

It is said that Zeus tranformed himself into a little bird on a weathery night and flew through Hera's window. Hera took pity on a little wet bird and hugged it. Then Zeus turned back into himself and begged Hera with such passion that she agreed to become his wife.

Answer: family and marriage

It is sort of ironic that Hera's own marriage was none too happy. She always spied on Zeus to find out his latest love and brought a lot of trouble to Zeus' lovers and children.

Answer: True

Hera and others caught Zeus sleeping and tied him with many knots, but then stopped to argue what to do next. Briareus, the gardener, heard them and saw through the window his master tied. So with his quick fingers he untied the ropes. Zeus then seized his thunderbolts and hung Hera in the sky.

However, Hera's crying made a lot of noise and kept Zeus from sleeping, so the next day he released her, taking a promise that she would never trying to revolt again.

Answer: False

No, Hera is said to create the Milky Way. When Heracles was born, Zeus gave him to Hera to be suckled, so that he would receive the milk of a goddess. However, when Hera realized who she was feeding, she flung Heracles away and the milk spilled, thus creating the Milky Way.

Answer: Semele

Semele did so and the sight was so magnificent that she burned -- as Hera knew she would. No mortal could handle the sight of a god in all his glory.

Answer: An apple

Eris, the goddess of discord, was not invited to Peleus' wedding, which made her bitter. In order to make trouble she took the apple on which was inscribed "to the fairest" and threw it on the table where the goddesses sat. Indeed that created quite a bit of trouble.

Answer: Heracles

Heracles was also known as Hercules in Roman myth. When he was a baby, Hera sent two snakes to kill him, but Heracles in his crib caught a snake in each hand and strangled them both.

Answer: True

Indeed, Tiresias said that if judged out of ten, a woman receives nine parts of the pleasure and the man only one. This truly infuriated Hera who struck him blind immediately. (In another myth, Tiresias's blindness resulted from his seeing Athena in an indelicate moment.)