Friday, February 14, 2014

Post #4

This is myth takes place on Mount Cyllene, in Arcadia. Hermes was born in a secluded cave in a ridged bowl-shaped valley, that was lush with greenery. The powerful essence of the toddler Hermes, and the somewhat lesser power (but not in radiance, because DANG Maia was fine!) of his mountain nymph mother, Maia.


Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Post #3

Mythomagical Hermes

Hermes, is the god of many things, but most importantly, the god of mischief and thievery. The kid had a natural talent of nicking your spectacles right from your nose without you ever noticing. Even as an infant, Zeus and Maia had a difficult time of keeping up with the shifty trickster....

Even as an infant, Hermes had more Ferris Bueller in him than I ever have...

When Hermes was still a toddler, he snuck out of his cradle, and out of his cave and set off to a place called Pieria, which was in northern Greece. The wee devil had his sights on his half-brother, Apollo's sacred cows. 

Finding these cows very quickly for a toddler, Hermes sneakily stole one cow at a time from Apollo's watch and with them he did an odd thing: He detached their hooves and replaced them in a mismatched order, so they stumbled around hilariously and clumsily, and could only walk backwards. 

Taking these cows, he hid them in a cave (Hermes seems to have a thing with caves) and casually resumed his baby life back in his own cave on Mount Cyllene.

Of course, Apollo found out, but Hermes was a little surprised at how slow his half-brother caught on to his shenanigans. It's like Apollo worshiped those cows, so he'd thought he would've been been way more furious way faster. 

Apollo had been searching for the cows everywhere, but of course the footprints were like riddles to him, because they were backwards. But then Apollo  realized he was the god of Prophecies and eventually discovered it was the little prick Hermes, and thus stormed to Mount Cyllene. When he got there, Hermes was sound asleep in his cradle, but Apollo paid no attention to that and roughly  took them both up to Mount Olympus, so that Zeus could take his annoyance out on him.

At first, when asked, Hermes denied everything and lied to Zeus, which takes ultimate will power, but of course, as in all lies, the truth was unveiled. Surprisingly enough and much to the fury of Apollo, Zeus wasn't very mad, and only asked that the cow herd be returned. 

Hermes, in a stunning turn of events, felt remorse for what he had done, and in a sort of peace offering, he gave Apollo his homemade lyre, which he crafted out of turtle bone. Apollo, finally feeling gratified and a little flustered, gave Hermes a pretty golden staff that could herd the cows, because Apollo apparently liked the kids guts and wit.

After the events that took place, not only was there peace on Olympus, but Apollo and Hermes became bosom friends.  


Post #2

Cultural Hermes

Hermes is mentioned in many different places because he's kind of a popular dude. For example:
  • Hermes has a fashion line dedicated to him, mainly because one of Hermes's symbols is a little prada purse. 

  • The next cultural reference towards Hermes is in Rick Riordan's mythological fantasy book series Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Since these books are very accurate and about Greek/Roman mythology, Hermes is mentioned multiple times. Also, in the second book's movie adaptation (which was nothing like the book, and thinking about it makes me hostile) of Sea of Monsters, Hermes plays an important role of supreme FedEx king or the likes of it. 
  • The last but not least, there is a rad sculpture of Hermes and Apollo in The British Museum, with his cute little sandals, and caduceus.
  • This is no longer needed, but there was also a place of worship, almost a shrine to Hermes, which was also, coincidentally, his birthplace. Mount Cilene, is located in Arcadia.
Links: https://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/m/marble_statue_of_hermes.aspx