Labor 10: Geryon’s Cattle

      The Cattle of Geryon

      To accomplish his tenth labor, Hercules had to
      journey to the end of the world. Eurystheus ordered
      the hero to bring him the cattle of the monster Geryon.
      Geryon was the son of Chrysaor and Callirrhoe.
      Chrysaor had sprung from the body of the Gorgon
      Medusa after Perseus beheaded her, and Callirrhoe
      was the daughter of two Titans, Oceanus and Tethys.
      With such distinguished lineage, it is no surprise that
      Geryon himself was quite unique. It seems that
      Geryon had three heads and three sets of legs all
      joined at the waist.

      Geryon lived on an island called Erythia, which was
      near the boundary of Europe and Libya. On this
      island, Geryon kept a herd of red cattle guarded by
      Cerberus’s brother, Orthus, a two-headed hound, and
      the herdsman Eurytion. Hercules set off on for
      Erythia, encountering and promptly killing many wild
      beasts along the way, and he came to the place where
      Libya met Europe. Here, Apollodorus tells us,
      Hercules built two massive mountains, one in Europe
      and one in Libya, to commemorate his extensive
      journey. Other accounts say that Hercules split one
      mountain into two. Either way, these mountains
      became known as the Gates or Pillars of Hercules.
      The strait Hercules made when he broke the mountain
      apart is now called the Strait of Gibraltar, between
      Spain and Morocco, the gateway from the
      Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic Ocean.

      Sailing in a goblet which the Sun gave him in
      admiration, Hercules reached the island of Erythia.
      Not long after he arrived, Orthus, the two-headed dog,
      attacked Hercules, so Hercules bashed him with his
      club. Eurytion followed, with the same result. Another
      herdsman in the area reported these events to Geryon.
      Just as Hercules was escaping with the cattle, Geryon
      attacked him. Hercules fought with him and shot him
      dead with his arrows

      The stealing of the cattle was not such a difficult task,
      compared to the trouble Hercules had bringing the
      herd back to Greece. In Liguria, two sons of
      Poseidon, the god of the sea, tried to steal the cattle,
      so he killed them. At Rhegium, a bull got loose and
      jumped into the sea. The bull swam to Sicily and then
      made its way to the neighboring country. The native
      word for bull was “italus,” and so the country came to
      be named after the bull, and was called Italy.

      The escaped bull was found by a ruler named Eryx,
      another of Poseidon’s sons, and Eryx put this bull into
      his own herd. Meanwhile, Hercules was searching for
      the runaway animal. He temporarily entrusted the rest
      of the herd to the god Hephaestus, and went after the
      bull. He found it in Eryx’s herd, but the king would
      return it only if the hero could beat him in a wrestling
      contest. Never one to shy away from competition,
      Hercules beat Eryx three times in wrestling, killed the
      king, took back the bull, and returned it to the herd.

      Hercules made it to the edge of the Ionian Sea, with
      the end of his journey finally in sight. Hera, however,
      was not about to let the hero accomplish this labor.
      She sent a gadfly to attack the cattle, and the herd
      scattered far and wide. Now, Hercules had to run
      around Thrace gathering the escaped cows. Finally,
      he regrouped the herd and, blaming his troubles on the
      river Strymon in Thrace, he filled the river with
      rocks, making it unnavigable. Then, he brought the
      cattle of Geryon to Eurystheus, who sacrificed the
      herd to Hera.