Hera was the greatest of all the Olympian goddesses. She was the daughter of Cronus and Rhea, and the sister and lawful wife of the supreme god Zeus. Cronus swallowed Hera immediately after the birth and she lived inside of him until liberated by her youngest brother Zeus. During the struggle between Zeus and Cronus, the goddess Rhea entrusted Hera to Oceanus and Tethys, who brought her up. Other traditions claim that Hera was brought up by Temenus (1), or by the daughters of Asterion.
Hera and Zeus started a relationship in the days when Cronus still ruled the world, but the formal wedding ceremony took place after the victory of the Olympians in the war against the Titans. There are many versions of how Zeus and Hera first met. According to one of them, Zeus won Hera by a trick. He transformed himself into a cuckoo, started a storm with a rain and landed on the hill where Hera was talking a walk. When she sat down to rest, the frozen and soaked with rain cuckoo flew onto her lap. The goddess felt sorry for the bird and warmed it by putting it against her breast. Then, Zeus showed his real face. Hera at first resisted, but then she agreed to become his lover only after he had promised to marry her. The sacred marriage was solemnly celebrated on Olympus, in the presence of all gods who brought the precious presents. Gaea gave them the tree of life with the golden apples, which Hera found so beautiful that she planted it in the garden of the gods, on the shores of the Ocean (see Hesperides). Some other traditions mention the islands Crete and Euboea as the possible places of the Zeus' and Hera's marital ceremony. Hera had given Zeus three children: daughters Hebe and Eilithyia, and son Ares. She also gave a parthenogenetical birth to Hephaestus.
As the master of the Heaven and the Zeus' lawful wife, Hera was the protector of the marriage and she used to punish those who didn't respect it. She herself had never committed an adultery. However, that wasn't the case with her husband, who was constantly unfaithful. Unable to prevent the numerous love affairs of Zeus, jealous Hera got the cruel and violent revenges not only on her rivals, but also on their children. For example, she tried to prevent the birth of Apollo and Artemis when Leto was in labour. She also tried to hold up the birth of Heracles, whom she later persecuted until his death (see Alcmene, Heracles). She persecuted Io too, she caused Semele's death, and she cruelly punished Semele's sister Ino for having cared for the infant Dionysus, a child from Semele's union with Zeus. Because of her acts, Zeus sometimes got very angry. Thus, for oppressing Heracles, he punished Hera by hanging her from Mt. Olympus by her wrists with an anvil fastened to each foot.
Hera had a very vindictive temper, not only when her conjugal honour was in question, but in other occasions as well. Because Antigone (3) had boasted of having hair more beautiful than Hera's, Hera turned her locks into serpents. On another occasion, she was arguing with her husband about who got more pleasure from sex, men or women. Zeus said that women did, Hera thought that men enjoyed it more. Then, they consulted the prophet Tiresias who said that if pleasure of love was constituted out of ten parts, the women felt nine parts and the men only one. Displeased with Tiresias' answer, Hera blinded him.
Finally, Hera never forgave the Trojan Paris for having preferred Aphrodite on the occasion of the famous beauty contents on Mt. Ida. Her ego was hurt, and in revenge for Paris' refusal to award her the prize, in the Trojan war she was against the Trojans and her rancour was satisfied only when the entire Trojan race had been annihilated.
Hera is one of the oldest Greek divinities. The name Hera was initially connected with the Latin word herus (master) and with an old Greek word which meant 'earth'. Later, the mythographers agreed that the name was related to the Sanskrit svar (the Sky). Originally, Hera was the goddess of the sky, and at first she was worshipped independently from Zeus. The marriage between the two of them was arranged afterwards, in order to explain the fusion of the two cults.
Hera soon lost her cosmic character and retained only her moral attributes. She became the goddess of marriage and maternity; she controlled the destiny of a woman from her childhood to the motherhood. The holiness of marriage was highlighted by the wedding of Hera and Zeus, which was celebrated in Athens and on the islands Samos and Crete as the holy marriage (hieros gamos).
Hera was worshipped in the whole Greece, but the biggest number of temples and sanctuaries dedicated to her was on Peloponnese, especially in the Argolis area: Argos, the main centre of Hera's cult, then Mycenae, Corinth, Sicyon and Epidaurus. Hera also possessed sanctuaries in Sparta, Olympia, in Attica, Boeotia and Euboea. She was worshipped on Crete and on the island of Samos where her cult was expanded from Argos, by the Argonauts.
Hera was represented as a young woman of a pure and severe beauty. Her forehead was usually crowned with a diadem or with a high crown of cylindrical shape. She was dressed in a long tunic covered with a veil. Hera's attributes were a sceptre surmounted by a cuckoo and a pomegranate, symbol of conjugal love and fruitfulness. The animals sacred to her were peacock, cuckoo and cow.