lasgis, worshipped at Iolcos. But the principal place of her worship was Argos, hence called the δῶμα Ἥρας. (Pind. Nem. x. init.; comp. Aeschyl. Suppl. 297.) According to tradition, Hera had disputed the possession of Argos with Poseidon, but the river-gods of the country adjudicated it to her. (Paus. ii. 15. §5.) Her most celebrated sanctuary was situated between Argos and Mycenae, at the foot of Mount Euboea, The vestibule of the temple contained ancient statues of the Charites, the bed of Hera, and a shield which Menelaus had taken at Troy from Euphorbus. The sitting colossal statue of Hera in this temple, made of gold and ivory, was the work of Polycletus. She wore a crown on her head, adorned with the Charites and Horae; in the one hand she held a pomegranate, and in the other a sceptre headed with a cuckoo. (Paus. ii. 17, 22; Strab. p. 373; Stat. Theb. i. 383.) Respecting the great quinquennial festival celebrated to her at Argos, see Dict. of Ant. s. v. Ἥραια. Her worship was very ancient also at Corinth (Paus. ii. 24, 1, &c.; Apollod. i. 9. §28), Sparta (iii. 13. §6, 15. §7), in Samos (Herod, iii. 60; Paus. vii. 4. §4; Strab. p. 637), at Sicyon (Paus. ii. 11. §2), Olympia (v. 15. §7, &c.), Epidaurus (Thucyd. v. 75; Paus. ii. 29. §1), Heraea in Arcadia (Paus. viii. 26. §2), and many other places.
Respecting the real significance of Hera, the ancients themselves offer several interpretations: some regarded her as the personification of the atmosphere (Serv. ad Aen. i. 51), others as the queen of heaven or the goddess of the stars (Eurip. Helen. 1097), or as the goddess of the moon (Plut. Quaest. Rom. 74), and she is even confounded with Ceres, Diana, and Proserpina. (Serv. ad Virg. Georg. i. 5). According to modern views, Hera is the great goddess of nature, who was every where worshipped from the earliest times. The Romans identified their goddess Juno with the Greek Hera [Juno]. We still possess several representations of Hera. The noblest image, and which was afterwards looked upon as the ideal of the goddess, was the statue by Polycletus. She was usually represented as a majestic woman at a mature age, with a beautiful forehead, large and widely opened eyes, and with a grave expression commanding reverence. Her hair was adorned with a crown or a diadem. A veil frequently hangs down the back of her head, to characterise her as the bride of Zeus, and, in fact, the diadem, veil, sceptre, and peacock are her ordinary attributes. A number of statues and heads of Hera still exist. (Hirt, Mythol. Bilderb. i. p. 22; comp. Müller, Dorians, ii, 10. §1.)
HERACLEA, daughter of Hieron II., king of Syracuse, was married to a Syracusan named Zoïppus. Though her husband was a man of a quiet and unambitious character, and had taken no part in the schemes of Andranodorus and Themistus, after the death of Hieronymus, the unhappy Heraclea was nevertheless involved in the sentence of proscription passed on the whole house of Hieron at the instigation of Sopater, and was put to death together with her two daughters. It is said that the people relented, and revoked the sentence against her, but not until it was too late. (Liv. xxiv. 26.)
HERACLEIDAE (Ἡρακλεῖδαι), a patronymic from Heracles, and consequently given to all the sons and descendants of the Greek Heracles; but the name is also applied in a narrower sense to those descendants of the hero who, in conjunction with the Dorians, invaded and took possession of Peloponnesus.
The many sons of Heracles are enumerated by Apollodorus (ii. 7. §8), though his list is very far from being complete; and a large number of tribes or noble families of Greece traced their origin to Heracles. In some of them the belief in their descent from Heracles seems to have arisen only from the fact, that the hero was worshipped by a particular tribe. The principal sons and descendants of Heracles are treated of in separate articles, and we shall here confine ourselves to those Heracleidae whose conquest of Peloponnesus forms the transition from mythology to history. It was the will of Zeus that Heracles should rule over the country of the Perseids, at Mycenae and Tiryns. Through Hera's cunning, however, Eurystheus had been put into the place of Heracles, and the latter had become the servant of the former. After the death of the two, the claims of Heracles devolved upon the sons and descendants of Heracles. The leader of these Heracleidae was Hyllus, the eldest of the four sons of Heracles by Deianeira. The descendants of Heracles, who, according to the tradition of the Dorians (Herod, v. 72), were in reality Achaeans, ruled over Dorians, as Heracles had received for himself and his descendants one third of the dominions of the Doric king, Aegimius, for the assistance he had given him against the Lapithae. The countries to which the Heracleidae had especial claims were Argos, Lacedaemon, and the Messenian Pylos, which Heracles himself had subdued: Elis, the kingdom of Augeas, might likewise be said to have belonged to him. (Apollod. ii. 7. §2, &c.; Paus. ii. 18. §6, &c., v. 3. §1, &c.) The Heracleidae, in conjunction with the Dorians, invaded Pelcponnesus, to take possession of those countries and rights which their ancestor had duly acquired. This expedition is called the return of the Heracleidae, κάθοδος τῶν Ἡρακλειδῶν. (Comp. Thuc. i. 12; Isocrat. Archid. 6.) They did not, however, succeed in their first attempt; but the legend mentions five different expeditions, of which we have the following accounts. According to some, it happened that, after the demise of Heracles, his son, Hyllus, with his brothers and a band of Arcadians, was staying with Ceyx at Trachis. As Eurystheus demanded their surrender, and Ceyx was unable to protect them, they fled to various parts of Greece, until they were received as suppliants at Athens, at the altar of Eleos, Mercy, (Apollod. ii. 8. §1; Diod. iv. 57; Paus. i. 32. §5; Longin. 27). According to the Heracleidae of Euripides, the sons of Heracles were at first staying at Argos, and thence went to Trachis, Thessaly, and at length to Athens. (Comp. Anton. Lib. 33.) Demophon, the son of Theseus, received them, and they settled in the Attic tetrapolis. Eurystheus, to whom the Athenians refused to surrender the fugitives, now made war on the Athenians with a large army, but was defeated by the Athenians under Iolaus, Theseus, and Hyllus, and was slain with his sons. Hyllus took his head to his grandmother, Alcmene; and the Athenians of later times showed the tomb of Eurystheus in front of the temple of the Pallenian Athena. The battle itself was very celebrated in the Attic stories, as the battle of the Scironian rock, on the coast of the Saronic gulf (comp. Dem. de Coron.
