The Greek Goddesses

Hera

Hera presides over the right ordering of marriage.

The legitimate offspring of her union with Zeus are Ares , Hebe , Eris Eileithyia, Enyo.

Enyo, a war goddess responsible with the destruction , and perhaps Hephaistos.

It is said she gave birth to Hephaistos  without Zeus, because she was jealous of his love toward Athena. When Hephaistos was born she saw his ugliness and cast him from Olympus.

Hephaistos gained revenge against Hera for rejecting him by making her a magical throne which bound her and would not allow her to leave.

At the bidding of Zeus, the other gods begged Hephaistos to let her go, but he repeatedly refused.

Later Dionysos came to him and got him drunk and convinced him to release Hera from the thrown. After Hephaistos released Hera, Zeus gave him Aphrodite as his wife.

                    Early  life

Hera was born to Kronos and Rhea. Kronos had made it a practice of eating his children once they are born.

Years later, Hera's brother, Zeus had given Rhea a mustard, wine, and herb mixture to give to Kronos. He thought it would make him unstoppable, but instead he vomited up his now full grown children.

As they were immortal, they were growing inside his stomach. Eventually Zeus had chopped Kronos into pieces with his own sickle, and threw him into Tartarus.

                   Homecoming

Zeus had asked her to be his queen, but she knew of his many other wives and denied his requests.

Slyly, Zeus made a thunderstorm and turned into a disheveled cuckoo. Hera felt sorry for it, so she held it to keep it warm. Zeus then forced himself upon her. She married him to cover her shame.

                          Hephaestus

After Hera gave birth to Hephaestus, he was so ugly and lame that she threw him off of Olympus. He landed on an island and his legs were permanently damaged. He now has an awkward walk and his home is on the island that he landed on.

                      Later

When Zeus and Io were having an affair, he tried to hide it from Hera by creating thick clouds over them, so that Hera couldn't see down to him.

However, Hera knew that Zeus must be under the clouds, so she went down to earth and went under the clouds.

Zeus, worrying about Hera's wrath, turned his lover, Io, into a stunning white heifer. Hera was not fooled.

She knew this was one of Zeus' tricks but she pretended that she didn't know. She asked Zeus if she could keep the cow and Zeus, not wanting her to find out, allowed Hera to take the cow to their palace in Olympus. Hera tied Io to a tree and set Argos to watch over her.

Argos was a faithful companion of Hera who was the best guard that there ever was. This was because his body was completely covered in one hundred blue eyes. Also, Argos never closed more than half of his eyes at once, so he never missed anything.

When Zeus could no longer stand Io's distress, he sent Hermes, the sneakiest of gods, to set Io free. Hermes disguised himself as a shepherd and went to Argos, playing music on a pipe.

Argos enjoyed the music and the company of another person as he was very bored watching a cow all day. After Hermes finished his tune he began to tell a very dull story.