Hercules' Dream Team; ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENT

Byline: Compiled By Charles Legge

QUESTION

In La Coruna, Spain, there is a Tower Of Hercules. There is also a football team called Hercules, and Plato dubbed Gibraltar one of the Pillars of Hercules. Why the association with this Greek mythological figure? SPAiN has no more affiliation with heracles/hercules than anywhere else in the world. this powerful, lion-skin clad, club-wielding demi-god was popular wherever his cult was taken.

Temples dedicated to heracles were common along the Mediterranean coast. the temple of heracles Monoikos (the lone dweller) on a lonely promontory in what is now the Cote d'Azur is the origin of Monaco.

the Pillars of heracles were defined by the Greeks. At that time, there was no such thing as Spain, just a conglomeration of Celtic, Iberian and Turdetani tribes who occupied the area.

in Greek mythology, heracles had to perform 12 labours, one of which was to fetch the Cattle of Geryon from the far west and bring them to King Eurystheus. the pillars were the exit of the Mediterranean into the great unknown.

When the Romans became the premier empire in the Western world, they subsumed and adapted the Greek pantheon; the Greek heracles became hercules.

the imported …

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Publication information: Article title: Hercules' Dream Team; ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENT. Contributors: Not available. Newspaper title: Daily Mail (London). Publication date: May 27, 2011. Page number: 73. © 2007 Daily Mail. COPYRIGHT 2011 Gale Group.

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