HERA, in Greek mythology, the sister and wife of Zeus and queen of the Olympian gods ; she was identified by the Romans with Juno. The derivation of the name is obscure and it seems likely that she is a pre-hellenic deity. Various ancient and modern theorists identify her with the air, earth, or moon. Whatever may have been her origin, to the historic Greeks (except a few poets or philosophers) she was a purely anthropomorphic goddess. In lit erature, from the times of Homer and Hesiod, she played an im portant part, appearing most frequently as the jealous and resent ful wife of Zeus. In this character she pursues with vindictive hatred the heroines, such as Alcmene, Leto, and Semele, who were beloved by Zeus, and also their children. This character belongs to literature rather than to cult, in which the dignity and power of the goddess is naturally more emphasized.
The worship of Hera is found, in different degrees of promi nence, throughout the Greek world. It was especially important in the ancient centres, Argos, Mycenae and Sparta, which she claims in the Iliad (iv. 51.) as her three dearest cities. Whether Hera was also worshipped by the early Dorians is uncertain; after the Dorian invasion she remained the chief deity of Argos, but her cult at Sparta was not so conspicuous. She received honour, how ever, in other parts of the Peloponnese, in central Greece, and in the islands, particularly Samos, where, according to the local tradition, she was born. As Hera Lacinia (from her Lacinian temple near Croton) she was extensively worshipped in Magna Graecia.
The connection of Zeus and Hera was probably not primitive, since Dione seems to have preceded Hera as the wife of Zeus at Dodona. But it certainly is early. The close relation of the two deities appears in a frequent community of altars and sacrifices, and also in the logos 76.1.103, a dramatic representation of their sacred marriage. For instance, at the Daedala, as the festival was called at Plataea, an effigy was made from an oak-tree, dressed in bridal attire, and carried in a cart with a woman who acted as bridesmaid. The image was called Daedale, and the ritual was explained by a myth : Hera had left Zeus in her anger; in order to win her back, Zeus an nounced that he was about to marry, and dressed up a puppet to imitate a bride; Hera met the procession, tore the veil from the false bride, and, on discov ering the ruse, became reconciled to her husband. The image was put away after each occasion; every 6o years a large number of such images, which had served in previous celebrations, were carried in procession to the top of Mount Cithaeron and were burned on an altar to gether with animals and the altar itself. As Frazer notes (Golden Bough [3rd ed.] ii. i4o, et seq.; cf. Nilsson in Journ. Hell. Stud. xliii. 144), this festival appears to belong to the large class of mimetic charms designed to quicken the growth of vegeta tion ; the marriage of Zeus and Hera would, in this case, represent the union of the king and queen of May. But it by no means fol lows that Hera was therefore originally a goddess of the earth or of vegetation, for we have no proof that she or Zeus had originally anything to do with it. At Samos the image of Hera was annually concealed on the seashore and solemnly discovered. There is nothing here to suggest a marriage of heaven and earth, or of two vegetation-spirits; as Dr. Farnell points out, the ritual appears to connect with certain local marriage customs. It is at least remarkable that, except at Argos, Hera had little to do with agriculture, and was not closely associated with such deities as Cybele, Demeter, Persephone, and Dionysus, whose connection with the earth, or with its fruits, is beyond doubt.
In her general cult Hera was worshipped in two main capacities: (1) as the consort of Zeus and queen of heaven ; (2) as the god dess who presided over marriage, and, in a wider sense, over the various phases of a woman's life. The marriage-goddess naturally became the protectress of women in child-bed, and bore the title of the birth-goddess (Eileithyia), at Argos and Athens. In Homer (Il. xi. 2 7o) and Hesiod (Theog. 9 2 2) she is the mother of the Eileitliyiai, or the single Eileithyia. Her cult-titles irapOEvos (or TEXEia and a(i7pa the "maiden," "wife," and "widow" (or "divorced") express the different conditions in the lives of her human worshippers. The Argives believed that Hera recovered her virginity every year by bathing in a certain spring (Paus. viii. 22, 2), a belief which probably reflects the custom of ceremonial purification after marriage (see Frazer, Adonis, p. 176). Although Hera was not the bestower of feminine charm to the same extent as Aphrodite, she was the patron of a contest for beauty in a Les bian festival It is this relation to women which gives some slight plausibility to her identification with the moon, which is constantly associated with them.
Among her particular worshippers, at Argos and Santos, Hera was much more than the queen of heaven and the marriage-god dess. As the patron of these cities (iroXwovXos) she held a place corresponding to that of Athena in Athens. In Argos the agricul tural character of her ritual is well marked; the first oxen used in ploughing were dedicated to her as Z€ .Via ("lady of the yoke") ; and the sprouting ears of corn were called "the flowers of Hera." She was worshipped as the goddess of flowers (6. 0Eia); girls served in her temple under the name of "flower-bearers," and a flower festival ('Ilpovav9ELa, 'HpoavOca) was celebrated by Peloponnesian women in spring. These rites recall our May day observance and give colour to the earth-goddess theory. On the other hand, it must be remembered that the patron deity of a Greek state had very wide functions ; and it is not surprising to find that Hera (whatever her origin may have been) assumed an agricultural character among her own people, whose occupations were largely agricultural. So, although the warlike character of Hera was not elsewhere prominent, she assumed a militant aspect in her two chief cities ; a festival called the Shield was part of the Argive cult, and there was an armed procession in her honour at Samos. The city-goddess, whether Hera or Athena, must be chief alike in peace and war.
The cow was the animal especially sacred to Hera both in ritual and in mythology. The Homeric epithet 13ownrcs may have meant "cow-faced" to the earliest worshippers of Hera (see Io) though by Homer and the later Greeks it was understood as "large eyed," like the cow. A car drawn by oxen seems to have been widely used in the processions of Hera, and the cow was her most frequent sacrifice. The cuckoo was also sacred to Hera, who, ac cording to the Argive legend, was wooed by Zeus in the form of the bird. In later times the peacock, which was still unfamiliar to the Greeks in the 5th century, was her favourite, especially at Samos.
Cult-statues.—A log at Thespiae, a plank at Samos, a pillar at Argos served to represent the goddess. In the archaic period of sculpture the oavov or wooden statue of the Samian Hera by Smilis was famous. The most celebrated statue of Hera was the chryselephantine work of Polycleitus, made for the Heraion at Argos soon after 423 B.C. Polycleitus seems to have fixed the type of Hera as a youthful matron, but unfortunately the exact char acter of her head cannot be determined. A majestic and rather severe beauty marks the conception of Hera in later art, of which the Farnese bust at Naples and the Ludovisi Hera are the most conspicuous examples.