VULCAN (the name is probably connected with fulgere and fulgur, and may be trans lated the " bright shining one") was the old Italian god of tire. The various myths in connection with Vulcan prove the great antiquity of his worship. Latterly, the char acter, attributes and history of the Greek Hepinestus were transferred to Vulcan; and the two thus became identified. According to Homer Hephaestus was the son of Zeus and Hera; later accounts, however, asserting that the latter gave birth to him without any co-operation on the part of her husband. He appears to have been twice violently ex pelled from Olympus—the first occasion was shortly after his birth, when lie was dropped upon the earth by his mother, who was disgusted with his sickly deformity; he was re ceived by the marine divinities, Thetis and Euronyme, with whom he dwelt for nine years. He afterward returned to heaven, and on interfering in a quarrel between his mother and Zeus, the latter seized him by the leg, amid flung him from Olympus. After falling for a whole day, he alighted on where he was kindly received by the Sintians. He afterward returned to Olympus. Homer makes him lame from his birth, while later writers attribute this defect to his second fall on Lemnos. The popular no tion of Vulcan or Hepinestus appears to have been that of a burly, lame, good-natured, awkward god, often made the butt and laughing-stock of his fellows. He had a mag
nificent palace of his own in Olympus, "immortal, brazen, shilling like stars," in which was his workshop, containing an anvil and 20 bellows. which worked at his command. Later accounts locate his workshop in the interior of some volcanic isle, such as Lemnos, Lipara, Sicily, etc., and• give him as workmen the Cyclopes, Brontes, Steropes, etc. Many wonderful works of art are ascribed to Vulcan by the a _cient poets, and as an artist or artificer, he appears to have been regarded as corresponding in some respects to Athene: both instructed men in the useful and ornamental arts, had the power of heal ing, etc., and at Athens had temples and festivals in common. In the Iliad, the wife of flepliTstus is Charis; while in the Odyssey, and in later writers, he is representedas being much tormented by the amours of his frail and charming spouse Aphrodite, with her favorite Ares (Mars). In the earlier statues, his lameness appears to have been indi cated; but latterly, he was represented as a full-grown, vigorous mm, with a beard.