The son of Zeus and Hera, he was born with weak limbs and an ugly face. “Well,” said the disappointed Hera, “with legs like those he is never going to play for Olympus,” and rather unsympathetically tipped him over the edge of a cloud.

He fell into the sea but two Goddesses, Eurynome and Thetis, rescued him. They taught him to make seaside souvenirs from seashells and coral and he turned out to be an amazing craftsman... and graduated from this to greater and grander things.

Apart from his ugly mug and withered legs, he became a muscular hunk. With his strength went strength of purpose and he went for blacksmithery in a big way. If you can run an underwater forge you have unassailable skills. Such was his fame, he was allowed back to Olympus and Zeus had him making thunderbolts and supervising the Cyclopes when the war with the Titans was in full swing.

Peace came and with it new demands as he could make just about anything: clockwork tables, armor of invincibility, wrought iron pub signs and robotic statues.

He even got to marry Aphrodite; quite a consolation — even if she did cheat on him a lot. But he did have a small revenge when he caught her and Ares in-flagrante in a net of his own devising and put them on display for a bit. This made him even more popular.

For all his strength he is not a God to go about causing trouble and smiting folk. Like his works, he is well-tempered, and has acted as a role model for smithery the world over. The Romans couldn’t wait to commit forgery and sign him up as Vulcan.

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Article last revised on September 06, 2018 by Rowan Allen.
Editors: Peter J. Allen, Chas Saunders

References: Coming soon.

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