According to the mythological Labors of Hercules, the second step of preliminary works is to thin, disperse, and volatilize the raw salts. Let Mercurius/Secret Fire out.
Or, in a more traditional alchemical language, to turn the raw matter’s earth into philosophical water. Our water doesn’t wet hands, but it still keeps flowing correctly. The raw matter is opened only when Spirits are allowed to come out. What the preliminary works are about.
Jean Pierre Fabre, in his “Hercules Piochymicus” 1634, an alchemical explication of the mythological Labors of Hercules, managed not to respect the strict position stated by ancient greek mythology even for the Learnean Hydra, in fact, after having arbitrarily placed the Nemean Lion in third leading, the Hydra was instead given the honor to open the list, as first, just because the misplacing of the lion had left the position empty. However, I agree with the french physician’s general meaning of the overall labor: to extract the watery seed of metals from the raw matter. Nevertheless, Fabre’s chapter on the Hydra doesn’t go beyond this basic concept. For instance, he doesn’t mention the reason for the monster’s heads numbers, why the eighth head was immortal, the circumstance of the Hydra being supported by a crab, the indispensable involvement of Iolaos, the conservation of the Hydra’s venom as a powerful medicine and cooking weapon/tool.
We know the story: having survived and won on the Nemean Lion, Hercules put up with the Ὑδρα Λερναια, Hydra Lernaia, a monster oppressing the Lerna swamps. But for each of the monster’s heads, he cut off, and two more sprang forth. So he called Iolaos to burn the Hydra’s stumps and prevent the head’s regeneration. A giant crab came to assist the Hydra but remained crushed under Hercules’s heel. Athena suggested Hercules keep the Hydra venom as a weapon and medicine. Once the flames had prevented the growth of replacement heads, Hercules managed to have the better of the beast. He could remove and destroy the eight mortal heads and finally chop off the ninth (or better, the eighth) immortal head. This he buried at the side of the road leading from Lerna to Elaeus, and for good measure, he covered it with a heavy rock. As for the rest of the hapless hydra, Hercules slit open the corpse and dipped his arrows in the venomous blood.
Eurystheus was not impressed with Hercules’ battle, however. He said that since Iolaos had helped his uncle, this labor should not count as one of the ten. So, as we will see, another labor will be added.
Eventually, Hera has to admit the defeat and will place Hydra and Crab among the stars as constellations. Let’s see what ancient authors say about this Heracles’ second labor and discover the features of the second part of our preliminary operations:
The Second Labor.
PseudoApollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 77 80 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.): “For his second labor Herakles was instructed to slay the Lernaian Hydra”.
Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 4. 11. 5 (trans. Old father) (Greek historian C1st B.C.): “The second Labour which he [Herakles] undertook was the slaying of the Lernaian Hydra.”
The second labor is a direct consequence of the fixed raw matter/Nemean Lion: Once the matter is opened, the power of the Spiritus/Secret Fire/Mercurius comes to light (see Opus Magnum scheme).
The Origin of the Hydra.
Hesiod, Theogony 313 ff (trans. Evelyn White) (Greek epic C8th or 7th B.C.): “And third again she [Echidna] bore the grisly minded Lernaian Hydra, whom the goddess white armed Hera nourished because of her quenchless grudge against the strong Herakles. Yet he, Herakles, son of Zeus, of the line of Amphitryon, by the design of Athene the spoiler and with help from warlike Iolaos, killed this beast with the pitiless bronze sword.”
PseudoHyginus, Fabulae 151: “From Typhon, the giant and Echidna were born . . . the Hydra which Hercules killed by the spring of Lerna.”
In her turn, Hydra’s mother, the Echidna, is a mercurial serpent born of Ea and Tartar. Typhon, the father, is a representation of the Primitive Mercurius. It is clear enough that this monstrous family is the same substance in three different stages: from Typhon, the uncatchable Spirit, to Hydra, the alchemical extraction of the Spirit.
Hercules is always the alchemist but needs Iolaos, fire, and unique vessels. Suppose during the step of the Nemean Lion, the alchemist could put the raw matter to putrefy in a closed vessel and allow vapors-spirits to separate from the corpse in the second step. In that case, he has to apply fire/heat/another dispersing method to have the saline corpse volatilized along with the spirits.
The Hydra as a Water Serpent.
Strabo, Geography 8. 6. 2 (trans. Jones) (Greek geographer C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.): “The river Lerna, as it is called, bearing the same name as the marsh in which is laid the scene of the myth of the Hydra.” Strabo, Geography 8. 6. 6: “Lake Lerna, the scene of the story of the Hydra, lies in Argeia and the Mycenean territory.”
PseudoApollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 77 80 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.): “…….The beast was nurtured in the marshes of Lerna.”
Pausanias, Description of Greece 2. 37. 4 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.): ”At the source of the Amymone [near Lerna, Argolis] grows a plane tree, beneath which, they say, the Hydra (Water snake) grew. I am ready to believe that this beast was superior in size to other water snakes and that its poison had something so deadly that Herakles treated the points of his arrows with its gall.”
The result of these volatilization dispersions is a watery substance. Watery as element Water. Not just a liquid, of course, but a flowing substance, more than often gaseous. Serpent, as a synonym of our Mercurius.
Athena’s Intervention.
Pausanias, Description of Greece 5. 17. 11 :
“[Amongst the illustrations on the chest of Kypselos dedicated at Olympia :] Heracles, with Athena standing beside him, is shooting at the Hydra, the beast in the river Amymone.”
Athena is the goddess in charge of teaching Knowledge. She is the alchemist’s patroness.
The Nine-headed Hydra.
Alcaeus, Fragment 443 (from Schoiast on Hesiod’s Theogony) (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric II) (Greek lyric C6th B.C.): “The Hydra is called nine headed by Alcaeus, fifty headed by Simonides.”
Simonides, Fragment 569 (from Servius on Virgil’s Aeneid) (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric II) (Greek lyric C6th to 5th B.C.): “One hundred snakes as in Simonides, as we said above [he spoke of Simonides fifty headed Hydra]; others say there were nine.”
PseudoHyginus, Preface (trans. Grant) (Roman mythographer C2nd A.D.): “From Typhon and Echidna [was born]: . . . Hydra serpent which had nine heads which Hercules killed, and Draco Hesperidum.”
Suidas s.v. Hydra : “Hydra: Nine headed snake.”
From six to eight repetitions of these salts volatilizations. The eighth volatilization gives rise to a ninth, the immortal one.
Regenerating Stumps.
Plato, Euthydemus 297c (trans. Lamb) (Greek philosopher C4th B.C.) :
“[Plato uses the myth of the Hydra as a metaphor for argument :] Herakles, who was no match for the Hydra . . . who was so clever that she sent forth many heads . . . in place of each one that was cut off… “
Ovid, Metamorphoses 9. 69 ff (trans. Melville) (Roman epic C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
“[Herakles addresses the shape shifting river god Akhelous :] `Mastering Dracones is child’s play, Achelous! Yes, if you were a champion serpent, how could you compare with Echidna Lernaea [Hydra], you a single snake? It throve on wounds: of all its hundred heads, I cut off one, but from its neck, two more sprang to succeed, stronger than before! Yes, though it branched with serpents sprung from death, and multiplied on doom, I mastered it, and, mastered, I dispatched it.'”
Ovid, Metamorphoses 9. 192 ff :
“The Hydra’s gain from loss, with doubled strength, was all in vain [i.e., against the might of Herakles].”
Ovid, Heroides 9. 87 ff (trans. Showerman) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
“[Herakles] told of the deeds . . . The fertile serpent that sprang forth again from the fruitful wound, grown rich from her hurt.”
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 25. 196 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.) :
“[Herakles] took all that trouble to liberate some little snaky brook like Lerna by cutting down the self-growing first fruits of the lurking serpent as that plentiful crop of snakeheads grew spiking up. If only he had made the killing alone! Instead of calling in his distress for Iolaos to destroy the heads as they grew afresh, by lifting a burning torch; until the two together managed to get the better of one female serpent . . . cutting down a bush of heads which ever grew again on so many necks.”
Suidas s.v. Hydran temnein (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek Lexicon C10th A.D.) :
“Hydran temnein (you are cutting off a hydra): Said of things that are hopeless; for the story goes that when Herakles was fighting a Hydra in Lerna which had a hundred heads, and as the heads were cut off more grew, he ordered Iolaos to burn the cut ones.”
At each repeated volatilization, the substance is improved, and each section can grow into a whole “seed of matter”. This aspect must be dexterously mastered by fire/head/other dispersing methods.
One Hydra’s Head as Immortal-Gold.
Ptolemy Hephaestion, New History Book 2 (summary from Photius, Myriobiblon 190) (trans. Pearse) (Greek mythographer C1st to C2nd A.D.) :
“Aristonikos of Tarenton says that the middle head of the Hydra was of gold.”
PseudoApollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 77 80 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.) :
“For his second labor, Herakles was instructed to slay the Lernaian Hydra. The beast was nurtured in the marshes of Lerna, from where she would go out onto the flatland to raid flocks and ruin the land. The Hydra was enormous, with eight mortal heads and an immortal ninth one in the middle. With Iolaos driving, Herakles rode a chariot to Lerna, and there, stopping the horses, he found the Hydra on a ridge beside the springs of Amymone, where she nested. By throwing flaming spears at her, he forced her to emerge, and as she did, he could catch hold. But she hung on to him by wrapping herself around one of his feet, and he could not help by striking her with his club, for as soon as one head was pounded off, two others would grow in its place. Then a giant crab came along to help the Hydra and bit Herakles on foot. For this, he killed the crab and called on his behalf to Iolaos for help. Iolaos made some torches by setting fire to a portion of the adjoining woods, and he kept them from growing by using these to burn the buddings of the heads. When he had overcome this problem, Herakles lopped off the immortal head, which he buried and covered with a heavy boulder at the side of the road that runs through Lerna to Elaios.”
The repetition after the sixth or the eighth produces the seventh or ninth, the immortal ones, therefore indestructible. They are sometimes called “philosophers gold”.
Hercules buried it at the side of the road leading from Lerna to Elaeus, and for good measure, he covered it with a heavy rock. That’s to say: only the last immortal head, the philosophical gold, will become a “stone”.
The Victory by Fire.
Seneca, Hercules Furens 241 ff: “[The labors of Herakles :] Lerna’s fell monster, pest manifold, did he not quell at last by fire and teach to die?”
Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica 7. 623 ff (trans. Mozley) (Roman epic C1st A.D.): “The Tirynthian [Herakles] wearied in the fight against the Hydra’s dreadful hosts turned to the fires of Pallas [Athene who suggested to the hero this means of destroying the creature].”
Statius, Thebaid 2. 375 ff (trans. Mozley) (Roman epic C1st A.D.): “The marsh of Lerna and the burnt Hydra’s heat makes warm the depths of those unrighteous waters.”
Salts volatilizations are performed inside closed and specifically made vessels. The methods can be more than one: fire, balneum, circulating vessels, alembics, sunbeams, specific salts that can produce reactions and risings, or other physic dispersing systems. In addition, we cannot underestimate the power of an alcahest already prepared. All that is summarized with the definition “by fire”.
Because of the intervention of Iolaos/fire, Eurystheus decreed this labor should not count as one of the ten.
The Giant problem of the Volatile Crab.
Plato, Euthydemus 297c (trans. Lamb) (Greek philosopher C4th B.C.): . . . [and a] crab . . . from the seafreshly, I fancy, arrived on shore; and, when the hero was so bothered with its leftward barks and bites, he summoned his nephew Iolaos to the rescue, and he brought him effective relief.”
Of course, the crab cannot be a giant since the problem it arises is a huge one among alchemists. The crab is an allegorical representation of mercurial volatility. Mercurial, because it is being born by the Moon, the mercurial mother for antonomasia. The volatility of the substances inside the alchemist/Hercules vessel during the salts volatilization can and is a problem, but Hercules is skilled enough to neutralize the challenge.
The Hydra’s Venom is a cooking Weapon, Medicine, and Love Potion.
PseudoApollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 157 :
“In fear, lest Herakles desire Iole more than herself [Deianeira], and in her belief that the blood of Nessos [who was slain by Herakles with an arrow poisoned with Hydra’s blood] was truly a lovepotion, she doused the robe with it. Herakles put it on and started the sacrifice, but soon the robe grew warm as the Hydra’s venom began to cook his flesh. He caught up Likhas by the foot and hurled him into the Euboian sea, then tore off the robe, which stuck to his body so that he ripped off his flesh along with hit.”
PseudoApollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 80 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.) :
“He [Herakles] cut up the Hydra’s body and dipped his arrows in its venom.”
Alcman, Fragment 815 Geryoneis (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric III) (Greek lyric C7th B.C.) :
“[Herakles arrow] (Bringing) the end that is hateful (death), having (doom) on its head, befouled with blood and with . . [lacuna] gall, the anguish of the dapplenecked Hydra, destroyer of men [Herakles used an arrow poisoned with the blood and gall of the Hydra]; and Geryon drooped his neck to one side”
Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica 4. 1390 ff (trans. Rieu) (Greek epic C3rd B.C.) :
“The snake [the Drakon of the Hesperides], struck down by Herakles, lay by the trunk of the apple tree. Only the tip of his tail was twitching; from the head down, his dark spine showed no sign of life. His blood had been poisoned by arrows steeped in the gall of the Lernaean Hydra, and flies perished in the festering wounds.”
Strabo, Geography 8. 3. 19 (trans. Jones) (Greek geographer C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
“It [the Anigros River of Elis] emits an offensive odor for a distance of twenty stadia and makes the fish unfit to eat. In the mythical accounts, however, this is attributed by some writers to the fact that certain of the Kentauroi here washed off the poison they got from the Hydra [after their battle with Herakles] . . . The bathing water from here cures leprosy, elephantiasis, and scabies.”
PseudoHyginus, Fabulae 30 (trans. Grant) (Roman mythographer C2nd A.D.) :
“Under Minerva’s [Athene’s] instructions, he [Herakles] killed her [Hydra], disemboweled her, and dipped his arrows in her gall; and so whatever later he hit with his arrows did not escape death, and later he perished in Phrygia from the same cause.”
PseudoHyginus, Fabulae 34 :
“[Herakles] pierced Nessus with his arrows. As he died, Nessus, knowing how poisonous the arrows were since they had been dipped in the gall of the Lernaean Hydra, drew out some of his blood and gave it to Dejanira, telling her it was a love charm. If she wanted her husband not to desert her, she should have his garments smeared with this blood. Dejanira, believing him, kept it carefully preserved.”
Ovid, Metamorphoses 9. 129 & 158 ff (trans. Melville) (Roman epic C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
“An arrow flew [from the bow of Herakles] and pierced the fleeing centaur’s [Nessos’] back: out from his breast the barbed point stuck. He wrenched the shaft away, and blood from both wounds spurted, blood that bore Lernaei’s [Hydra’s] poison. Nessus caught it up. `I’ll not die unavenged’, he thought and gave his shirt soaked in warm gore to Deianira, a talisman, he said, to kindle love.’ . . . [Deianeira, the wife of Herakles, heard rumors that her husband was about to marry Iole] She chose to send the shirt imbued with Nessus’ blood to fortify her husband’s failing love. Not knowing what she gave, she entrusted her sorrow to Lichas (ignorant no less) and charged him with soft words to take it to her lord. And Hercules receiving the gift and on his shoulders wore, in ignorance, Echidna Lernaea’s [Hydra’s] poisoned gore. The flame was lit; he offered prayer and incense, pouring on the marble altar wine from the bowl. That deadly force grew warm. Freed by the flame, it seeped and stole along, spreading through all the limbs of Hercules. While he still could, that hero‘s heart stifled his groans, but when the agony triumphed beyond endurance, he threw down the altar, and his cries of anguish filled the glades of Oeta. Desperately he tried to tear the fatal shirt away; each tear tore his skin too, and, loathsome to relate, either it stuck, defeating his attempts to free it from his flesh, or else laid bare his lacerated muscles and huge bones. Why, as the poison burned, his blood bubbled and hissed as when a white hot blade is quenched in icy water. Never an end! The flames licked inwards, greedy for his guts; dark perspiration streamed from every pore; his scorching sinews crackled; the blind rot melted his marrow . . . In wounded agony, he roamed the heights of Oeta [and died escaping pain in the flames of his funeral pyre].”
Ovid, Heroides 9. 115 ff (trans. Showerman) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
“The darts [of Herakles] blackened with the venom of Lerna.”
Seneca, Hercules Furens 44 (trans. Miller) (Roman tragedy C1st A.D.) :
“Why he [Herakles] bears as weapons what he once fought and overcame; he goes armed by a lion [i.e., the skin of the Nemean lion] and by Hydra [i.e., his arrows dipped in its venom].”
Athena teaches alchemists that the Hydra’s venom, or the flowing substance extracted from the insoluble salts, is our Mercurius, medicine, and a deadly weapon. The Mercurius/Spirit of Life/Secret Fire can give life and death. This is the alchemical meaning of the expression “Love Potion”.
The Hydra is the Guardian of the Hades.
Virgil, Aeneid 6. 287 ff (trans. Fair clough) (Roman epic C1st B.C.): “Many monstrous forms besides of various beasts are stalled at the doors [of Haides], Centauri and double shaped Scylla, and the hundredfold Briareus, and the beast of Lerna, hissing horribly, and the Chimaera armed with flame, Gorgones and Harpyiae, and the shape of the three-bodied shade [Geryon].”
Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica 3. 224 (trans. Mozley) (Roman epic C1st A.D.): “[The Titan] Coeus in the lowest pit [of Tartaros] burst the adamantine bonds and trailing Jove’s [Zeus’[ fettering chains . . . conceives a hope of scaling heaven, yet though he repasses the rivers and the gloom the hound of the Furiai [Kerberos] and the sprawling Hydra’s crest [the two guardians of Haides] repel him.”
Statius, Silvae 2. 1. 228 ff (trans. Mozley) (Roman poetry C1st A.D.): “Neither the ferryman [Kharon] nor the comrade [the Hydra] of the cruel beast [Kerberos] bars the way [to the Underworld] to innocent souls.”
Statius, Silvae 5. 3. 260 ff: “But do ye, O monarchs of the dead and thou, Ennean Juno [Persephone], if ye approve my prayer [provide a peaceful journey for the soul of my dead father] . . . let the warder of the gate [Kerberos] make no fierce barking, let distant vales conceal the Centauri and Hydra’s multitude and Scylla’s monstrous horde [other monsters appointed guardians of Haides after their deaths].”
Are not only the deadly properties of Mercurius to make it suitable to be the guardian of Hades but moreover the regenerative properties.
The Pitiful Setting among Constellations.
PseudoHyginus, Astronomica 2. 23: “The Crab is said to have been put among the stars by the favor of Juno [Hera], because, when Hercules had stood firm against the Lernaean Hydra, it had snapped at his foot from the swamp. Hercules, enraged at this, had killed it, and Juno [Hera] put it among the constellations.”
The largest constellation (the Water Snake or Sea Monster) is said to represent the beast slain by Hercules. These few bright stars are close to the celestial equator. The crab constellation is nearby. And we will see in other articles that these two constellations have a role in death/ resurrection practices.
First labor of Hercules: The Nemean Lion.
All the ancient authors’ fragments are taken from theoi. com;