Ares

Ares is the Olympian god of war, a son of Zeus and Hera. Unlike Athena, who stands for skill and strategy in battle, Ares stands for its violence and bloodshed, and Homer makes him the least welcome of the Olympians, hated even by his own father. His best-known adventure is his affair with Aphrodite, the wife of Hephaestus.

Ares’ Role

Greek War God

Ares is the god of war as slaughter and the clash of armies. His name is also used in Homer for war itself: the Iliad speaks of men “gathering the strife of Ares” (Iliad 5.861). He is a fighter, and the poems show him wounded, bellowing in pain and running to Zeus to complain.

Ares' Portrayal and Symbolism

On the shield of Heracles, as Hesiod describes it, Ares stands in his chariot, spear in hand, urging the foot-soldiers on, red with blood “as if he were killing living men,” while Deimos and Phobos stand beside him (Hesiod, Shield 191–196). Homer gives him the same companions: Phobos follows him into battle (Iliad 13.298–300) and Deimos and Phobos yoke his horses (Iliad 15.119–120).

Ares' Epithets

Few of Ares’ epithets are flattering. In the Iliad Athena addresses him as “Ares, Ares, bane of mortals, blood-stained, stormer of walls” (Iliad 5.31). Elsewhere he is “man-slaying” (Iliad 4.441), “brazen” (Iliad 5.859) and, in Hesiod, “sacker of cities” (Theogony 936).

Ares' Family

Hesiod makes Ares a son of Zeus and Hera, with Hebe and Eileithyia as his sisters (Theogony 921–923). Hera bore Hephaestus without Zeus (Theogony 927–929). Homer agrees on Ares’ parentage: when Zeus scolds him, he says that Ares is his son and that Hera is his mother (Iliad 5.892–896).

Ares’ Consorts and Children

By Aphrodite, Hesiod gives Ares two sons, Phobos (Fear) and Deimos (Dread), and a daughter, Harmonia, whom Cadmus married (Theogony 934–937; Apollodorus, Library 3.4.2). Other children named in ancient sources include:

• Ascalaphus and Ialmenus, who led the men of Orchomenus to Troy; their mother was Astyoche, whom Ares lay with in secret (Iliad 2.512–515).
• Alcippe, whom he had by Agraulus, daughter of Cecrops (Apollodorus, Library 3.14.2).
• Phlegyas, by Dotis (Apollodorus, Library 3.5.5).
• Cycnus, who challenged Heracles to single combat (Apollodorus, Library 2.5.11 and 2.7.7; Hesiod, Shield 57–59).
• Hippolyte and Penthesilea, queens of the Amazons; Hyginus calls Hippolyte the daughter of Mars and Otrera, and Apollodorus calls Penthesilea the daughter of Otrera and Ares (Hyginus, Fabulae 30; Apollodorus, Epitome 5.1).

Hesiod makes Eros one of the first beings to exist (Theogony 120), so he is not a child of Ares in the Theogony.

Ares, the Unloved God

Battle with Diomedes

In the fifth book of the Iliad, Diomedes, helped by Athena, drives his spear into Ares’ belly. The god bellows as loud as nine or ten thousand men and goes up to Olympus like a dark cloud. Zeus tells him: “Most hateful to me are you of all the gods who hold Olympus, for strife is always dear to you, and wars and battles.” He adds that if Ares were the son of any other god, he would long since have been lower than the sons of Uranus, that is, the Titans (Iliad 5.855–898). Even so, Zeus has Paieon heal his wound, and Hebe bathes and dresses him (Iliad 5.899–906).

Trojan War

Diomedes is not his only humiliation at Troy. When the gods fight each other in the twenty-first book, Ares attacks Athena first, taunting her with what she did to him; she takes up a large black boundary stone, strikes him on the neck and lays him out, covering seven plethra of ground. Athena laughs over him (Iliad 21.391–408).

Ares Defeats

Ares is wounded by mortals as well. In the Shield of Heracles, Heracles recalls an earlier fight at sandy Pylos, where he struck Ares three times with his spear and the fourth time pierced his thigh and threw him in the dust (Hesiod, Shield 359–367). Later, Heracles meets Ares in support of Cycnus and wounds him in the thigh with his spear and throws him to the ground; Phobos and Deimos carry the god away in his chariot to Olympus (Hesiod, Shield 457–466). Apollodorus has Zeus part Heracles and Cycnus with a thunderbolt (Library 2.5.11).

Most humiliating of all, Otus and Ephialtes, the sons of Aloeus, once bound Ares and kept him in a bronze jar for thirteen months. Their stepmother Eriboea told Hermes, who stole him out when “the harsh bond was crushing him,” and Ares “insatiable of war” would have perished otherwise (Iliad 5.385–391).

Ares and Aphrodite

Ares had other lovers, but his affair with Aphrodite was the most famous. Homer tells it in the song of the bard Demodocus in the Odyssey. Aphrodite was the wife of Hephaestus, and Ares gave her many gifts and dishonoured Hephaestus’ bed; Helios saw the pair together and told Hephaestus (Odyssey 8.266–271). Hephaestus forged a net of fine bonds and set it around the bed. When the two lay down, the net fell on them and they could not move. Hephaestus summoned the gods, and when they came to the doorway, “unquenchable laughter rose among the blessed gods” (Odyssey 8.326). Hermes said he would gladly lie beside golden Aphrodite even in such bonds.

Poseidon begged Hephaestus to release Ares and promised to pay Ares’ fine himself if Ares fled without paying. Hephaestus agreed and freed them: Ares went to Thrace and Aphrodite to Paphos in Cyprus (Odyssey 8.343–363).

Ares’ Companions and Other Children

Ares War Companions

Ares is rarely alone in battle. His sons Deimos and Phobos are with him, as is Eris (Strife), whom Homer calls the sister and comrade of Ares the man-slayer (Iliad 4.440–441). In the fifth book Ares and the lady Enyo lead the Trojans, Enyo carrying Kydoimos (Din of Battle) and Ares brandishing a huge spear (Iliad 5.592–595).

Ares and Greek Heroes

Ares appears around many violent figures. Cycnus, his son, was killed by Heracles. Diomedes the Thracian, king of the Bistones, was a son of Ares and Cyrene and owned man-eating mares, which Heracles had to bring to Mycenae as his eighth labour (Apollodorus, Library 2.5.8). Hippolyte, the Amazon queen, wore a belt that Heracles was sent to fetch as his ninth labour; Apollodorus calls it the belt of Ares, given to her as a sign of her prowess (Library 2.5.9). According to Apollodorus, Oenomaus of Pisa had his arms and horses from Ares (Epitome 2.5).

Ares at Thebes and Athens

Ares and the city of Thebes

When Cadmus came to the site of Thebes and sent men to the spring of Ares for water, a dragon guarded it, which some said was the offspring of Ares. Cadmus killed it, and on Athena’s advice he sowed its teeth, from which armed men, the Sparti, sprang. To atone for the killing, Cadmus served Ares for an eternal year, which then equalled eight years. After that Zeus gave him Harmonia, the daughter of Aphrodite and Ares, and all the gods feasted in the Cadmea to celebrate the marriage (Apollodorus, Library 3.4.1–2).

Ares and Areopagus

The Areopagus, “Hill of Ares,” in Athens was said to be named for the god, because he was the first to be tried there. His daughter Alcippe was attacked by Halirrhothius, a son of Poseidon, and Ares killed him; Ares was tried for the killing on the Areopagus before the twelve gods and acquitted (Apollodorus, Library 3.14.2; Pausanias 1.21.4 and 1.28.5). Pausanias adds that Orestes was tried there later for killing his mother (Pausanias 1.28.5).

Ares at Sparta

Pausanias reports that before their ritual fights the Spartan youths sacrificed a puppy to Enyalius (in Homer a name of Ares himself, Iliad 17.211) at the Phoebaeum near Therapne, because the puppy was the bravest of tame animals and Enyalius the bravest of gods (Pausanias 3.14.9).

Ares Sources

The Homeric Hymn to Ares (Hymn 8) contains some of the very few flattering verses addressed to the god. Ares fights, and is beaten, in the fifth and twenty-first books of Homer’s Iliad (5.31–35, 5.385–391, 5.855–909, 21.391–408) and his companions are named in Iliad 4.439–445, 5.592–595, 13.298–300 and 15.119–120 (Enyalius in 17.211); his sons Ascalaphus and Ialmenus appear in Iliad 2.512–515. His affair with Aphrodite is told in Odyssey 8.266–366. For his family see Hesiod, Theogony 120, 921–937; Hesiod, Shield of Heracles 57–59, 191–196, 359–367, 457–466; Apollodorus, Library 2.5.8–11, 2.7.7, 3.4.1–2, 3.5.5, 3.14.2; Apollodorus, Epitome 2.5, 5.1; Hyginus, Fabulae 30; Pausanias 1.21.4, 1.28.5, 3.14.9.

See Also: Aphrodite, Zeus, Hera, Athena, Hephaestus, Harmonia, Heracles