Euripides, Heracles 348–441: First choral song: the labours of Heracles

Phoebus is singing a dirge, after his happier strains, for Linus dead in his beauty, striking his lyre with key of gold; but I wish to sing a song of praise, a crown to all his toil, on the one who has gone to the gloom beneath the nether world, whether I am to call him son of Zeus or of Amphitryon. For the virtue of noble toils is a glory to the dead.

First he cleared the grove of Zeus of a lion, and put its skin upon his back, hiding his yellow auburn hair in its fearful gaping jaws.

And then one day with murderous bow he wounded the race of wild Centaurs, that range the hills, slaying them with winged shafts. Peneus, the river of fair eddies, knows him well, and those far fields unharvested, and the steadings on Pelion and neighboring caves of Homole, from where the Centaurs rode forth to conquer Thessaly, arming themselves with pines.

And he slew that dappled deer with horns of gold, that preyed upon the country-folk, glorifying Artemis, huntress queen of Oenoe.

Next he mounted on a chariot and tamed with the bit the horses of Diomedes, that greedily champed their bloody food at gory mangers with unbridled jaws, devouring with hideous joy the flesh of men; then crossing the heights of Hebrus that flow with silver, he still toiled on for the tyrant of Mycenae.

And at the strand of the Pelian gulf by the streams of Anaurus, he slew with his arrows Cycnus, murderer of his guests, the savage wretch who dwelt in Amphanae.

And he came to those minstrel maids, to their orchard in the west, to pluck from the leafy apple-tree its golden fruit, when he had slain the tawny dragon, whose terrible coils were twined all round to guard it; and he made his way into ocean’s lairs, bringing calm to men that use the oar.

And he stretched out his hands to uphold the firmament, seeking the home of Atlas, and on his manly shoulders took the starry mansions of the gods.

Then he went through the waves of heaving Euxine against the mounted host of Amazons dwelling round Maeotis, the lake that is fed by many a stream, having gathered to his standard all his friends from Hellas, to fetch the gold-embroidered raiment of the warrior queen, a deadly quest for a girdle. Hellas won those glorious spoils of the barbarian maid, and they are safe in Mycenae.

He burned to ashes Lerna’s murderous hound, the many-headed water-snake, and smeared its venom on his darts, with which he slew the shepherd of Erytheia, a monster with three bodies.

And many another glorious achievement he brought to a happy issue; to Hades’ house of tears has he now sailed, the goal of his labors, where he is ending his career of toil, nor does he come back again. Now your house is left without a friend, and Charon’s boat awaits your children to bear them on that journey out of life, without return, contrary to the gods’ law and man’s justice; and it is to your prowess that your house is looking although you are not here.

Had I been strong and lusty, able to brandish the spear in battle’s onset, and my Theban companions too, I would have stood by your children to champion them; but now my happy youth is gone and I am left.