known for his craftsmanship. Read those old Greek writers and they go on and on for pages about every shield or piece of armor Hephaestus made, describing every color and decoration, what size grommets he used, how many nails and zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Sorry. I fell asleep just thinking about it.
I’ll just give you the basics, but Hephaestus did do nice work. He made thrones for all the gods, and most of them weren’t even booby-trapped! He made a fleet of magical tripods—three-legged tables that had wheels on their feet and raced around Mount Olympus, bringing people drinks and hors d’oeuvres and whatever. If you were staying in Mount Olympus and said, “Now, where did I put my iPhone?” pretty soon one of the tripods would come puttering up to you, open its drawer, and there would be your phone. Kind of handy, those little guys.
Hephaestus also made the best armor and weapons. Sure, the Elder Cyclopes and the telkhines were good craftsmen, but nobody could touch the blacksmith god. Hercules, Achilles, all the greatest Greek heroes? They only used Hephaestus-brand equipment. I don’t even think Hephaestus paid them an endorsement fee.
He made chariots for the Olympians with better suspension, all-wheel drive, rotating blades on the wheels, and all kinds of optional upgrade packages. He designed everything from jewelry to palaces. He made this one guy, the king of Chios, an entire underground mansion like a secret bunker.
But Hephaestus’s specialty was automatons—mechanical creatures that were basically the first robots. In Hephaestus’s workshop, he had a bunch of mechanical women assistants made out of gold. He crafted four of those for Apollo’s temple, too, so they could sing Apollo’s praises in four-part harmony. For King Alcinous, Hephaestus made a pair of metal guard dogs—one gold and one silver—that were smarter and more vicious than real dogs. For King Laomedon, he made a golden vine that actually grew. For King Minos, he made a giant metal soldier named Talos, who patrolled the borders of the palace day and night. Metal horses, metal bulls, metal people. You name it. If I ever become a king, I’m totally going to ask him for an army of giant golden acid-spitting llamas.
Okay, sorry. I got distracted again.
Next I should probably tell you how Hephaestus reacted when he found out his wife, Aphrodite, was cheating on him. It’s kind of a sad story, and no llamas are involved, but Aphrodite and Ares do get badly humiliated, which is always a good thing.
Aphrodite had never wanted to marry Hephaestus. The goddess of love was all about looks, and Hephaestus didn’t have any.
Hephaestus tried to be a good husband. It didn’t matter. As soon as they were married, Aphrodite started having an affair with the war god Ares, and it seemed like Hephaestus was the only one who didn’t know about it.
Why was he so clueless? I don’t know. Maybe he wanted to believe Aphrodite could love him. Maybe he figured if he did the right thing, she would. Sure, he noticed that all the other gods were whispering and snickering behind his back, but Hephaestus was used to that.
He started to suspect something was wrong when Aphrodite had her first child. Hephaestus had been expecting the baby to be crippled like him, or at least have some of his features—the misshapen head, the warty face, perhaps a beard.
But the baby boy, Eros, was perfect—handsome and fit. He also bore a striking resemblance to Ares.
Huh, Hephaestus thought. That’s weird.
Aphrodite’s next child was a girl named Harmonia, and again she looked absolutely nothing like Hephaestus. The blacksmith started to get uncomfortable. Every time he referred to Harmonia as “my daughter,” the other gods looked like they were trying not to laugh. And why did Aphrodite and Ares keep giving each other knowing glances?
Finally the sun Titan Helios took pity on Hephaestus. Helios saw everything from his sun chariot chick magnet up in the sky—even stuff he didn’t want to see—so of course he’d witnessed Aphrodite and Ares being way more than “just friends.”
One night he pulled Hephaestus aside and said, “Dude, there’s no easy way to tell you this. Your wife is cheating on you.”
Hephaestus felt like he’d been hit in the face with a three-pound club hammer—one of the really nice ones with the fiberglass grip and the double-faced drop-forged steel head.
“Cheating on me?” he asked. “Impossible!”
“Possible,” Helios said grimly. “I saw them myself. Not that I was looking! But, well, they were kind of hard to miss.”
The sun Titan explained that