Alcmena
mythological figure · 8 works · 10 mentions · 32 anchored passages
Alcmena's son (referring to Heracles) · Tirynthian Alcmena · daughter of Electryon · neat-ankled Alcmena · the daughter of Electryon · the neat-ankled daughter of Electryon · wife of Amphitryon
in the texts
Alcestis
Heracles's mortal mother, daughter of Electryon, invoked by Heracles to affirm his own courage and lineage.
O heart, O soul, both sufferers oft, now show the mettle of that son Tirynthian Alcmena, daughter of Electryon, bare to Zeus.
Yet shall no man ever see Alcmena’s son trembling at his foemen’s prowess.
yonder, I believe, comes Alcmena’s son toward thy hearth.
Heracleidae
Aged mother of Heracles, grandmother of the suppliant children, who shelters Macaria's sister within the shrine and later anxiously awaits news of the battle.
But you, children, I lament and pity, and that aged mother of your sire, Alcmena.
of Zeus will I never speak ill, but himself doth know, whether he is just to me.
my care is centred on these boys, while she, I mean Alcmena, clasps her son’s daughter in her arms, and bears her for safety within this shrine, for we shrink from letting tender maidens come anigh the crowd or stand as suppliants at the altar.
Heracles
Mortal wife of Amphitryon and, by Zeus, mother of Heracles; granddaughter of Perseus.
We have not come to do your city any hurt, but our warfare is against the house of one man only, against him whom they call the son of Zeus and Alcmena.
the other, Zeus, who came to wed the bride sprung from Perseus;
All hail the marriage!
Shield of Heracles
Wife of Amphitryon, daughter of Electryon, mother of Heracles by Zeus and of Iphicles by Amphitryon.
So in one night Zeus shared the bed and love of the neat-ankled daughter of Electryon and fulfilled his desire;
Or like her who left home and country and came to Thebes, following warlike Amphitryon,—even Alcmena, the daughter of Electryon, gatherer of the people.
She bore him through the embrace of the son of Cronos lord of dark clouds and the other, Iphicles, of Amphitryon the spear-wielder— offspring distinct, this one of union with a mortal man, but that other of union with Zeus, leader of all the gods.
Theogony
A mortal woman, mother of Heracles by Zeus.
And Alcmena was joined in love with Zeus who drives the clouds and bore mighty Heracles.
And mighty Heracles, the valiant son of neat-ankled Alcmena, when he had finished his grievous toils, made Hebe the child of great Zeus and goldshod Hera his shy wife in snowy Olympus.
Hymn 15 To Heracles
Mythological woman named as the mother of Heracles.
Alcmena bare him in Thebes, the city of lovely dances, when the dark-clouded Son of Cronos had lain with her.
Helen
Mortal woman whom Zeus approached in the likeness of her husband Amphitryon, mother of Heracles.
For in the likeness of Amphitryon he came to Alcmena, and as a shower of gold he united with Danae, and in the guise of a swan he took refuge in the bosom of Nemesis, and again in this form he espoused Leda;
While he was devoted most of all to the son of Alcmena and to the sons of Leda, yet his preference for Helen, as compared with Heracles, was so great that, although he conferred upon his son strength of body, which is able to overpower all others by force, yet to her he gave the gift of beauty, which by its nature brings even strength itself into subjection to it.
Amphitruo
Wife of Amphitryon and daughter of Electryon; unknowingly deceived by Jupiter into intimacy, left pregnant by both her husband and the god, and eventually delivered of Hercules and Iphiclus.
JUPITER, being captivated by love (Amore) for Alcmena, has changed (Mutavit) himself into the form of her husband, while Amphitryon is fighting for (Pro) his country with the foe;
This is commanded by Amphitryon, who leaves his wife Alcmena pregnant at his departure from Thebes.
both by her husband and by supreme Jupiter And my father is now lying here (he points to the house) in-doors with her;