Parents: Aethra and both Poseidon and Aegeus.

Famous for: Slaying the Minotaur

Theseus’ myth:​ Athens was forced to send 14 young people to Crete every nine years as tribute to King Minos. The youths were sacrificed to the Minotaur, a monstrous half-man, half-bull, who was confined to a complex Labyrinth. Theseus volunteered to be one of the tributes to end the bloodshed. In Crete, Minos's daughter, Ariadne, fell in love with Theseus. She gave him a sword and a ball of thread, with which he could navigate the Labyrinth. Theseus killed the Minotaur, rescued the youths, and escaped the Labyrinth by following the thread. Ariadne fled with him, but he later abandoned her on the island of Naxos.

​

Fun fact: On his return journey, Theseus forgot to change his ship's black sails to white, the prearranged signal of his victory. His father, seeing the black sails, assumed his son had died and threw himself into the sea, which was then named the Aegean Sea.​

Parents: Zeus and Alcmene.

Famous for: Completion of the Twelve Labours

The twelve labours:​

1. Slay the Nemean Lion: Heracles killed the invulnerable beast with his bare hands and wore its hide as armour.

2. Slay the Lernaean Hydra: With the help of his nephew Iolaus, he defeated the nine-headed serpent, using its poisonous blood for his arrows.

3. Capture the Ceryneian Hind: He tracked and captured the swift, sacred hind of Artemis.

4. Capture the Erymanthian Boar: He captured the fearsome boar and brought it back alive.

5. Clean the Augean Stables: He diverted two rivers to clean the stables in a single day.

6. Slay the Stymphalian Birds: He drove off the man-eating birds with a rattle given to him by Athena.

7. Capture the Cretan Bull: He captured the bull ravaging Crete and brought it to Eurystheus.

8. Steal the Mares of Diomedes: He stole the king's human-flesh-eating horses.

9. Obtain the Girdle of Hippolyta: He retrieved the belt of the Amazonian queen.

10. Obtain the Cattle of Geryon: He killed the three-headed giant and took his cattle.

11. Steal the Golden Apples of the Hesperides: He tricked the Titan Atlas into retrieving the apples for him.

12. Capture and bring back Cerberus: His final labour was to venture into the Underworld and capture Hades' three-headed dog.

Parents: Thetis and Peleus.

Famous for: Immortality obtained via the River Styx and his role in the Trojan War.

Achilles’s myth:​ Thetis tried to make her son immortal by dipping him in the River Styx. She held him by one heel, which the water did not touch, leaving it as his only weak point - this is important later. 

During the Trojan War, Achilles withdrew from battle after a dispute with Agamemnon, the leader of the Greek forces. Agamemnon publicly dishonoured Achilles by taking his captive war prize, Briseis. In his fury, Achilles refused to fight, causing the Greeks to suffer heavy losses. As the Trojans gained ground, Achilles's closest companion, Patroclus, pleaded with Achilles to return to battle. Achilles refused but allowed Patroclus to wear his armour to rally the Greek troops. Patroclus was killed in the fighting by the Trojan prince Hector, enraging Achilles and causing him to rejoin the war to seek revenge. Driven by grief, Achilles engaged Hector in single combat outside the gates of Troy and killed him. Paris of Troy, with the help of the god Apollo, shot Achilles in the heel with an arrow, killing the hero. 

​

​

Fun fact: The myth of Achilles' vulnerable heel gave rise to the phrase "Achilles' heel," which refers to a person's or system's single point of weakness. The thick tendon connecting the calf muscles to the heel bone is named after Achilles. Injury to this tendon, such as tendonitis or a rupture, is a common ailment.

Parents: Zeus and Danaë.

Famous for: Slaying Medusa and rescuing Andromeda.

Perseus’ myth:​​ An oracle warned King Acrisius of Argos that his grandson would kill him. To prevent this, he locked his daughter, Danaë, in a bronze chamber. However, Zeus visited Danae as a shower of gold, and she gave birth to Perseus. Enraged, Acrisius sealed Danaë and her son in a wooden chest and cast them into the sea. They were eventually rescued by a fisherman on the island of Seriphos.

Much later in life, King Polydectes of Seriphos, who desired Danaë, sent Perseus on a seemingly impossible mission to retrieve the head of the Gorgon Medusa, whose gaze could turn men to stone. With the help of the gods, Perseus was given magical tools: Hermes' winged sandals, Hades' helm of invisibility, and Athena's reflective shield, which allowed him to see Medusa without looking at her directly. On his journey home, Perseus used Medusa's head to turn a sea monster to stone, saving the princess Andromeda from being sacrificed. He married her soon after.​

Parents: Aeson and Alcimede.

Famous for: Leading the Argonauts on the quest for the Golden Fleece

Jason’s myth:​​ Jason was the son of Aeson, the rightful king of Iolcus, so when Jason was an infant, his uncle Pelias usurped the throne, and Jason was sent away to be raised by the wise centaur Chiron. As an adult, Jason returned to Iolcus to reclaim his throne. On his way, he helped an old woman cross a river, losing one of his sandals in the process. The old woman was the goddess Hera in disguise, who favoured Jason. An oracle had warned Pelias to "beware a man with one sandal," and so when Jason appeared, Pelias immediately recognised the threat. The impossible task: Pelias told Jason he could have the throne, but only if he brought back the Golden Fleece from the distant land of Colchis. This was a seemingly impossible quest designed to kill him. To retrieve the Fleece, Jason commissioned the ship Argo and assembled a crew of heroes called the Argonauts, including Heracles, Orpheus, and the twins Castor and Pollux. They landed on an island inhabited only by women who had killed their husbands. Jason fathered twins with their queen. Then a tragic encounter in which the Argonauts accidentally killed the friendly King Cyzicus and many of his men in a night battle. Later, they helped a blind prophet tormented by winged monsters called Harpies. In return, Phineus told them how to navigate the perilous Symplegades, or "Clashing Rocks”, which involved successfully sailing past two giant cliffs that slammed together, crushing anything in their path. Upon reaching Colchis, the king, Aeetes, assigned Jason a series of impossible tasks before he would hand over the fleece, which was only possible through the use of Medea, King Aeetes's sorceress daughter, who fell in love with him. Medea gave Jason a fire-resistant ointment to use while yoking fire-breathing bulls and advised him on how to defeat an army of earth-born warriors. She then used her magic to put the sleepless dragon guarding the Golden Fleece to sleep so Jason could take it. As they fled, Medea brutally murdered her own brother, Apsyrtus, and threw his body parts into the sea to delay their pursuers. Upon returning to Iolcus, Jason and Medea used sorcery to trick Pelias' daughters into killing their own father. Jason and Medea were then exiled and settled in Corinth.​

Parents: Laërtes and Anticlea.

Famous for: The Trojan Horse and his long journey home.

Odysseus' myth:​​ Odysseus originally feigned madness to avoid fighting in the Trojan War, as a prophecy foretold a long, difficult return home. He was exposed when a recruiter, Palamedes, placed his infant son, Telemachus, in the path of Odysseus's plough, forcing him to veer away. Caught and forced to fight, after a decade, Odysseus conceived the decisive stratagem to take Troy: the Trojan Horse. The Greek forces pretended to sail away, leaving behind a giant wooden horse as a supposed offering to the gods. Greek soldiers, including Odysseus, were hidden inside. When the Trojans wheeled the horse into their city, the Greeks emerged at night and opened the city gates for the rest of their army. The sacking of Troy and the desecration of its temples angered many gods, leading to storms that scattered the Greek fleet. Odysseus's journey home was particularly prolonged due to the enmity of Poseidon, the sea god, after he blinded Poseidon's son, the Cyclops Polyphemus. It took Odysseus an incredible ten years to get home, consistently delayed by obstacles thrown his way, thanks to the vengeful gods.

1) Odysseus and his men were trapped in the cave of the one-eyed Cyclops. Using his wits, Odysseus got the giant drunk, blinded him with a heated stake, and escaped with his men hidden underneath the bellies of Polyphemus's sheep.

2) The enchantress Circe turned many of his men into swine. With the help of the god Hermes, Odysseus resisted her magic and persuaded her to restore his men. He and his crew remained on her island for a year.

3) Under Circe's instruction, Odysseus navigated treacherous waters. To pass the enchanting Sirens, he had his men plug their ears with wax while he was tied to the ship's mast. He later had to sail between the six-headed monster Scylla and the whirlpool Charybdis, losing six crew members to Scylla in the process.

4) Despite warnings, Odysseus's men slaughtered and ate the sacred cattle of the sun god Helios. In punishment, Zeus caused a shipwreck that killed all of the crew except Odysseus.

5) The nymph Calypso held Odysseus captive as her lover for seven years on her island before the gods intervened and forced her to release him.

​

Knocking on twenty years after he left Ithaca, Odysseus finally returned home; however, he found his palace overrun by suitors for his wife Penelope's hand. He arrived disguised as a beggar to assess the situation. Only his faithful old dog, Argos, and his elderly nurse, Eurycleia (who recognised a scar on his leg), saw through his disguise. Penelope proposed an archery contest to choose a new husband, challenging the suitors to string Odysseus's great bow and shoot an arrow through twelve axe-heads. The disguised Odysseus won the challenge with ease after all the suitors failed. With the help of his son, Telemachus, and his loyal servants, Odysseus slaughtered the suitors and reclaimed his kingdom. Even after revealing his identity, Penelope remained cautious. She tested him by asking for their marital bed to be moved. Odysseus described the bed's immovable construction around a living olive tree, a secret only the two of them shared, finally convincing her it was him.