Day Sixteen: Children of Hermes

Here we have Hermes, god of commerce and thieves, guide to the underworld and messenger of the Olympians. According to the internet, he may have fathered as many as thirty-five children! I guess the winged sandals must have been pretty sexy, no?


So here's a list of the most important kids:

Pan: son of Hermes and the nymph Dryope. He was a satyr and invented the panpipe, which you can see in this picture. He was a trickster and supposedly lured people into the woods with his pipe and then did horrible nasty things to them.

Hermaphroditus: son of Hermes and Aphrodite, goddess of love. He fell in love with the nymph Salmacis, who asked the gods to make it so they would never be apart. They embraced in a pool and were subsequently turned into a hermaphrodite. Hermaphroditus then cursed the pool so that any man who entered it would be castrated.

Priapus: son of Hermes and Aphrodite, cursed by Hera because of his mother's promiscuity. Her curse gave him an enormous permanent erection. Minor fertility god, guardian of livestock, fruit plants, gardens, and protector of male genitalia.

Eros (Cupid): son of Hermes and Aphrodite, although he may have been the son of Ares, Hephaestus, or just sprung from thin air. God of love and given magical arrows to pierce lovers' hearts.

Tyche: daughter of Hermes and Aphrodite. (Man, those two got it on!) Also known as Fortuna, she was the goddess of luck and destiny. She wore a crown shaped like the walls of a city.







Autolycus: no photo available unfortunately, he was the son of Hermes and Chione. Apparently Hermes put Chione to sleep and raped her. Autolycus wasn't all that exciting, but he was the grandfather of Odysseus, which would make Odysseus one-eighth god.