Greek Goddess Hebe

According to Greek mythology the goddess Hebe was the Goddess of youth and her Roman counterpart who was worshiped was known as Juventas. She was typically depicted in Greek and Roman works of art as being young and attractive, wearing a sleeveless dress and bearing a pitcher or pitchers that were alleged to contain an elixir that could restore of maintain a persons youthfulness.

Also Hebe was featured in artwork of the time as being the bride of Heracles, which she was, with and without a pitcher and occasionally with wings on her head. Hebe had a unique station in the society of mythological figures of ancient Greece in that her main functions were in serving other mythological figures.

She served as the cup bearer at the heavenly feast of the gods according to Greek mythology and also served as an attendant to the goddess Aphrodite. Also according to ancient Greek lore Hebe was received in marriage to the Greek semigod Heracles upon his assention to his position among the gods on Mount Olympus. As legend has it, it was his marriage to Hebe which healed the rift that had been ongoing between Heracles and Hebe's mother Hera.

Hebe was the daughter of Zeus and Hera who like most all of the other consorts of Zeus was a sister born from the union of Titans. Some of the other heavenly tasks that Hebe was credited with performing were assisting her mother Hera to hitch her horses to her chariot and then helping her to get into it. Also she has been featured in Greek writings as helping to bathe and dress her brother Ares.

Hebe was depicted in later Greek mythology as having become the mother of two sons who were fathered by Heracles and the names of the two sons were Alexiares and Anticetus. She was an important mythological figure in the city of Athens where she along with her husband Heracles had alters in the Cynosarges.

While Hebe was not credited with any of the great feats that so many other Greek mythological figures of the time were credited with she was viewed as having the divine ability to bestow immortality on a person. So, along with that and her role as the keeper of the pitcher of elixir of youth she was an important goddess to both the ancient Greeks and the Romans.