Hephaestus, a.k.a. Vulcan, a.k.a. the god of the forge, is basically the nerd god. He’s the quiet, introverted one that spends most of his time in his garage, alone, playing with his toys, building machines and armor and jewelry. He believes in reason over all (there’s a reason Spock’s people are named after him). He’s overshadowed by his jock brother Ares, god of war. Notably, he’s the only Greek god who’s unattractive.
Often the myths present Hephaestus as an innocent victim who has done nothing to earn his ill treatment. But Hephaestus is also a classic “nice guy”: a self-centered, entitled, bitter schmuck who thinks he’s smarter than everyone else and then doesn’t understand why people don’t want his advice (see also: Nice Guys of OKCupid). The kind of guy who can’t understand why girls prefer “handsome jerks” like his brother to “nice guys” like him. Hephaestus, while demonstrating the good sides of being a nerd (he’s super good at making shit), also demonstrates a lot of nerdom’s fatal flaws.
Most of the myths about him, as hilariously recounted in the new book Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes, show Hephaestus getting dicked around. A lot. Either his parents are chucking him off Olympus, or his wife—Aphroditite, goddess of love—is cheating on him. With his brother. In his own bed. Basically, Hephaestus is Jerry from Parks and Recreation, the schlimazel of the Olympians. He exists to be shit upon.
On BetterMyths.com, Cory O’Brien recounts the myth of Hephaestus’s birth—he was born crippled, and his horrible parents, Zeus and Hera, threw him off Olympus for being ugly. In that version, Hephaestus was literally an innocent baby. But there’s another version of the myth that says the fall is what crippled Hephaestus, and he fell because he inserted himself in the middle of an argument between his parents. All of the other gods understood that when the king and queen fought, the best thing to do was run and hide for a few days. But Hephaestus thought he was so smart, and that he could prove to Zeus that Zeus was wrong, and then Mommy and Daddy would stop fighting and everyone could go out for ice cream. Or whatever the Olympian version of ice cream is. Ambrosia? Greek yogurt?
Anyway, it didn’t work. For one thing, Hera didn’t really need someone to defend her. She could take care of herself, thank you very much. And for another, of course approaching the RULER OF ALL CREATION at his angriest and telling him “um, actually, you made a mistake” was going to end in disaster. Yes, being thrown off Olympus, falling for somewhere between a day and a week, and then being crippled for the rest of his immortal life were excessive punishments, well beyond what Hephaestus deserved, but Hephaestus was not entirely innocent here. He made a classic nerd mistake: he believed being right was enough to make him persuasive, and that people should and would just listen to him because he’s smarter than them.
At least in this myth, Hephaestus’s heart was in the right place; he was trying to help, to make peace between Zeus and Hera, even if his interference only made things much much worse. He does not come across so well in the story of Aphrodite…
The story goes that Zeus married Aphrodite off to Hephaestus to keep the other gods from fighting over her. But while Hephaestus worked at his forge all day, she slept with half of Olympus, including Hephaestus’s brother Ares. When Hephaestus found out, he laid a net on his bed to trap Ares and Aphrodite in the act, then hung the net in front of all the other gods so they could laugh at the naked pair.
You know what’s missing from that story? Any sign that Hephaestus actually loved Aphrodite, or even liked her, or thought of her as an autonomous being, at all. He didn’t woo her, Zeus simply handed her over. Hephaestus made jewelry for her, but did nothing with her, because they had no shared interests. He spent most of his time away from her, playing with his toys. And when he found out she was sleeping with Ares, did he go to her directly, to talk about their relationship, to fix the problem? Nope, it was straight to the public embarrassment and slut-shaming.
Or, rather, attempted slut-shaming. Because, it turned out, Ares and Aphrodite had no shame about what they were doing, so they just kept right on fucking there in the net in front of the other gods.
This is classic “nice guy” nerd behavior. Hephaestus is “nice,” so he thinks he deserves a wife. He gives his wife pretty things, so he thinks she should be happy. When it turns out she, the literal goddess of sex, has desires outside his own, rather than asking himself what he could do to meet those desires, he gets angry at her. It’s not surprising that she prefers Ares, who gives her what she actually wants, over Hephaestus, who gives her what he presumes she should be happy with.
And those are just the more famous myths. There are other, darker myths that reveal the depths of Hephaestus’s misogyny. For example, one time he tried to rape Athena.
If Hephaestus is the nerd god, Athena is certainly the nerd goddess; they share a love of intelligence, craftsmanship, and cleverness. But when Athena came to Hephaestus’s forge for some weapons, instead of bonding over their mutual interests, Hephaestus was overcome with lust and tried to seduce her. When she saw through his weak game and politely refused him, he assaulted her. Athena fought him off, because she is the goddess of war and he is crippled, but not before he came on her leg. (Athena then wiped the rape semen off onto the earth, where it accidentally impregnated Gaia, Hephaestus’s great grandmother, who then birthed Erichthonius of Athens from the soil. Greek myths are weird, yo.)
Isn’t this the most dramatic version of many women’s experience entering a male dominated nerd space, whether it be a comic book store or a gaming convention? It doesn’t matter if they know their shit, if they sincerely love superheroes or fighting games, or if they’re interesting, creative people in their own right. Some lonely man-child sees a woman, reduces her to her sexual characteristics, and then tries to have sex with her. When the woman turns him down, the troll then gets angry at her, sometimes abusively so.
And like those trolls, Hephaestus is never directly punished for his abuse of Athena. He suffers because he interfered in his parents’ fight, he is embarrassed by Aphrodite because he ignored her, but he faces no consequences for trying to rape a goddess. He may have received some undeserved abuse in his life, but he never receives the punishment he deserves for the worst sin he commits, and so never learns he did anything wrong.
Like many myths, like many people, like nerd culture itself, Hephaestus is complicated. He’s brilliant, but also myopic. He’s pathetic, but also remarkably un-empathetic. And he’s deeply, deeply flawed. Yes, he’s smart, but that doesn’t give him rights to enforce his solutions. Yes, he’s suffered, but that doesn’t give him rights to inflict suffering on others. Yes, he’s given women beautiful gifts, but that doesn’t give him rights to their bodies.
Hephaestus is almost a perfect model of everything a male nerd could be. He just isn’t a model of what a male nerd should be.
Steven Padnick is a freelance writer and editor. By day. You can find more of his writing and funny pictures at padnick.tumblr.com.
I never knew that was the definition of a “nice guy.”
That is NOT the definition of a “nice guy”.
I appreciate the point this article is trying to make and found the comparison of Heph to some modern nerds hilarious. I was big into both Greek and Norse mythology in 4th and 5th grade and it’s amazing what will fly right over the head of a kid. Granted, the books I had access to were heavily sanitized versions of the original myths. I was surprised to discover later on just how much rape and other inappropriate behavior was going on in those myths.
That being said, I have a couple of problems with this article. I agree with jmcclay3: Heph is not really displaying what we think of as “nice guy” behavior. I may be wrong on this, and I must admit I’ve never tried to codify it before, but I usually think of the “nice guy complex” when it comes to relationships as a guy being super nice and helpful to a woman as a method of seduction. Most of these nice guys are not self-aware enough to think of it that way, but there is a definite quid pro quo expectation of (sexual?) favors in return for being nice. They treat the object of their seduction as a perfect being, putting them up on a pedestal. Most women (and men too, if the situation were reversed) are not interested in a relationship with such power dynamics, regardless of any other factors involved (such as chemistry or attractiveness). In none of the myths that you mentioned do we see Heph displaying any attempt to be nice to Aphrodite as a method of courtship. The marriage is simply a fait accompli, and Heph has moved on to the “ignoring his wife” stage.
My main problem with the article though is the implied view that Aphrodite’s behavior is justified. It is tough to overlay modern views on myths (and I do have sympathy for Aphrodite because of the forced marriage thing), but if something like this was occurring today I don’t see how her actions could be so excused with statements like:
“It’s not surprising that she prefers Ares, who gives her what she
actually wants, over Hephaestus, who gives her what he presumes she should be happy with”
This is deplorable. She is the one cheating on her husband, it is her responsibility to go to Heph and discuss how she is unhappy with the relationship. Cheating is never the answer, and you’ve implied that it is Heph’s fault that Aphrodite cheated and his responsibility to fix the problem alone:
“And when he found out she was sleeping with Ares, did he go to her
directly, to talk about their relationship, to fix the problem?”
In my view, this is astonishingly misogynistic, as if you don’t recognize that Aphrodite has any agency or responsibility regarding her relationship with her husband. The attitude is that her cheating is justified because she has certain innate desires that were not being met by her husband. Flip the genders in this marriage and NO ONE would defend a cheating husband in such a way!
What @3 said. If your wife was cheating with your brother in your bed you’d try to talk it out? Not me. There’s a time to realize it ain’t working, and that’s a sure sign. I’d tape it and give it to my lawyer. I guess maybe I’m not nice.
I think the author was trying too hard in this article to make the myth of Hephaestus fit within the modern conception of the sleazy nice guy.
So Heph would have been wrong to side with Hera during an arument with Zeus, because Hera could take care of herself? Do you know that Hera was often depicted as being victim of beatings and other forms of abuse by the King of the gods? Are you really going to say that a son trying to side with his mother against an abusive father was wrong to do so? What was he going to do, call the police? Give the guy a break; he did enough of bad things that denying him one of his good moments is almost cruel.
Also, saying Hephaestus was wrong to be angry at his wife cheating on him, because they didn’t talk much? While Aphrodite didn’t love her husband, I doubt it was because of his lack of conversational skills. Given that Ares’ seduction of Aphrodite basically amounted to: “your hubby is gone, let’s get it on”, I doubt conversation is what she was looking for in a man. Using such a weak motive trying to make Hephaestus the villain makes no sense, since all the people involved in this story were self-centered jerks, as are most greek gods.
Which is obvious when you get to the part when the god of the forge tried to rape Athena. It’s an awful act, but hardly an extraordinary one for a greek god. Zeus and Poseidon have to be the worst serial rapists in litterature, and the rest of the family isn’t that far behind, with a few rare exceptions. The only reason people would think Hephaestus was a nice guy was merely beacause the rest of the gods he could be compared to were such huge jerkasses.
That is a lie
You make the common mistake of cherry picking the myths that make it seem like Hephaestus, aka Vulcan was simply a nerdy cockold.
First Venus isn’t the only wife he had, Maia and some others have said to have been his wife as well, even some of suggested Athena was his wife too.
Also Vulcan is said to have created slave girls out of gold to serve his needs.
And Vulcan got Venus in the first place by getting the last laugh on his mother by giving her a throne that ultimately entrapped her. Zeus was only able to secure her release by offering him beauty.
And Vulcan is a cockold or a pimp? In one version of that mythology Vulcan released Mars and Venus from his net only when Poisiden promised him that Mars (Ares) would pay him an adultery fee. If Vulcan got a adultery fee for every act of adultery Venus did, well that’s a nice income.
Also recognize that Vulcan aka Vulcanus is the God of Vulcanos, the ultimate express of powerful male sexuality in the natural world. Erupting lava, the crackling of Vulcanic lightening, driving forth of the shear pressure of millions of rock, steam shooting into the air when lava meets water, and ultimately the eruption generates changed weather patterns, giving rise to storms and other weather patterns.
Basically it boils down to Ancient Greeks not having a problem with rape or domestic violence. So of course neither did their gods.