Hebe

• the goddess of youth (pure Lat. Juventas), the daughter of Juno, cup-bearer to the gods, and, after the deification of Hercules, his wife, Ov. M. 9, 400; Prop. 1, 13, 23; Cat. 68, 116; Serv. Verg. A. 1, 28; 5, 134 al.

(Ἥβη), the personification of youth, is described as a daughter of Zeus and Hera (Apollod. 1.3.1.), and is, according to the Iliad (4.2), the minister of the gods, who fills their cups with nectar; she assists Hera in putting the horses to her chariot (5.722); and she bathes and dresses her brother Ares (5.905). According to the Odyssey (11.603); comp. Hes. Th. 950), she was married to Heracles after his apotheosis. Later traditions, however, describe her as having become by Heracles the mother of two sons, Alexiares and Anticetus (Apollod. 2.7.7), and as a divinity who had it in her power to make persons of an advanced age young again. (Ov. Met. 9.400, &c.) She was worshipped at Athens, where she had an altar in the Cynosarges, near one of Heracles. (Paus. 1.19.3.) Under the name of the female Ganymedes (Ganymeda) or Dia, she was worshipped in a sacred grove at Sicyon and Phlius. (Paus. 2.13.3; Strab. viii. p.382.)

At Rome the goddess was worshipped under the corresponding name of Juventas, and that at a very early time, for her chapel on the Capitol existed before the temple of Jupiter was built there; and she, as well as Terminus, is said to have opposed the consecration of the temple of Jupiter. (Liv. 5.54.) Another temple of Juventas, in the Circus Maximus, was vowed by the consul M. Livius, after the defeat of Hasdrubal, in B. C. 207, and was consecrated 16 years afterwards. (Liv. 36.36 ; comp. 21.62; Dionys. A. R. 4.15, where a temple of Juventas is mentioned as early as the reign of Servius Tullius; August. de Civ. Dei, 4.23; Plin. Nat. 29.4, 14, 35.36, 22.) [L.S]

(Ἥβη). Daughter of Zeus and Heré, and goddess of eternal youth. She was represented as the handmaiden of the gods, for whom she pours out their nectar, and the consort of Heracles after his apotheosis. She was worshipped with Heracles in Sicyon and Phlius, especially under the name Ganymedé or Dia. She was represented as freeing men from chains and bonds, and her rites were celebrated with unrestrained merriment. The Romans identified Hebé with Iuventas, the personification of youthful manhood. As representing the eternal youth of the Roman State, Iuventas had a chapel on the Capitol in the front court of the Temple of Minerva, and in later times a temple of her own in the city (Livy, v. 54). It was to Iupiter and Iuventas that boys offered prayer on the Capitol when they put on the toga virilis, putting a piece of money into their treasury. Two fine poems in English are suggested by the myth of Hebé—one the Fall of Hebé, by Thomas Moore, and the other, Hebé, by James Russell Lowell.

• Apollod. 1.2.6, Paus. 1.19.3, Paus. 2.13.3, Paus. 8.9.3
• married to Herakles: Apollod. 2.7.7, Apollod. 2.7.7, Paus. 1.19.3, Paus. 2.17.6
• the name used as a watchword or battle-cry: Hdt. 9.98
• cupbearer of the gods: Paus. 2.13.3
• her altar: Paus. 1.19.3
• images: Paus. 2.17.5, Paus. 8.9.3
• sanctuary at Phlius: Paus. 2.12.4, Paus. 2.13.3
• her sanctuary an asylum for slaves: Paus. 2.13.4
• released prisoners hang up fetters in her grove: Paus. 2.13.4
• Homer's account of her: Paus. 2.13.3
• Olen's account of her: Paus. 2.13.3