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Updated: June 28, 2025
When the hero stepped before King Augeas and without telling him anything of the demands of Eurystheus, pledged himself to the task, the latter measured the noble form in the lion-skin and could hardly refrain from laughing when he thought of so worthy a warrior undertaking so menial a work.
Then he dug a canal, and turned the water of two rivers into the stables, so as effectually to cleanse them; but when Augeas heard it was his task, he tried to cheat him of the payment, and on the other hand Eurystheus said, as he had been rewarded, it could not count as one of his labours, and ordered him off to clear the woods near Lake Stymphalis of some horrible birds, with brazen beaks and claws, and ready-made arrows for feathers, which ate human flesh.
Augeas did not wait for the decision; he grew angry and commanded his son as well as the stranger to leave his kingdom instantly. Hercules now returned with new adventures to Eurystheus; but the latter would not give him credit for the task because Hercules had demanded a reward for his labor. He sent the hero forth upon a sixth adventure, commanding him to drive away the Stymphalides.
Then Hercules continued his hunt for the boar, drove him with cries out of the thick of the woods, pursued him into a deep snow field, bound the exhausted animal, and brought him, as he had been commanded, alive to Mycene. Thereupon King Eurystheus sent him upon the fifth labor, which: was one little worthy of a hero. It was to clean the stables of Augeas in a single day.
The Labors of Hercules which chiefly interest us are: The capture of the Bull, the slaughter of the Lion, the destruction of the Hydra, of the Boar, the cleansing of the stables of Augeas, the descent into Hades and the taming of Cerberus.
"The moon-eyed kine will do better in clean stables," said the wise Hercules, "and if thou wilt pledge me a tenth of thy herds I will clean out thy stalls in a day." To this Augeas delightedly agreed and, speaking as they were in the presence of the young son of the King, Hercules called upon the prince to witness the pact.
And the lower river took the burden and carried it out to the salt sea, which is ever and always cleaning and purifying whatever comes to its waters. And when night fell there stood the hero Hercules looking at his work the filthy stables of Augeas cleaned. When next day Hercules asked for the tenth of the herds which the King had pledged, Augeas refused to stand by his agreement.
'Yea, old man, I fain would see Augeas, prince of the Epeans, for truly 'twas need of him that brought me hither.
This is another idyl of the epic sort. The poet's interest in the details of the rural life, and in the description of the herds of King Augeas, seem to mark it as the work of Theocritus. It has, however, been attributed by learned conjecture to various writers of an older age. The idyl, or fragment, is incomplete.
But Hercules, after he had called the son of Augeas to witness the agreement, tore the foundations away from one side of the stables; directed to it by means of a canal the streams of Alpheus and Peneus that flowed near by; and let the waters carry away the filth through another opening. So he accomplished the menial work without stooping to anything unworthy of an immortal.
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