Vulcan

(Gr. ῾Ηφαιστος), in Greek and Roman mythology, was the son of Jupiter and Juno, and consequently the brother of Mars, to whom, therefore, he bears a close relation, because he prepares for him the weapons of warfare. A later story says Juno gave birth to Vulcan, being jealous because of the birth of Minerva, without the assistance of man, having been made fruitful in eating a certain plant. Vulcan is the god of fire, and especially in two ways-first as a subterraneous power of nature, showing himself in fire- ejecting volcanoes, and second as an indispensable aid for the trades and arts of man. Thegbid was born as a weakling, and was therefore so hated by his mother that she planned to dispense with him, whereupon he fell down from Olympus. Thetis and Eurynome, goddesses of the sea, caught him in their laps. With them he then remained nine years, and made for them all kinds of costly apparel. He also made at this time an enchanted chair, from which no one who had seated himself in it could rise again without his consent, and sent it to his mother as a present, to punish her for her dislike of him. When she was accordingly held fast by the chair, no god could persuade him to withdraw the enchantment save Bacchus, who intoxicated him. Vulcan then returned from his hiding-place and was obedient to his mother, although she had wished to kill him in his childhood. When Jupiter at the time quarreled with her, he actually took her part, for which his father took him by the foot and hurled him from heaven. According to some, in consequence of this fall, according to others, from birth, he was lame and limped. By Homer he has a place of work upon Olympus, built by himself, where he also built dwellings for the other gods. Later his working-places are in the fire-ejecting volcanoes as, for instance, in AEtna or upon Lemnos and his helpers are the Cyclops (q.v.) Brontes, Steropes, and Pyracmon. His wife, according to the Iliad, is Charis (Grace); according to the Odyssey, Venus, who however, was untrue to him. As an ingenious god, who, similar to Minersa, teaches men the delightful and conducive arts, he was associated with her in religious worship by the Athenians, who dedicated feasts to both, and placed their statues side by side in their temples. According to Homer, Vulcan had no offspring. Others affirm that he had children by different mothers: Cupid, Erichthonius, Peripletes, Palaemon, Rhadamanthus, Olenus, Cacus, Caeculus, Servius Tullius, the nymph Thalia, Casmilus, and the three Cabiri. The Romans called Vulcan also Mulciber, that is, "the melter." In Rome he had a number of temples, among them one by the Comitium, the mass meeting place, whose erection was sometimes accredited to Romulus, at other times again to Titus Tatius. His festival, the Vulcanalia, was celebrated Aug. 23, with plays, in the Flaminian Circus, where also a temple of the god was erected, and at this feast the Romans began to work by light, in order to inaugurate the practice of working by light, a gift of Vulcan. See Smith, Dict. of Class. Biog. and Mythol. s.v.