Juno

Also known as: Juno of Argos / Queen Juno / daughter of mighty Saturn / queen of goddesses / white-armed Juno · Family: gods · Role: goddess · First appears: BOOK I

🌐 Also appears in: Greek Mythology — A Family Orrery (as Hera) · The Odyssey (as Juno) · The Aeneid (as Juno) · The Metamorphoses of Ovid (as Juno) · Greek Tragedy — The Same Myth, Three Voices (as Hera)

In Book I, Juno sent Minerva to help those they both loved, and was married to Jove, who called her “my wife.” By Book IV, she identified herself as Saturn’s eldest daughter and Jove’s wife; Menelaus was named as one of her friends. In Book V, Minerva joined her in urging action, and Mars was described as having his mother Juno’s stubborn spirit. In Book VIII, Juno put it into Agamemnon’s mind to encourage the Achaeans; when Jove ordered her and Minerva back, they abandoned their attempt to fight.

In Book XIV, Juno recalled that Oceanus and Tethys had taken her in and brought her up. At Lemnos, she promised Sleep marriage to Pasithea in exchange for his help; at Ida, her stratagem succeeded when Jove embraced her and fell asleep. In Book XVIII, she sent Iris, and in Book XIX, she beguiled Jove on the day Alcmena was to give birth to Hercules, then urged Eurystheus to claim his lineage and reign over the Argives. She had also endowed Xanthus, the horse of Achilles, with human speech.

In Book XX, Juno took part in the gods’ war, and in Book XXI she beat Diana and took her bow and arrows. She also called Vulcan her child, while in Book XXIV she said that she had reared and brought up Thetis.