Soon Eurystheus gave a new assignment to Hercules. He had to clear the entire farmyard of Augeas, king of Elis, son of the radiant Helios, from manure. The sun god gave his son innumerable wealth. Augeas' herds were especially numerous. Among his herds were three hundred bulls with legs as white as snow, two hundred bulls were red like Sidonian purple, twelve bulls dedicated to the god Helios were white like swans, and one bull, distinguished by its extraordinary beauty, shone like a star. Hercules invited Augeas to cleanse his entire huge cattle yard in one day if he agreed to give him a tenth of his herds. Augeas agreed. It seemed impossible to him to complete such work in one day. Hercules broke the wall surrounding the barnyard on two opposite sides and diverted the water of two rivers, Alpheus and Peneus, into it. The water of these rivers in one day carried away all the manure from the barnyard, and Hercules again built the walls. When the hero came to Augeas to demand a reward, the proud king did not give him the promised tenth of the herds, and Hercules had to return to Tiryns with nothing.
The great hero took terrible revenge on the king of Elis. A few years later, having already been freed from service with Eurystheus, Hercules invaded Elis with a large army, defeated Augeas in a bloody battle and killed him with his deadly arrow. After the victory, Hercules gathered an army and all the rich booty near the city of Pisa, made sacrifices to the Olympic gods and established the Olympic Games, which have since been celebrated by all Greeks every four years on the sacred plain, planted by Hercules himself with olive trees dedicated to the goddess Athena-Pallas.
Hercules took revenge on all of Augeas’s allies. The king of Pylos, Neleus, paid especially. Hercules, coming with an army to Pylos, took the city and killed Neleus and his eleven sons. Neleus’s son Periclymenus, who was given the gift of turning into a lion, snake and bee by the ruler of the sea, Poseidon, did not escape either. Hercules killed him when, having turned into a bee, Periclymenes sat on one of the horses harnessed to Hercules' chariot. Only Neleus' son Nestor survived. Nestor subsequently became famous among the Greeks for his exploits and great wisdom.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru