Eurystheus instructed Hercules to kill the Stymphalian birds. These birds almost turned the entire environs of the Arcadian city of Stymphalus into a desert. They attacked both animals and people and tore them apart with their copper claws and beaks. But the worst thing was that the feathers of these birds were made of solid bronze, and the birds, having taken off, could drop them, like arrows, on anyone who decided to attack them. It was difficult for Hercules to fulfill this order of Eurystheus. The warrior Pallas Athena came to his aid. She gave Hercules two copper tympani, they were forged by the god Hephaestus, and ordered Hercules to stand on a high hill near the forest where the Stymphalian birds nested and strike the tympani; when the birds fly up, shoot them with a bow. This is what Hercules did. Having ascended the hill, he struck the timbrels, and such a deafening ringing arose that the birds in a huge flock took off above the forest and began to circle above him in horror. They rained down their feathers, sharp as arrows, onto the ground, but the feathers did not hit Hercules, who was standing on the hill. The hero grabbed his bow and began to strike the birds with deadly arrows. In fear, the Stymphalian birds soared into the clouds and disappeared from the eyes of Hercules. The birds flew far beyond the borders of Greece, to the shores of the Euxine Pontus, and never returned to the vicinity of Stymphalos. So Hercules fulfilled this order of Eurystheus and returned to Tiryns, but he immediately had to go to an even more difficult feat.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru