Hercules

plural Herculeses · obsolete plural Herculesses · obsolete plural Hercules's

1. Romanhuman sciencesThe Roman name for the Greek divine hero Heracles, who was the son of Jupiter and Alcmene, a celebrated hero who possessed exceptional strength. Most famous for his twelve labours performed to redeem himself after killing his family.

   Supporters.] Two Herculeſſes, with clubs over their ſhoulders, proper, crined and habited about the middle, or.

   1769, The New Peerage; or Present State of the Nobility of England: […], volume III, London: […] R. Davis, […]; L. Davis, […]; and W. Owen, […], page 227

   5 more examples

   THere were many Hercules’s, but (as Tully ſays, de Nat. Deor. lib. 3.) the famous Actions of them all are aſcrib’d to him who was the Son of Jupiter, by Alcmena, the Wife of Amphitryo King of Thebes.

   1698, The Pantheon, Representing the Fabulous Histories of the Heathen Gods and Most Illustrious Heroes, in a Short, Plain and Familiar Method by Way of Dialogue, 2nd edition, London: […] Charles Harper, […], page 332

   THere were many Hercules’s amongſt the Antients; Varro enumerates Forty four. The moſt famous were, Hercules Marguſanus, Hercules Ogmius, who was the Symbol of Eloquence amongſt the Gauls; Hercules Pollens, Hercules Thebanus, firſt called Alcides, Hercules Tyrius, or Egyptian; and there were two of them; the Elder called Melicarthus, or Eſau, the Founder of the City of Tyre; and the Younger, who Subdu’d Geryon, and was Worſhipped in Sidon in Spain.

   1705, The Antient Religion of the Gentiles, and Causes of Their Errors Consider’d: […], London: […] John Nutt, […], page 166

   Mr. Sympſon would read Theban, the Story of Omphale being, as he thinks, only applicable to him: But as there were many Hercules’s, and among the reſt a Libyan, the Son of Jupiter Ammon; if it is inaccurate, it ſeems the Inaccuracy of a Scholar, and not an Error of the Preſs.

   1750, The Works of Mr. Francis Beaumont, and Mr. John Fletcher, volume the third, London: […] J. and R. Tonson and S. Draper […], page 70

   There were so many Hercules in the Grecian mythology and history, that it was necessary to specify when the principal Hercules, the son of Jupiter and Alcmena, was meant.

   1795, Paradise Regained, a Poem, in Four Books, by John Milton. A New Edition, with Notes of Various Authors, by Charles Dunster, M.A., London: […] T[homas] Cadell, Jun. and W[illiam] Davies, […], page 258

   Thus he enumerates many Hercules’s, and many Mercury’s; but one part of the history of each is so much the same, that I know not how he could avoid perceiving that they were only two names of one person.

   1838, L[eveson] Vernon Harcourt, The Doctrine of the Deluge; Vindicating the Scriptural Account from the Doubts Which Have Recently Been Cast upon It by Geological Speculations, volume I, London: […] Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, […], page 453

2. astronomyA summer constellation of the northern sky, said to resemble the mythical hero, lying between the constellations Lyra and Corona Borealis.
3. astronomyA crater in the first quadrant on the moon.
4. countablerareA male given name from Ancient Greek.
5. A city in Contra Costa County, California, United States.

1. A Hercules beetle.
2. A man with Herculean attributes.

   For the immaculate gentleman her cries had lured to what was to have been his death had been suddenly metamorphosed into a demon of revenge. Instead of soft muscles and a weak resistance, she was looking upon a veritable Hercules gone mad.

   1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 28