Cacus- Roman CreatureCreature · Monster"Son of Vulcan"

The Theft

Cacus lived in a cave on the Aventine slope. Virgil describes it: skulls and bones nailed above the entrance, the ground around it blackened. He was a son of Vulcan, and he breathed fire.

When Hercules came through the region driving the cattle of Geryon, his tenth labor, he pastured the herd near the Tiber and slept. Cacus crept out at night and took four bulls and four heifers. He dragged them backward into his cave by their tails, so the hoofprints pointed away from the entrance. At dawn Hercules counted the herd, found animals missing, and followed the tracks. They led in every direction except toward the cave.

He was driving the remaining cattle away when one of the stolen cows lowed from inside the mountain. The rest of the herd answered. Hercules turned around.

The Killing

Virgil gives the fight in full. Hercules climbed the Aventine and tore the cap off the rock, exposing the cave to daylight for the first time. Cacus crouched below, blinded, and vomited fire and black smoke to fill the cavern. Hercules dropped in. He found Cacus in the dark, locked his arms around the monster's throat, and squeezed until the eyes burst from the skull.

Livy tells a simpler version: Hercules struck Cacus with his club. Ovid adds that Cacus tried to seal the cave mouth with a boulder his father Vulcan had placed there, but Hercules pushed it aside.

Evander, the Arcadian king living on the Palatine, saw the body and recognized Hercules as Jupiter's son. He built the Ara Maxima in the Forum Boarium, the cattle market by the Tiber. The altar stood for centuries. Sacrifices there were conducted with the head uncovered, in the Greek manner, because Evander was Greek.