S9E2 - Asclepius the Healer

The stories featured in Greaking Out are original adaptations of classic Greek myths.

This week's story features Caesarean section, Love Gone Wrong, the off-stage death of a minor character, anatomically named gods, death by honey, and the perils of being the healer.

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Today, our story starts, as they often do, with a god and a baby.

Apollo had fallen in love.

Yes, that Apollo, god of light, art, healing, and a bunch of other random stuff like archery, poetry, and the plague.

He met the beautiful woman Coronas, and she captured his heart.

At least for a little while, or for as long as you can have the heart of an immortal god.

And this isn't the first time that Apollo Apollo had fallen in love.

Or even the first story we've told about one of Apollo's loves on this podcast.

Remember Cassandra?

Apollo was super into her, and she was not super into Apollo.

But Coronas and Apollo weren't like that.

For a while, they made a really nice couple, and things were going along well.

But unfortunately, sometimes love is not meant to last.

Stop me if you've heard this one before.

It happens a lot with Zeus in particular, right?

An immortal god falls for a mortal human human and eventually gets bored and moves on.

Well, that's what happened here, except this time, it was the human who wanted to move on.

Coronas fell in love with someone else.

His name was Iscus.

And we don't actually know that much about him, probably because he didn't live very long.

One day, a beautiful white raven visited Apollo on Olympus.

This bird had the unfortunate job of telling Apollo that he had seen Apollo's lady with another man.

And predictably, Apollo kind of lost it.

The gods didn't tolerate disobedience from humans in general, and they certainly weren't used to being cheated on.

Apollo's rage was so great that his eyes burned with anger.

And when he looked at the raven, he scorched the bird's feathers and turned them black.

In fact, he not only turned that raven black, but he turned all ravens black.

Apparently, up until this point, they had been white.

In biology, Corvidae is the name of a family of birds that include crows, magpies, and of course, ravens.

After altering the genetic makeup of every raven on the planet, Apollo stormed off in a rage and immediately went to find this Iscus guy.

Now, you might know that Apollo also has a twin sister, Artemis, goddess of the hunt.

Also wild animals, vegetation, and childbirth.

And no, I don't know who gives out these assignments.

Artemis was devastated to see her brother so upset and she wanted to help.

So naturally, she decided that Coronis had to go.

You may have noticed Artemis tends to overreact.

And this was a shame in this case because what Artemis didn't know was that Coronis was pregnant with Apollo's child.

So after taking care of Iscus, Apollo was flying on his way back to Olympus when he saw Coronis way down below, dying.

He rushed to her side, but he was too late to save her life.

Apollo held her in his arms as she died.

Even though he had been angry at her, this was still a big bummer.

But when Apollo realized that Coronas had been pregnant, he was able to save the baby by cutting into Coronas' body and taking the baby out himself.

According to legend, this event earned Asclepius his name, which translates to cut open.

Many refer to this as the first recorded Caesarean section, an operation where a baby is surgically removed from the mother's womb during childbirth.

It's worth noting that this part of the story has a lot of different versions.

Some stories say that Coronas lived but abandoned her baby on a hillside for Apollo to find later.

Some say that Asclepius wasn't even Apollo's son after all.

And some versions claim that Apollo just popped a baby out all on his lonesome.

But they all wind up in the same place, with Apollo holding a crying newborn and trying to figure out what to do with it like I said it all starts with a god and a baby

well Apollo clearly loved his child but he had no idea how to raise one so he took the baby to Mount Pelion in the kingdom of Thessaly and gave it to Chiron the centaur to raise and train fully expecting the boy to become a great hero now you might have heard of Chiron before he trained a number of well-known heroes and demigods, including Heracles, Achilles, Aristeas, and Jason.

And he raised many of his students from birth.

He was considered the wisest and most just of all centaurs, but in many ways, he was basically nanny of the demigods.

A centaur, sometimes called a hippocentaur, is a Greek mythological creature that is half man, half horse.

It has the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse.

But Chiron was also a great teacher, a great warrior, and a great healer.

And it was this last bit that was particularly interesting to young Asclepius.

You see, Chiron trained him in all of the arts of combat and war, and Asclepius did okay.

He wasn't terrible.

I mean, he was a demigod after all, but he was certainly no Achilles or Jason or anyone notable, really.

I mean, he could shoot a bow, ride a horse, throw a spear and swing a sword, but those were things that he just happened to be pretty good at, not necessarily the things that he really liked doing.

What young Asclepius really liked doing was asking questions.

Why does this plant have a flower and that one doesn't have a flower?

Where do the animals go when it gets cold?

Why do we bleed when we get cut?

The boy asked so many questions sometimes that Chiron thought his head would explode.

He knew that Apollo wanted his son to grow up to be a hero of men, but Chiron began to see that Asclepius was going to be different.

Chiron began to teach Asclepius about plants and herbs and healing.

He explained how bodies work, how living things functioned, how all things on Earth were connected, and he showed him how to fix things.

Asclepius wasn't just a quick study.

He was practically a prodigy.

He seemed to remember and understand everything Chiron told him right away, and he figured out how to fix, heal, and build things instinctively.

One day, the young boy was out looking for herbs when he saw a snake slithering slowly through the grass.

It had been injured by a hawk, but somehow the snake managed to escape.

Still, it was badly wounded, and so Asclepius decided to help the poor creature.

I love this kid.

In perfect conditions, adult snakes can live to be 20 to 30 years old if they can avoid natural predators and environmental hardships.

Asclepius carefully brought the snake into his home and helped it heal.

In a few days, the serpent was good as new.

And as a reward for Asclepius's kindness, the snake whispered some of the greatest secrets of healing into the young man's ear.

I have told you all of the secrets but one,

the snake said.

There is one secret I cannot share.

Wait, what?

Why?

Why not?

Asclepius asked, but the snake was already gone.

Well, after that point, Asclepius became one of the most sought-after healers in all of Greece.

He was as good at medicine as Achilles was in battle.

He was skilled at surgery, and he knew how to use the right plants and herbs for medicine.

Even his father Apollo, who was also the god of healing, was pretty impressed.

Asclepius traveled from town to town, helping the sick and injured, and his reputation grew and grew.

One day, as he was settling down in a small town, a messenger found him and told him that Chiron needed him at home.

Panicked, Asclepius threw his belongings into a pack and set out for Mount Pelion at once to see his mentor.

Was something wrong?

Was he ill?

Well, it turned out that Chiron was just fine.

But he had another visitor with him when Asclepius arrived, a handsome man with a rugged face and a warrior's frame beneath shining gold armor.

This is Jason, Chiron said to Asclepius.

He is another one of my greatest pupils, and he needs your help.

There are many famous Jasons.

There is even a fictitious horror movie, Jason, who wears a hockey mask.

But this is the original Jason.

And you may remember his adventures from the very first episode of Greek King Out.

And this is how Asclepius became an Argonaut.

The Argonauts were all of Greece's greatest heroes united on the same mission.

All of them sailing together on the same ship called the Argo.

Heracles, Jason, Meleager, Orpheus, and now Asclepius.

Yeah, they were basically the OG Avengers.

Basically.

The adventures of Jason and the Argonauts could not possibly fit into one single episode.

We tried that and we had to skip a bunch of stuff, remember?

But what I can tell you is that it was a dangerous and harrowing journey.

Jason was trying to win back his kingdom by delivering a golden fleece to his cruel uncle who had stolen the throne, and there were a lot of setbacks.

But for Asclepius, the worst setbacks were when the crew members died.

The voyage was fraught with monsters and demons and many, many battles, and all of this meant that good men lost their lives.

Asclepius was a great hero, but even he couldn't save men from war.

Many heroes lost their lives on the Argo, and Asclepius felt like he failed each and every one of them.

After the voyage, Asclepius joined Meleager and some of his other shipmates on a boar hunt in Caledonia.

This town had a giant boar roaming the countryside and ravaging homes and farms.

During the hunt, Meleager was gravely wounded by the beast, and again, Asclepius could not save one of his friends from death.

Perhaps this was why he was given a special gift from the gods.

Some say it was his father who gave it to him.

Other stories say it was the goddess Athena.

Some stories don't even tell you what it was, but in our version, we're going to say that Asclepius wound up with two vials of Gorgonblood in his possession.

And a vial of Gorgonblood, as they say, could bring someone back from the dead.

While in other traditions, people come back from being dead all the time.

In Greek mythology, it does not happen a lot.

Yeah, if you think about it, when someone gets killed, even the gods can't bring them back.

They just make them into stars or plants or whatever.

Orpheus tries to bring back his wife Eurydice, but fails.

And Sisyphus gets locked into Tartarus for trying to escape death.

Famously, Hades does not give up what is his.

So bringing someone back from the dead in Greek mythology is a big deal.

Asclepius was told to use these gifts wisely.

There would still be people he could not save, but now he had a special way to do the impossible.

And when the time was right, he would use it.

Over time, Asclepius became more and more famous.

Even though he wasn't your typical sword-swinging demigod, or maybe because of it, Asclepius had established himself as a different kind of hero.

And the gods began to take notice.

Some of them were even a little scared of him.

They weren't worried that he would challenge them on Olympus or anything, but the fact that he seemed to be able to outwit death was a little concerning, particularly to Hades, god of the underworld.

I mean, who was this guy who was keeping souls away from him?

But Apollo could not have been more proud.

He bragged about his son to anyone on Olympus who would listen, and he even had to call on Asclepius for help himself.

Here's a little story within a story, okay?

One of Apollo's other sons, Hymenias, was in love.

He had fallen in love with a beautiful maiden who was from a rich and powerful family and not knowing that Hymenias was a demigod, didn't really think he was worthy of their daughter.

But the young man wasn't going to give up that easily.

So one day he followed the girl home and disguised himself as a woman to get close to her.

But then, fate stepped in.

All of the girls were kidnapped by a band of pirates, including Hymenias.

With a little luck and some demigodlike skills, Hymenias fought off all the pirates and escaped with all of the maidens, including the girl of his dreams.

We're going to take a break.

We'll be right back.

Hey parents, did you know Rick Riordan just released another book in the Percy Jackson series?

If you happen to know someone who loves the series, Chalice of the Gods is available in stores.

After saving the world multiple times, Percy Jackson is hoping to have a normal senior year.

Unfortunately, the gods aren't quite done with him.

Percy will have to fulfill three quests in order to get the necessary three letters of recommendation from Mount Olympus for college.

Check back in with your favorite characters in Chalice of the Gods by Rick Riordan.

Available wherever books are sold.

Okay, we're back.

Where were we?

Hymenias, right?

He'd fought off all the pirates, escaped with all of the maidens, including the girl of his dreams, who he was able able to marry and live happily ever after with.

Or at least he would have done that, except, well, again, fate stepped in and had other plans.

Hymenias was thrown from his horse on his wedding day, hit his head, and died.

Of course, Apollo was devastated about the death of his son and was at a little bit of a loss as to what to do.

Enter Asclepius, Apollo's other son.

After some serious pleading from his father, the healer made his way to the home of Hymenias.

Needless to say, everyone was devastated.

After all of those heroics, to die in such a seemingly random way was, I don't know, just added insult to injury, you know?

It seemed that Asclepius felt the same way because he quietly removed one of the vials of Gorgon blood from his satchel and used it to revive the hero.

The entire wedding party was overjoyed.

Never had there been such a joyous celebration.

In fact, it was such a party that Hymenias was named the god of weddings.

This is an old Athenian legend, but there are many versions of the story of Hymenius, also called High Men.

He is even said to have sung the bridal hymn at the wedding of Dionysus and Ariadne.

A few years later, It was Artemis who needed the help of Asclepius and got him involved in a bit of nastiness and jealousy among the gods.

Hippolytus was the son of the great hero Theseus.

He was smart, handsome, and an avid hunter and sportsman, but he wasn't much of a romantic.

He pledged himself to the goddess Artemis exclusively and was seemingly so opposed to love and romance that he actually refused to honor Aphrodite, the goddess of love, at all.

Well, this turned out to be a bad idea.

Aphrodite was so offended that she cursed Phaedra, Hippolytus' stepmother, to fall in love with him.

This led to a chain of events so complicated that they actually wrote plays about it.

The Greek tragedy, Hippolytus, was written by the famous playwright Euripides in 428 BCE.

He entered the performance in a competition in Athens, and it won first prize.

Phaedra was written by the Roman playwright Seneca in 54

CE.

The whole mess wound up with Theseus getting Poseidon to terrify the horses that were pulling his son's chariot, causing it to crash and make the young man die.

Once again, a god came to Asclepius and asked him for help, but this time it was Artemis herself.

I'm not sure how you refuse a god in this situation, especially one who is technically your aunt, but what choice did he have?

Asclepius saw the man's injuries after the accident and knew that he had no choice but to use the other bottle of Gorgon blood.

In no time, Hippolytus was revived.

But obviously he was pretty upset.

Artemis explained the situation to both Hippolytus and Theseus, but the young man decided he needed to leave forever.

Some believe that he went to Italy and founded a new kingdom there.

This is not how the play ends.

It is a tragedy, so it ends with Hippolytus's death.

Although, he does have a religious order established in his honor.

So, his name lives on.

Well, after this, Asclepius was the subject of great scrutiny on Mount Olympus.

Both Hades and Aphrodite had him on their naughty list, but Apollo was quick to point out that the healer had already used both vials of Gorgon blood.

What more could he do?

As it turns out, he could do quite a lot.

The travels of Asclepius eventually led him to Crete, which was famously ruled by King Minos and his wife Queen Pasiphae.

Yes, they were the parents of the famous Minotaur, but that is a whole different story.

Minos and Pasiphae had a young son named Glaucus, and one day, he just vanished.

He had been last seen chasing a ball or a mouse or something and simply didn't come back.

His parents were so distraught that they went to the famous oracle at Delphi, who told them that Asclepius, who had already impressed everyone with his smarts, not only could find young Glaucus, but could also return him to his family.

Well, the king and queen were relieved to have someone else solve their problem for them, so they asked Asclepius to get to work right away.

Asclepius quickly pointed out that finding missing persons wasn't really his jam.

I'm a doctor, not a detective, he complained.

But King Minos would have none of it.

He sent Asclepius off to find his missing son straight away.

After about an hour of wandering aimlessly around the castle, Asclepius saw an owl swooping out of the sky right above the entrance to the king's wine cellar.

The bird was snapping at bugs in the air, and as Asclepius got closer, he could see that they were bees.

He noticed a small trail of honey seeping out from under the door to the wine cellar.

He opened the door, and there he found an open barrel of honey.

And inside the barrel was the body of young Glaucus.

Apparently, the young boy wanted to sneak a treat, fell inside the barrel, and died.

Asclepius immediately sent for the king and queen, and they were, obviously, devastated.

King Minos immediately demanded that Asclepius bring his son back from the dead.

I've heard the stories, he demanded.

I know you can do it.

And the oracle said you would return him to his family.

So return him to us.

Asclepius tried to protest, but Minos was mad with grief.

He demanded that the healer stay in the wine cellar with the boy's body and told him not to come out until his son had been restored to life.

Of course, you and I both know that Asclepius was out of Gorgonblood, and without it, he didn't have the power to bring anyone back from the dead.

As the sun set and darkness descended, Asclepius sat down in the wine cellar and began to think.

There had to be a way out of this mess.

After a while, Asclepius heard a slithering noise and a loud hiss.

In the blackness, Asclepius could make out the two glowing eyes of a serpent.

Without thinking, Asclepius grabbed a nearby sword and just swung it at the snake.

Despite this being the first time in a long while that the man had actually used a sword, the blade found its mark and the serpent was killed.

Rude, after all that snakes have done for him.

Well, to Asclepius' credit, he felt bad about this almost immediately, especially when he heard the hissing of another serpent.

It was almost dawn, and the healer saw the new serpent look at the body of its dead partner.

Immediately, the snake slithered away and then returned moments later with a strange-looking plant.

It gave the herb to the dead snake, and slowly that serpent began to revive itself.

Asclepius knew he'd seen something amazing.

He remembered the snake from his childhood and how it taught him everything it knew about medicine except for one last big secret.

Long time listeners will remember the tale of Gilgamesh where a snake stole Gilgamesh's magical plant.

that was supposed to restore his youth.

Right.

These snakes also seem to know the magical properties of plants.

So the healer followed the two snakes out of the cellar into a field, where he found the plant the first snake had used.

He pulled up the plant, rushed back to the wine cellar, where he crushed some of the leaves into a paste and poured it into Glaucus' mouth.

In moments, the boy began to stir, and soon he was fully alive again, calling for his mother and father.

This should be a happy ending, right?

Well, not for our friend Asclepius.

This was the final straw for Zeus and company.

Immortality was a gift meant for the gods and the gods alone.

Human beings were mortal and meant to stay mortal.

Apollo begged Zeus to reconsider, but the king of the gods was determined.

There was no Gorgon blood this time.

Asclepius had found a way to bring the dead back to life, and that could not go unpunished.

And this is why, despite saving countless lives and healing more sick and wounded than an army of normal healers, Asclepius was struck down by Zeus's thunderbolt with no hope of coming back.

As a way to acknowledge the heroic deeds of Asclepius, it is said that Zeus immortalized him in the stars in the Ophuchus constellation, which means serpent-bearer in Greek.

This was basically a compromise that no one was happy with.

The gods didn't get to make the mortal they hate suffer.

The mortal world lost a great healer and Apollo lost one of his sons.

But even to this day, snakes are still a symbol of medicine because of their association with Asclepius.

Many medical associations will have snakes as part of their sign or their crest, and the staff with the snake wrapped around it remains a prominent symbol of medicine in the contemporary world.

It's actually the logo for the World Health Organization.

Because snakes are great.

Right.

Because snakes are great, of course.

Greaking Out.

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National Geographic Kids Greaking Out is written by Jillian Hughes and Kenny Curtis and hosted by Kenny Curtis with Tori Kerr as the oracle of Wi-Fi, audio production and sound design by Scotty Beam, and our theme song was composed by Perry Gripp.

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Adria Haluska is our subject matter expert, Emily Burkett, Laurie Boda, and Juliana Schiavo are our producers, and Emily Everhart is our senior producer.