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" It will have been noticed that when Hera wished to bear a child without Zeus, she nevertheless was scrupulous not to dishonour her husband’s bed. She laid especial emphasis on this. The form of marriage that she protected as our marriage-goddess was monogamy, or—as seen from the woman’s point of view—the fulfilment of herself through a single husband, to whom she should be the single wife. Hence Hera’s jealousy and hatred of sons born to Zeus by others. Zeus, on the other hand, not only was the marriage-god in our religion, but also represented the principle of the other, non-maternal origin of life: the principle of paternal origin as being the higher, the father not being associated with a single woman nor standing in a relation of servitude to womanhood generally—like the relation of the Daktyloi to the Great Mother—and still less so to a single woman, but instead bestowing progeny as a divine gift upon all women. Hera seems to have preserved from earlier, pre-Olympian times an association with beings of a Dactylic nature. "

Karl Kerényi , The Gods of the Greeks


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Karl Kerényi quote : It will have been noticed that when Hera wished to bear a child without Zeus, she nevertheless was scrupulous not to dishonour her husband’s bed. She laid especial emphasis on this. The form of marriage that she protected as our marriage-goddess was monogamy, or—as seen from the woman’s point of view—the fulfilment of herself through a single husband, to whom she should be the single wife. Hence Hera’s jealousy and hatred of sons born to Zeus by others. Zeus, on the other hand, not only was the marriage-god in our religion, but also represented the principle of the other, non-maternal origin of life: the principle of paternal origin as being the higher, the father not being associated with a single woman nor standing in a relation of servitude to womanhood generally—like the relation of the Daktyloi to the Great Mother—and still less so to a single woman, but instead bestowing progeny as a divine gift upon all women. Hera seems to have preserved from earlier, pre-Olympian times an association with beings of a Dactylic nature.