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When Hercules fought the Hydra, it had 9 heads I think.

But the way of the Hydra is that when one is cut down 2 grow up.

So obviously some foolish fighters went in and cut some heads before, to know that information.

So what I am asking, when the Hydra was first born, How many heads did he originally have?

3 Answers 3

9

There are many different accounts. I don't believe a simple, conclusive "it started with X heads" is possible.

Author Source Heads Regeneration
Hesiod Theogony N/A N/A
Alcaeus scholiast on Theogony 9 N/A
Simonides scholiast on Theogony 50 N/A
Euripides Herakles Many Yes
Plato Euthydemas N/A Many for each severed
Apollodorus Library 9 2 for each severed
Pausanias Description of Greece 1 No
Diodorus Siculus Library of History 100 2 for each severed
Quintus Smyrnaeus Fall of Troy Many >1 for each severed
Hyginus Fabulae 9 N/A
Ovid Metamorphoses 100 2 for each severed
Seneca Hercules Furens Many N/A
Nonnus Dionysiaca Many Yes
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The Hydra was a multi-headed monster--according to Diodorus (first century B.C.), it had a hundred heads; Simonides (sixth century B.C.) said it had fifty. The most common opinion, however, seems to be that it had nine. What made the Hydra so difficult was the fact that, whenever one of its heads was chopped off, two would grow in its place. Hercules managed to get around this rather major obstacle by having his nephew, Iolaus, cauterize each stump with a hot iron as soon as Hercules could chop off a head. The hero then buried the monster's immortal head beneath a rock. The task was made somewhat more difficult by Juno, who sent a crab to nip at the feet of Hercules while he battled the Hydra. - Hydra

Various authors have given us different numbers for how many heads Hydra had originally. The earliest known author Hesiod of the 8th or 7th B.C says only many heads.

Alcaeus seems to be the first person to give us a number for how many heads Hydra originally had: NINE.

Alcaeus, Fragment 443 (from Schoiast on Hesiod’s Theogony) (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric II) (Greek lyric C6th B.C.) : “The Hydra is called nine ­headed by Alcaeus, fifty­ headed by Simonides.”

Simonides, Fragment 569 (from Servius on Virgil’s Aeneid) (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric II) (Greek lyric C6th to 5th B.C.) : “One hundred snakes as in Simonides, as we said above [he spoke of Simonides fifty­ headed Hydra]; others say there were nine.” - Labors of Hercules: Second, to Thin the Lernaean Hydra

Hydra

Black figure vase by the Eagle Painter, ca. 525 BCE, now in the Getty Museum (© 2008 Wolfgang Sauber via Wikimedia Commons)

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    "Hesiod ... says only many heads." I've seen this claim around, but I couldn't find the source of it, myself. Do you know where it comes from? At Theogony 313, the hydra bit is preceded by Cerberus, and succeeded by Chimaera, both of which are stated to have multiple heads, but I don't see any such statement about the Hydra. Am I missing something?
    – femtoRgon
    Commented Jul 20, 2016 at 16:19
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My understanding is that, originally, the Hydra was a single-headed serpent and the multi-head angle was only introduced later into the myth. I do know that there is a tendency to mistake the accounts of later poets, such as Hesiod, with the actual myths.

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