A Roman statue of the goddess Hera, dating from around the 2nd century AD but copied from an earlier Greek original. It stands today in the Louvre.
IN Platea there is a temple to Hera, worth seeing for the size and quality of its statues. They call her ‘the Bride’, for the following reason.
Apparently, Hera was angry with Zeus over something or other, and removed to Euboea. When he failed to persuade her to change her mind, Zeus went to consult Cithaeron.
At that time he was the ruler in Platea, and no man was wiser.
Cithaeron told Zeus to make a wooden figure, wrap it up well and set it rolling on an ox-cart, with a proclamation that he was celebrating his marriage to Platea, daughter of Asopos.*
Zeus followed Cithaerus’s instructions to the letter.
No sooner had Hera learnt about the ‘wedding’ than she was on the spot. She boarded the cart and ripped away the figure’s clothing — only to find a wooden carving, instead of a maiden bride.
So charmed was she by the hoax, that she kissed and made up with Zeus.
According to wider mythology, Platea was a Naiad, one of the twenty daughters of the river-god Asopos.
Précis
After Zeus and Hera had a serious falling-out, Zeus asked Cithaeron, King of Platea, for advice. He suggested staging a pretend wedding with a nuptial procession starring a dummy. In a jealous frenzy Hera came back to confront the ‘bride’, but after discovering the truth she was flattered by the lengths Zeus was willing to go to, and forgave him. (60 / 60 words)
