Hera deceives Zeus

Hera looks down from Olympus and decides she cannot watch any more. She is going to take Zeus out of the picture. She bathes, anoints herself with sacred oil, dresses with care, and goes to find Aphrodite. She tells Aphrodite a lie — that she is going to visit Ocean and Tethys, the parents of all the gods, who have quarreled and need reconciling, and that she needs Aphrodite's magical belt of love and longing for the journey. Aphrodite, suspecting nothing, hands it over. Hera then goes to Sleep, the brother of Death, and bribes him with a marriage to one of the younger Graces in exchange for putting Zeus to sleep at the right moment.

She finds Zeus on Mount Ida. The encounter is one of the few scenes in the poem played for outright comedy. Zeus sees his wife in the magic belt and is staggered. He recites the (long) list of the goddesses he has previously slept with — Danaë, Europa, Semele, Alcmene — saying none of them moved him as Hera does at this moment. He pulls her into his arms and the cloud descends. Sleep slips in.

While Zeus sleeps, Hera signals Poseidon, who is no longer disguised, to push openly. The Greeks rally. Ajax catches Hector with a thrown rock and knocks him senseless; he is dragged off the field by his own captains, half-dead. The Trojan line wobbles. The Greeks reclaim the ground inside the wall. Then Zeus wakes up. He sees what has happened, sees through it instantly, and rounds on Hera in fury. He threatens her, recalls past punishments, orders Sleep to wake everyone. The next day will not be like this one.