The meaning of each epithet is:[8] Hephaestus had his own palace on Olympus, containing his workshop with anvil and twenty bellows that worked at his bidding.

He designed Hermes' winged helmet and sandals, the Aegis breastplate, Aphrodite's famed girdle, Agamemnon's staff of office,[11] Achilles' armour, Diomedes' cuirass, Heracles' bronze clappers, Helios' chariot, the shoulder of Pelops, and Eros's bow and arrows.

This included tripods with golden wheels, able to move at his wish in and out the assembly hall of the celestials;[15] and "handmaidens wrought of gold in the semblance of living maids", who had "understanding in their hearts, and speech and strength", as a gift of the gods.

[17] A similar golden dog (Κυων Χρυσεος) was set by Rhea to guard the infant Zeus and his nurse, the goat Amaltheia, on the island of Krete.

According to Attic vase painters, Hephaestus was present at the birth of Athena and wielded the axe with which he split Zeus' head to free her.

In an archaic story,[a][22][23] Hephaestus gained revenge against Hera for rejecting him by making her a magical golden throne, which, when she sat on it, did not allow her to stand up again.

[25][26][27] In the painted scenes, the padded dancers and phallic figures of the Dionysan throng leading the mule show that the procession was a part of the dithyrambic celebrations that were the forerunners of the satyr plays of fifth-century Athens.

While Aphrodite and Ares lay together in bed, Hephaestus ensnared them in an unbreakable chain-link net so small as to be invisible and dragged them to Mount Olympus to shame them in front of the other gods for retribution.

[34] Some versions of the myth state that Zeus did not return the dowry, and in fact Aphrodite "simply charmed her way back again into her husband’s good graces.

[39] Helios discovered the two and alerted Hephaestus, as Ares, in rage, turned Alectryon into a rooster, which always crows at dawn when the sun is about to rise.

[42] Hephaestus was somehow connected with the archaic, pre-Greek Phrygian and Thracian mystery cult of the Kabeiroi, who were also called the Hephaistoi, "the Hephaestus-men", in Lemnos.

[49] The Greeks frequently placed miniature statues of Hephaestus near their hearths, and these figures are the oldest of all his representations.

[51] Nonetheless, he "seeks impetuously and passionately to make love to Athena: at the moment of climax she pushes him aside, and his semen falls to the earth where it impregnates Gaia.

An Athenian founding myth tells that the city's patron goddess, Athena, refused a union with Hephaestus.

Pseudo-Apollodorus[53] records an archaic legend, which claims that Hephaestus once attempted to rape Athena, but she pushed him away, causing him to ejaculate on her thigh.

[49] Hephaestus was associated by Greek colonists in southern Italy with the volcano gods Adranus (of Mount Etna) and Vulcanus of the Lipari islands.

[57] Nevertheless, Hephaestus’ domain over fire goes back to Homer’s Iliad, where he uses flames to dry the waters of Scamandrus River in order to force its eponymous deity, who was attacking Achilles, to retreat.

As a gift of gratitude, Hephaestus forged four ever-flowing fountains and fire-breathing bulls for Helios' son Aeëtes.

The Greeks frequently placed miniature statues of Hephaestus near their hearths, and these figures are the oldest of all his representations.

In Book XVIII of Homer's Iliad, the consort of Hephaestus is Charis ("the grace"), with whom he lives in a bronze-wrought home on Olympus,[36] a name used later in Nonnus's Dionysiaca.

[70] On the island of Lemnos, Hephaestus' consort was the sea nymph Cabeiro, by whom he was the father of two metalworking gods named the Cabeiri.

In addition, the Romans claim their equivalent god, Vulcan, to have produced the following children: Hephaestus was sometimes portrayed as a vigorous man with a beard and was characterized by his hammer or some other crafting tool, his oval cap, and the chiton.

In vase paintings, Hephaestus is sometimes shown bent over his anvil, hard at work on a metal creation, and sometimes his feet are curved back-to-front: Hephaistos amphigyēeis.

In some myths, Hephaestus built himself a "wheeled chair" or chariot with which to move around, thus helping support his mobility while demonstrating his skill to the other gods.

[90] Hephaestus's appearance and physical disability are taken by some to represent peripheral neuropathy and skin cancer resulting from arsenicosis, caused by arsenic exposure from metalworking.

[97] Pausanias wrote that the Lycians in Patara had a bronze bowl in their temple of Apollo, saying that Telephus dedicated it and Hephaestus made it.

According to Pliny, the stone was red and reflected images like a mirror, and when boiling water was poured over it, it cooled immediately.