Hermes is the God of shepherds, travel, and literature. Hermes led the dead to the Underworld which is why he was able to move very quickly between the human realm and that of the Gods and of the dead. Hermes is a very powerful God, and is said to use his cunning and mischievous persona and nature to outwit others, more often than his strength.

Hermes is normally portrayed as a young man, with a flying hat known as the ‘petasus’ and winged sandals adorning his feet. He is also shown to have wings attached to his shoulders and hat. He also held a winged staff with snakes wrapped around it. This staff helped Hermes to charm the Gods or wake up people under the spell of the God of sleep. Symbols of Hermes include the caduceus (his staff), the purse (or leather pouch), the winged sandals, the ram and the petasus (his hat). He is also believed to be the messenger and is said to deliver the news to the Gods.

According to Greek mythology, when Hermes was one day old, he ran away to explore the world. In his enthusiasm, he killed a tortoise by mistake and then took it’s shell and made it into an instrument. When he was an infant, he went to steal cattle from his half-brother Apollo. When he found the herd, he re-attached all the hooves in reverse order. He did the same to his sandals and tied twigs to his feet to avoid his footprints from being detected, so that it looked like the herd was walking backwards. After some time, Hermes hid the cattle in a cave. As Apollo was the God of prophecies, he predicted that Hermes stole his cattle and caught Hermes who was acting innocent. The mischievous Hermes refused to acknowledge that he had stolen the cattle and hence the matter reached their father Zeus for the final verdict. While the verdict was being made, Hermes started playing a beautiful tune on his instrument- lyre which awed Apollo and he begged his brother to give him the musical instrument. Hermes was waiting for this opportunity and he tricked Apollo into trading the cattle for the instrument and also got himself the position of the divine herdsman. Zeus signed off on this deal and thus Hermes intelligently got what he wanted.