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Vulcan, the son of Jupiter and Juno, was thrown from heaven by the former, for attempting to assist the queen of Olympus when under her husband's displeasure. The whirlwind employed by Jove, precipitated him into the island of Lemnos.
————-"I felt his matchless might,
Hurled headlong downward from the ethereal height;
Tossed all the day in rapid circles round;
Nor till the sun descended, touched the ground;
Breathless I fell in giddy motion lost;
The Sinthians raised me on the Lemnian coast."
Homer.
He fell with sufficient velocity to break his thigh, an accident, which, as it made him lame, did not at all tend to render his appearance less ugly than it is usually described.
———————"His hand was known
In heaven, by many a towered structure high,
Where sceptred angels held their residence,
And sate as princes;
Nor was his name unheard, or unadored,
In ancient Greece; and in Ausonian land
Men called him Mulciber; and how he fell
From heaven they fabled, thrown by angry Jove
Sheer o'er the chrystal battlements: from morn
To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve,
A summer's day; and with the setting sun,
Dropped from the zenith like a falling star,
On Lemnos, the Ægean isle."
Milton.
He was educated by the nymphs of the sea, and trained in his
youth in the art of working metals, and was able to cultivate those mechanical abilities which he is represented to possess.
—————————-"He taught
Man's earth-born race, that, like the bestial brood,
Haunted the rugged cave, or sheltering wood,
Th' inventive powers of dœdal art to know,
And all the joys from social life that flow;
In search no more of casual seats to roam,
But rear with skilful hand the lasting dome."
Horace.
In his labours he was assisted by the Cyclops, who are said by some, to have possessed but one eye, placed in the middle of the forehead. They inhabited the western part of the island of Sicily; but the tradition of their only having one eye originated, in all probability, from their custom of wearing small bucklers of steel which covered their faces, with a small aperture in the middle, corresponding exactly to the eye. They were sometimes reckoned among the Gods, and had a temple at Corinth, where worship and sacrifices were solemnly offered.
"The Cyclops brethren, arrogant of heart,
Who forged the lightning shaft, and gave to Jove
His thunder; they were like unto the gods,
Save that a single ball of sight was fixed
In their mid forehead. Cyclops was their name,
From that round eye-ball in their brow infixed;
And strength, and force, and manual craft were theirs."
Hesiod.