Keres

The Keres (singular Ker) were Greek spirits of violent death and doom. In Hesiod they are children of Night, sisters of the Moirai, Thanatos and Nemesis; in battle scenes they tear at the fallen and carry their souls to Hades. In Homer the word often means simply a person’s fated death, as in the “two Keres of death” weighed in Zeus’s scales.

Origins

Hesiod names the Ker among the children of Night: Night bore Moros (Doom), the black Ker and Thanatos (Death), then Hypnos (Sleep) and the tribe of Dreams, and she bore them without lying with anyone (Hesiod, Theogony 211–214). Later in the same list she gives birth to the Moirai and the Keres, the “ruthless avengers”, and then Nemesis, Apate, Geras and Eris (Theogony 217–225). So Hesiod gives the Keres no father; Night alone is their mother.

The Moirai in this passage are Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, who give mortals good and evil at birth. Of this group of goddesses Hesiod says that they pursue the transgressions of men and gods and never cease from their terrible anger until they have punished the offender (Theogony 217–222).

The Keres in Homer

In the Iliad the word often has the sense of a fated death. Odysseus, recalling the portent seen at Aulis, calls as witnesses all those “whom the keres of death have not carried off” (Iliad 2.301–302), and Sarpedon says that countless keres of death stand over mortals, which no one can escape (Iliad 12.326–327). Patroclus’s shade says that the hateful Ker, which opened its mouth around him at birth, has swallowed him (Iliad 23.78–79). When Zeus weighs the fates of Trojans and Achaeans, or of Achilles and Hector, he places on the scales two keres of death. Hector’s sinks toward Hades and Apollo leaves him (Iliad 8.69–74, 22.209–213).

The Ker can also appear as a figure on the battlefield. On the shield of Achilles, Strife and Tumult mingle with the deadly Ker, who holds one man alive and newly wounded, another unwounded, and drags a dead man by the feet through the fray, her cloak red with men’s blood (Iliad 18.535–538).

The Keres in Battle

The fullest description is in the Shield of Heracles, attributed to Hesiod. On the shield the dark Keres have white gnashing teeth and terrible, bloody faces. They fight over the fallen, all eager to drink black blood. Whichever man they seize first, lying or newly wounded, they dig their great claws into him and his soul goes down to chilly Tartarus. When they are satisfied with human blood, they throw the body behind them and rush back into the din of battle. Clotho and Lachesis stand over them; Atropos, though not tall, is the oldest and most honoured of the three (Hesiod, Shield of Heracles 248–260).

A figure of this kind appeared on the chest of Cypselus at Olympia, according to Pausanias. Behind Polyneices, fallen on one knee as Eteocles rushes on him, stood a woman with teeth like a beast’s and bent talon-like nails, whose inscription called her Ker (Doom) (Pausanias 5.19.6).

Keres Sources

Hesiod, Theogony 211–225; Hesiod, Shield of Heracles 248–260; Homer, Iliad 2.301–302, 8.69–74, 12.326–327, 18.535–538, 22.209–213, 23.78–79; Pausanias 5.19.6.

See Also: Nyx, Moirai, Nemesis, Oizys, Geras, Apate, Thanatos, Hypnos