Abstract
According to Herodotus (II, 50), " the Egyptians have no use for heroes ", which means that they don't worship this type of entity and that we're dealing with a Greek peculiarity. The very name of these entities requires us to look first at the epic, as the crucible for the term ἥρως, which designates the human protagonists of the plot, the " warlords " in theIliad, and the " warlords " tout court in theOdyssey, where the fields of excellence are more varied (poets, soothsayers, members of the civic assembly). But the Homeric epic gives no credence to the notion of " cult heroes " as mentioned by Herodotus in book II of his Enquiry. In Hesiod's Works and Days, the account of the five human species, also known as " myth of the races ", evokes the species of heroes after the genē of gold, silver and bronze, and before the genos of iron, which marks the present of poetic enunciation. These heroes are " those called demigods " who died before Thebes and Troy. Only a few escape Hades to reach the Isles of the Blessed at the world's margins. Unlike the deceased of the Golden and Silver Ages, who receive post-mortem honors (a geras or a timē), nothing is said of the heroes in this respect.
