The Hesperides

Evening-nymphs of the far west, who with the never-sleeping serpent Ladon kept the garden of the golden apples that Gaia had given Hera as a wedding gift. Three or four sisters depending on the tradition — Aegle, Erytheia, Hesperethusa (or Hesperia + Arethusa), sometimes a fourth Hespere — daughters of Night alone in Hesiod, but variously assigned to Atlas, Hesperus, or Phorcys/Ceto in later sources. Their garden lies beyond the western horizon, beside the stream of Ocean, where Atlas holds up the sky on his shoulders. Heracles came here for his eleventh labour: in one tradition he killed Ladon and plucked the apples himself, in the other he held the sky while Atlas fetched them for him, then tricked Atlas into taking back the burden (Apollod. 2.5.11; Apollonius *Argon.* 4.1396-1449, where the Argonauts visit the garden just after Heracles has been there).