Allusion in Hamlet

Hercules, also known as Heracles, was the son of the Greek god Zeus and the mortal Alcmene. He was endowed with enormous strength and is now famous for his Twelve Labors, which included slaying an invulnerable lion and defeating a nine-headed hydra. Hamlet states that Claudius, despite being King Hamlet's brother, is "no more like" Hamlet's father than Hamlet himself is like Hercules. Hamlet idolized his father and uses this comparison to imply that Claudius is not a good person. He also offers some insight into his perception of himself by comparing himself to Hercules as a way of emphasizing the difference in character between Claudius and King Hamlet. He does not perceive himself as heroic and strong, as Hercules was. Instead, he is as unlike the legendary hero as Claudius is unlike his father, foreshadowing Hamlet's struggles later in the play.

In Greek mythology, Hyperion was considered the "High One," Lord of the Light and the Titan of the East, one of the twelve titans that ruled the earth before Zeus and the Olympians fought them for control. Hamlet draws parallels between Hyperion and a satyr (a lustful, drunken god) and between King Hamlet and Claudius, forming an analogy that makes his father look like a saint and Claudius a depraved drunkard.

In Greek mythology, Niobe was a Queen of Thebes. She is said to have boasted about having fourteen children to the goddess Leto, who had only two, the twins Apollo and Artemis. In response, Apollo and Artemis killed all of Niobe's children, later turning her to stone on Mount Sipylus, where she continued to weep even in her petrified state. Niobe became the prototype for all grieving mothers in Greek tragedies and is here likened to Gertrude to emphasize the other's apparent lack of grief.

Shakespeare makes an oblique Biblical reference to Matthew 7: 13-14: "Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way..." Shakespeare alters the description somewhat to make the path to heaven look more dangerous than it does in the Bible while maintaining the essence of the danger implied by the subsequent line: "broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction."