Battus

In the Hermes–Apollo cattle-theft cycle (set in Maenalus in Arcadia) Battus observed the infant Hermes steal Apollo's cattle. Hermes gave Battus a heifer on condition he keep the theft secret. When Hermes later returned in disguise and offered a reward for information, Battus revealed the location of the cattle; for this act of betrayal Hermes punished him by turning him into stone. Separately, in Greco-Roman legendary material Battus is named as a semi-legendary king of Malta who offered sanctuary to Anna Perenna; the surviving summaries present this as a distinct local tradition and do not conflate it with the Arcadian witness.

Primary sources preserved in the surveyed summaries do not record a detailed pre-transformation description of Battus (no consistent clothing, stature, or complexion). The chief attested physical outcome in the myth is that Hermes transformed Battus into stone as punishment. No iconographic or consistent descriptive traits beyond that metamorphosis are recorded in the provided materials.

Battus is represented as an ordinary human agent: he witnesses a divine theft, accepts a gift (a heifer) in return for secrecy, speaks when tempted by further reward, and is subject to divine retribution. The accounts do not attribute supernatural powers to him before or after the transformation. In the separate Maltese legend he functions as a hospitable ruler who grants sanctuary; this version likewise lacks claims of supernatural ability in the supplied sources.