Greek Mythology

[Syrenna]

Gaia - Goddess of the Earth

Hesiod's Theogony tells how, after Chaos, arose broad-breasted Gaia, the everlasting foundation of the gods of Olympus. She brought forth Uranus, the starry sky, her equal, to cover her, the hills, and the fruitless deep of the Sea, Pontus, "without sweet union of love," out of her own self. But afterwards, Hesiod tells, she lay with Uranus and bore the World-Ocean Oceanus, Coeus and Crius and the Titans Hyperion and Iapetus, Theia and Rhea, Themis and Mnemosyne and Phoebe of the golden crown and lovely Tethys. "After them was born Cronus the wily, youngest and most terrible of her children, and he hated his lusty sire."

Hesiod mentions Gaia's further offspring conceived with Uranus, first the giant one-eyed Cyclopes: Brontes ("thunderer"), Steropes ("lightning") and the "bright" Arges: "Strength and might and craft were in their works." Then he adds the three terrible hundred-handed sons of Earth and Heaven, the Hecatonchires: Cottus and Briareos and Gyges, each with fifty heads.

Uranus hid the Hecatonchires and the Cyclopes in Tartarus so that they would not see the light, rejoicing in this evil doing. This caused pain to Gaia (Tartarus was her bowels) so she created grey flint (or adamantine) and shaped a great flint sickle, gathering together Cronos and his brothers to ask them to obey her. Only Cronos, the youngest, had the daring to take the flint sickle she made, and castrate his father as he approached Gaia to have intercourse with her. And from the drops of blood and semen, Gaia brought forth still more progeny, the strong Erinyes and the armoured Gigantes and the ash-tree Nymphs called the Meliae. From the testicles of Uranus in the sea came forth Aphrodite. For this, a Greek etymologist urged, Uranus called his sons "Titans," meaning "strainers" for they strained and did presumptuously a fearful deed, for which vengeance would come afterwards; for, as Uranus had been deposed by his son Cronos, so was Cronos destined to be overthrown by Zeus, the son born to him by his sister-wife Rhea. In the meantime, the Titans released the Cyclopes from Tartarus, and Cronos was awarded the kingship among them, beginning a Golden Age.

After Uranus' castration, Gaia gave birth to Echidna and Typhon by Tartarus. By Pontus, Gaia birthed the sea-deities Nereus, Thaumas, Phorcys, Ceto and Eurybia.

Zeus hid Elara, one of his lovers, from Hera by hiding her under the earth. His son by Elara, the giant Tityas, is therefore sometimes said to be a son of Gaia, the earth goddess, and Elara.

Gaia also made Aristaeus immortal.

Gaia is believed by some sources to be the original deity behind the Oracle at Delphi. She passed her powers on to, depending on the source, Poseidon, Apollo or Themis. Apollo is the best-known as the Oracle power behind Delphi, long established by the time of Homer, having killed Gaia's child Python there and usurped the chthonic power. Hera punished Apollo for this by sending him to King Admetus as a shepherd for nine years.

Oaths sworn in the name of Gaia, in ancient Greece, were considered the most binding of all.

In classical art Gaia was represented in one of two ways. In Athenian vase painting she was shown as a matronly woman only half risen from the earth, often in the act of handing the baby Erichthonius (a future king of Athens) to Athena to foster. Later in mosaic representations she appears as a woman reclining upon the earth surrounded by a host of Carpi, infant gods of the fruits of the earth.

In popular culture

• The embodiment of the Earth Mother in Greek mythology, Gaia entered popular culture following the publication of James Lovelock's Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth in 1979. Further books by Lovelock and others popularized the Gaia Hypothesis, which was widely embraced and passed into common usage as part of the heightened awareness of planetary vulnerability of the 1990s.
  
  
• There have been numerous uses of Gaia's name in market-driven popular culture since 1980.
  
  
• Paul Winter composed a "Missa Gaia", integrating world music with songs from the wild to celebrate the whole earth as a sacred space. The Missa Gaia has been performed annually since 1985 on the feast of Saint Francis of Assisi on the first Sunday in October in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. It was commissioned by the Dean of the Cathedral as a contemporary ecumenical Mass.
  
  
• The theme behind the movie Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within adapts Lovelock's philosophy of Gaia, which is also embraced within parts of the New Age movement, and by some environmentalists. The games Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy IX are set on a planet named Gaia.
  
  
• An internet hoax circulated in 1999 concerning the reunion and new album of British heavy metal band Iron Maiden. The supposed new album's name was "Majesty of Gaia" and fans actually paid money for advance copies of the rumoured album until the band's website exposed the hoax. The eventual new album was titled Brave New World and was released in 2000.
  
  
• In the game Werewolf: The Apocalypse, werewolves are supposed to be Gaia's weapons against the Wyrm, a representation of ecological destruction.
  
  
• The cartoon series Captain Planet and the Planeteers features a personification of Gaia, whose well-being is dependent on the state of the environment worldwide. The game SimEarth features a similar depiction of Gaia, with the same function.
  
  
• The game Illusion of Gaia features a large statue-esque entity named Gaia, who guides the hero through the game to save the Earth. The game, as well as its sequel, Terranigma, also feature an enemy named Dark Gaia, an evil opposite to Gaia. E.V.O.: Search For Eden also features Gaia, guiding the main character of the game through evolution and time, ultimately on a path to reach Eden and live with Gaia. These games were all made by Quintet, and E.V.O. may be part of the Terra Earth series.
  
  
• The techno artist BT produced a song named Lullaby for Gaia in 1997.
  
  
• Gaia Online is an online forum and games site founded on February 18, 2003.
  
  
• Gaia is the name of one of the Gundam Mobile suits in the Japanese anime, Gundam SEED Destiny.
  
  
• A somewhat older use of the name dates back to the 1965 novel The Arm of the Starfish. In this book, Madeleine L'Engle, another figure associated with the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, postulates a fictional island of Gaea off the coast of Portugal. Although the novel is not about the classical figure per se, it concerns the ethics of studying and abusing the wonders of the natural world, specifically tissue regeneration in starfish.
  
  
• In the DC Comics book Wonder Woman, the goddess Gaea is one of the most revered goddesses worshipped. Gaea's golden girdle was later transformed into Wonder Woman's Lasso of Truth.
  
  
• In the game, Age of Mythology, the expansion pack features Gaia as a character usable in the campaign.

[Syrenna]

Hemera - Goddess of daylight

Hemera was the female personification of day and one of the Protogenoi or primordial deities. She is the goddess of the daytime and, according to Hesiod, the daughter of Erebos and Nyx (the goddess of "the night"). Hemera is remarked upon in Cicero's De Natura Deorum, where it is logically determined that Dies (Hemera) must be a god, if Uranus is a god. The poet Bacchylides states that Nyx and Khronos are the parents, but Hyginus in his preface to the Fabulae mentions Khaos as the mother/ father and Nyx as her sister.

She was the female counterpart of her brother and consort, Aether (Light), but neither of them figured actively in myth or cult.

Hemera left Tartarus just as Nyx entered it; when Hemera returned, Nyx left:

"Nyx and Hemera draw near and greet one another as they pass the great threshold of bronze: and while the one is about to go down into the house, the other comes out at the door."

[Syrenna]

Nyx - Goddess of night

In Hesiod's Theogony, Night is born of Chaos; her offspring are many, and telling. With her brother Erebus, Night gives birth to Aether ("atmosphere") and Hemera ("day"). Later, on her own, Night gives birth to Momus "blame", Ponos "toil", Moros "fate", Thanatos "death", Hypnos "sleep", the Oneiroi "the tribe of dreams", the Hesperides, the Keres and Fates, Nemesis, Apate "deception", Philotes "friendship", Geras "age", and Eris "strife".

In his description of Tartarus, Hesiod says further that Hemera "day", who is now Night's sister rather than daughter, left Tartarus just as Nyx entered it; when Hemera returned, Nyx left. This mirrors the portrayal of Ratri "night" in the Rig-Veda, where she works in close cooperation but also tension with her sister Ushas "dawn".

Night took on an even more important role in several fragmentary poems attributed to Orpheus. In them, Night, rather than Chaos, is the first principle. Night occupies a cave or adyton, in which she gives oracles. Kronos - who is chained within, asleep and drunk on honey - dreams and prophesies. Outside the cave, Adrastea clashes cymbals and beats upon her tympanon, moving the entire universe in an ecstatic dance to the rhythm of Nyx's chanting.

[Syrenna]

Tartarus - The Titan (father of the gods) lives in the pit of tartaros in the darkest deepest part of the underworld controlled by Hades

Tartarus is both a deity and a place in the underworld — even lower than Hades. In ancient orphic sources and in the mystery schools Tartaros is also the unbounded first-existing "thing" from which the Light and the cosmos is born.

In Hesiod's Theogony the deity Tartarus was the son of Aether and Gaia, and father of Typhon and Echidna.

As for the place, the Greek poet Hesiod asserts that a bronze anvil falling from heaven would fall 9 days before it reached the Earth. The anvil would take nine more days to fall from Earth to Tartarus. In The Iliad, Zeus asserts that Tartarus is "as far beneath Hades as heaven is high above the earth." As a place so far from the sun and so deep in the earth, Tartarus is hemmed in by three layers of night, which surround a bronze wall which in turn encompasses Tartarus. It is a dank and wretched pit engulfed in murky gloom. It is one of the primordial objects which sprung from Chaos, the Abyss. Along with Tartarus, Gaia (Earth), and Eros, emerged into the universe.

While, according to Greek mythology, Hades is the place of the dead, Tartarus also has a number of inhabitants. When Cronus, the ruling Titan, came to power he imprisoned the Cyclopes in Tartarus. Zeus released them to aid in his conflict with the Titan giants. The gods of Olympus eventually defeated the Titans. Many, but not all of the Titans, were cast into Tartarus. Atlas, Cronus, Epimetheus, Metis, Menoetius, and Prometheus are some Titans who were not banished to Tartarus. In Tartarus, prisoners were guarded by giants, each with 50 enormous heads and 100 strong arms, who were called Hecatonchires. Later, when Zeus overcame the monster Typhon, the offspring of Tartarus and Gaia, he threw it, too, into the same pit.

Originally, Tartarus was used only to confine dangers to the gods of Olympus. In later mythologies, Tartarus became the place where the punishment fits the crime. For example Sisyphus, who was both a thief and murderer, was condemned for eternity to push a boulder up a hill only to have it roll down at the top. Also found there was Ixion, the first human to spill the blood of a relative. He caused his father in-law to fall into a pit of burning coals to avoid paying the bride-price. The fitting punishment was to spend eternity on a flaming wheel. Tantalus, who enjoyed the confidence of the gods by conversing and dining with them, shared the food and the secrets of the gods with his friends. The fitting punishment was to be immersed up to his neck in cool water, which disappeared whenever he attempted to quench his thirst, and luscious grapes above him that leapt up when he tried to take a hold.

[Syrenna]

Uranus - personification of the son and husband of Gaia

In the Olympian creation myth, as Hesiod tells it in Theogony, Uranus came every single night to cover the earth and mate with Gaia, but he hated the children she bore him. Hesiod names the Titans, six sons and six daughters, the one-hundred-armed giants (Hecatonchires) and the one-eyed giants, the Cyclopes. He imprisoned Gaia's youngest children in Tartarus, deep within Earth, where they caused pain to Gaia. She shaped a great flint-bladed sickle and asked her sons to castrate Uranus. Only Cronus, youngest of the Titans, was willing: he ambushed his father and castrated him, casting the severed testicles into the sea. For this fearful deed, Uranus called his sons Titanes Theoi, or "Straining Gods".

From the blood which spilled from Uranus onto the Earth came forth the Gigantes, the three avenging Furies—the Erinyes— Meliae, the ash-tree nymphs, and according to some the Telchines. From the genitals in the sea came forth Aphrodite. Some say the bloodied sickle was buried in the earth and from this was born the fabulous Phaeacian tribe.

After Uranus was deposed, Cronus re-imprisoned the Hecatonchires and Cyclopes in Tartarus. Uranus and Gaia then prophesied that Cronus in turn was destinied to be overthrown by his own son, and so the Titan attempted to avoid this fate by devouring his young. Only Zeus, through the deception of his mother Rhea, avoided this fate.

These ancient myths of distant origins were not expressed in cults among the Hellenes. The function of Uranus is as the vanquished god of an elder time, before real time began. After his castration, the Sky came no more to cover the Earth at night, but held to its place, and "the original begetting came to an end".

Uranus was scarcely regarded as anthropomorphic, aside from the genitalia in the castration myth. He was simply the sky, which was conceived by the ancients as an overarching dome or roof of bronze, held in place (or turned on an axis) by the Titan Atlas.

[Magic attack]

Not bad, jumps around a bit though.

U should put a directory in the first post that takes you to each entry. Just a thought if someone wants to look at someone specific, they wont have to go through the whole list. I assume you are going to continue, that is.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

That is a good suggestion. That way it would be easy to browse, what would be the best way to go by doing that?

[Syrenna]

Consider it done

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

[Joker]

Greek Mythology is interesting, but unlike some, I seriously doubt they ever existed, there's only one true God.

[Magic attack]

It's amazing that there are people still worship to this day. The power of faith is a wonder indeed.

[Joker]

There are millions or even billions who believe in God to this day. I see nothing wrong what that. It's absolutely foolish to believe all of the universe came about because of chance.

[Magic attack]

Not sure what you are on about. Have you even read The Metamorphoses?

[Joker]

I'm not "on" about anything, I said that Greek Mythology is interesting, but is just that, myth.

[Magic attack]

Sept 2, 2008 17:43:24 GMT -5 Joker said:

I'm not "on" about anything, I said that Greek Mythology is interesting, but is just that, myth.

Someone made a comment about chance and the universe, maybe it wasn't you then.


I feel the same way about the christian faith being interesting. Sure the bible is a good read, but nothing to worship or base a life on.



But anyways, I take it that no one has read Metamorphoses, a pity.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Lol I think Ron's comment about "faith is a wonder indeed" might have looked sarcastic at first glance, I remember when I rushed by it yesterday it looked kinda like that although I know he wouldn't joke like that. That's probably what caused the misunderstanding, lol.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Sept 2, 2008 19:13:34 GMT -5 Magic attack said:

Sept 2, 2008 17:43:24 GMT -5 Joker said:

I'm not "on" about anything, I said that Greek Mythology is interesting, but is just that, myth.

Someone made a comment about chance and the universe, maybe it wasn't you then.


I feel the same way about the christian faith being interesting. Sure the bible is a good read, but nothing to worship or base a life on.



But anyways, I take it that no one has read Metamorphoses, a pity.

I take it you highly recommend it then?

[Dja Majista]

To clear away any ambiguities, myth does not imply a fictitious story. In the bible, whether you believe the creation story to be utterly false, metaphorically true, literally true, or what have you, it is still classified as a creation myth. Because in academic usage A.K.A. "correct usage" myth is a sacred story and just that. Fact, fiction, truth, or falsehood have no place in the definition.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Sept 3, 2008 16:38:57 GMT -5 Dja Majista said:

To clear away any ambiguities, myth does not imply a fictitious story. In the bible, whether you believe the creation story to be utterly false, metaphorically true, literally true, or what have you, it is still classified as a creation myth. Because in academic usage A.K.A. "correct usage" myth is a sacred story and just that. Fact, fiction, truth, or falsehood have no place in the definition.

Great point to bring up, I don't think most people know that, and because of the way the word is generally used, most wouldn't have anyways.

[Magic attack]

Sept 3, 2008 0:20:13 GMT -5 The Big Daddy C-Master said:

Sept 2, 2008 19:13:34 GMT -5 Magic attack said:

Someone made a comment about chance and the universe, maybe it wasn't you then.


I feel the same way about the christian faith being interesting. Sure the bible is a good read, but nothing to worship or base a life on.



But anyways, I take it that no one has read Metamorphoses, a pity.

I take it you highly recommend it then?

I do., I also think that Syren's mention of Theogony is also worth reading.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

What is that about? In particular?