Myth Topic 6: The
Olympians
Olympians – the Twelve
Greek Name (Roman/Latin name)
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(1) Zeus (Jupiter) |
(7) Athena (Minerva) |
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(2) Hera (Juno) |
(8) Hephaestus (Vulcan) |
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(3) Poseidon (Neptune) |
(9) Apollo
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(4) Demeter (Ceres) |
(10) Artemis (Diana) |
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(5) Hestia (Vesta) |
(11) Ares (Mars) |
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(6) [Aphrodite (Venus)] |
(12) Hermes (Mercury) |
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{Hades (Pluto) not Olympian} |
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Each have own spheres of influence
Indo-European Sky-God
the word is cognate with Jupiter and Tiu (Germanic god)
The weather —”the thunderer”
(cf. Norse Thor)
Incredible strength:
King/Father of other gods
Iliad 8.1–54
Special relationship with Athena
Zeus and Hera
husband an wife
—antagonism
Mostly from Homer’s Iliad
Book Zeus chasing girls and boys
Hera, torturing those girls and boys, and their CHILDREN
Use it against each other
Iliad 14.296-359
Iliad 15.1-80
As an eagle and snatches up Ganymede—cupbearer
Symbols:
Aegis: goat skin
Thunderbolt
Bull and Eagle
Law and Justice:
xenia
treatment of friend /stranger; host/guest
HERA—marriage and fertility
“cow-eyed”
At Olympia her temple is older that Zeus'
Protector of monogamy
and persecutor of adultery
Never really presented as “mother”
Three (uninteresting?) kids with Zeus
Ares
Eileithyia (“relieve;” the divine midwife)
Hebe (youth)
Hephaestus
sexless son of Hera (in Hesiod)
a cripple
Unhappy marriage — do not invite them to your dinner party
Illiad 1.521-643
Anthropomorphism – taken to real extremes
(much more than YHWH)
Distinction between mythological tales and religious beliefs
Myth Topic 7
The Male Olympians
Poseidon (Neptune), Lord of the Deep
the Sea, and Earthquakes, Horses
Shaker of the Earth
Illiad 13.1-42
Contest for Athens
Hades –“the invisible”; Pluto “the enricher”
“the most hated of the gods”
married to Persephone
Apollo God of
Prophecy, “Phoebus”
Son of Zeus and Leto (a Titaness)
brother of Artemis
Sometimes a sun
god (but not his origin)
Arrows of
disease
Lord of
Mice, plague-bringer, “far-shooter”
Illiad 1.41-66
One of the
longest Homeric Hymns—in two parts
To the Delian Apollo (7th
century BC)
pregnant Leto persecuted by Hera
Apollo
born on floating island Delos
Apollo at Delphi (later)
oracular shrine on Parnassus
Apollo
plays the lyre
At
Delphi—kills the dragon “Python”
Shines at Delos and Delphi were pan-Hellenic
religious centers
Delphi
operated from 800BC – 394 AD
Prophetess:
Pythia
function as a medium (cf.
300)
Apollo’s
“Lovers” -- a lot in OVID
Cassandra
Sibyl
at Cumae
Satyricon
Daphne
a nymph
Hyacinth
– young boy
Coronis
·
pregnant
with Asclepius
(doctor – snake shedding skin)
·
saves
the son—gives him to Chiron,
the centaur
Ares (Mars) Bloodlust
two children Phobos and Deimos
(panic and fear)
Adultery with
Aphrodite most famous
told in Odyssey, 8.256-366 by Demodocus
Hephaestus (Vulcan) god of Smiths
Crippled
Son of just (?) Hera
thrown off Olympus by Zeus and/or Hera
Iliad 1.619 ff.
associated with Lemnos—active volcano
civilization and city life
Greek love/hate of craftspeople
Married to
Aphrodite
Uses his cleverness Odyssey, 8.256-366
HERMES, trickster,
wayfarers (Mercury)
“a Herm” phallic pillar/boundary marker
Arcadia
–shepherds
Protector of
thieves, merchants, commerce
Psychopompos
Argeophontes
Homeric Hymn to Hermes (sixth century)
son of Maia and Zeus
makes a LYRE
Apollo's
cattle
Two types
of men in Athens –aristoi
and kakoi
irreverence
Odysseus
is his grandson
PAN, the Goatherd's god
son of Hermes
a lustful. Lecherous half-goat (like a satyr)
in Arcadia
Associated
with Faunus and Silvanus—woodland gods
origin of our devil images
Myth
Topic 8
The
Female deities
Females—multiple
aspects of single concern:
fecundity
derived from
a single “Great Goddess”?
Demeter—harvest
fertility
Hestia
—home life
Hera—marriage
Aphrodite—sexual
power, indifferent to human happiness
Artemis—wild
animal fecundity
(Athena—female
crafts)
Demeter (Ceres)—the harvest, esp. wheat
mother of Persephone
–“the goddesses”
More
coming soon
Hestia (Vesta)
family; city
the hearth
never left Olympus
in Rome, connected
to the Penates
Aphrodite (Venus)
overwhelming power
of sexual attraction
“lover of laughter”
companion/child (by
Ares) Eros (Cupid)
Originally
an Eastern goddess
also important on
island of Cythera -- “Cytherea”
Children
of Aphrodite:
child with Hermes
Ovid—pursued
by nymph Salmasis
“the slightly titillating Hermaphroditus”
Priapus (with Dionysus
or Hermes)
very popular among Romans
Pygmalion
From
Ovid 10.266-331
Homeric
Hymn to Aphrodite (early 7th century BCE)
Aphrodite and Anchises
Zeus
gets her to fall in love with Anchises, a shepherd
Produce
Aeneas
Artemis (Diana)
Potnia
Theron “mistress of the animals”
mother-goddess (in
origin?), but Greek virgin (not mannish like Athena)
Kills
women suddenly with her bow (like her brother, Apollo)
Homer on Niobe: who boasts of
her 12 children to Leto's two
Iliad,
24.650-657
saw Artemis naked one
by accident while hunting
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 3.138-252
Athena (Minerva)
protector of
male heroes
Odysseus
Achilles : Illiad, 1.198-234
probably named
after the city
Parthenon (Temple to the virgin); don't confuse with (Pantheon)
Grey-eyed/owl-eyed
— giver of olive to Athens —“Pallas”
· Protectress of cities, and crafts—weaving and carpentry
· ships;
the Trojan horse; chariots
· The
Law
· Intelligent
warfare
· later—Wisdom
practical
knowledge, much like Prometheus
Always
armed, with a spear, and breast plate (aegis, from Zeus)
Arachne Ovid 6.1-162
