Shared Myth and Hesiod’s Theogony
Due Friday, April 1 at 5 PM; turn-in to Canvas
Why this assignment?
The second short essay in this class asks you to make an argument using a primary source—in this case, Hesiod’s Theogony. The essential element of this assignment is that you deploy the mechanics of a typical essay in history, where you cite a primary source and then spend some time explaining your reading of the primary source. By following the standard procedures of a history essay, you will be making a historical argument.
Details of the assignment:
For this assignment, I would like you to treat Hesiod’s Theogony as a shared myth reflecting ancient Greek culture as it existed in the time of Hesiod, around 750 BCE. You might also think of the Theogony as a form of Greek religion, which Harari situates as the most powerful form of shared myth in Chapter 12 of Sapiens. In short, shared myths create and reinforce social norms and behaviors. While we aren’t studying ancient Greek culture, I would like you to make an argument about Greek social norms and behaviors based on the Theogony. In other words, you should try to read the text NOT for what it says about the actions of gods and goddesses, but rather as a window onto the everyday lives of Greeks. I care less about the fact that Zeus was god of the sky than I do about, say, what the actions of Zeus in the Theogony say about family, fatherhood, power, and politics in the ancient Greek world. Among other themes you might see expressed through the shared myth of Theogony, you might explore: power, gender dynamics, childhood, afterlife, the order of nature or the environment, authority, warfare, nature of humans, nature of reality, sex, time, or divine intervention, among many other themes.
Because we established in the first essay that scholarly writing is argumentative writing, I want you to develop this essay as an argument. I want you to respond to this statement: “Hesiod’s Theogony is a worthless document because its depiction of the creation of the universe has been rendered obsolete by modern scientific observation and the discipline of physics.” I want you to reply to the argument by arguing that, “While Hesiod’s Theogony might not accurately depict how the universe was created, it does offer a window onto the shared myths that held ancient Greek society together.”
Your intellectual goal is to then show what kinds of shared myths are embedded in the Theogeny and what they say about ancient Greek society.
The following template should be used for this essay:
Paragraph 1:
“While scientists might argue that Hesiod’s Theogony offers nothing useful for understanding how the universe developed, historians treat that document as a useful example of a shared myth that bound ancient Greek society together. A shared myth might be defined as [insert your definition of shared myth based on readings of Harari]. This essay will explore three aspects of Greek society interpreted through Hesiod’s eighth century BCE creation story.”
Paragraph 2:
“The first example comes from line XX of Hesiod’s Theogony, which says: “ [insert actual words from Hesiod’s Theogony here]. (line XX).”” I interpret this line to mean, ___[insert explanation here]____.
Most quotations should be no longer than one or two lines that reflect the most important element that you want to elaborate upon in your interpretation. Be sure to tell the reader which lines you are quoting in an endnote (in parenthesis at the end of the quote) or a footnote. See your graduate assistants or the HERC for information on making a footnote.
Paragraph 3:
“The second example comes from line XX of Hesiod’s Theogony, which says: “ [insert actual words from Hesiod’s Theogony here]. (line XX).”” I interpret this line to mean, ___[insert explanation here]____.
Paragraph 4:
“The third example comes from line XX of Hesiod’s Theogony, which says: “ [insert actual words from Hesiod’s Theogony here]. (line XX).”” I interpret this line to mean, ___[insert explanation here]____.
Paragraph 5:
“As these examples have shown, the Theogony has much to offer historians. While not exactly a true or accurate depiction of the universe, it does reveal how a great deal about the eighth century BCE context in which it was produced.”
Your five paragraphs should begin with the template provided here. These sentences are meant to guide you on how to engage in a scholarly, fact-driven conversation that uses quotations from a primary source.
Your grade will be determined in the following ways:
Use of evidence in an argument: 40%
Reasoning based on that evidence: 40%
Proper grammar, punctuation, formatting, font: 20%
These essays should have a line at the top identifying you (your name and class), be written in 12 point font, have 1 inch margins on each side, and be double spaced. Your essay should be around 750 words.
A digital copy of your essay should be turned in to Canvas (under “Essay #2) by April 1 at 5 PM.
You should consult your Graduate Assistant and the tutors in the HERC for assistance with your essay.
Copyright 2017. University of California Press.
All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except fair uses permitted under U.S. or applicable copyright law.
Theogony
The Muses of Helikon—let us begin with them, who live on the great
and mystical mountain Helikon, and dance around the violet
spring on light feet, and the altar of the mighty son of Kronos.°
Bathing their tender skin in the spring of Permessos, or the Spring
of the Horse, or in sacred Olmeios, they make their dance on the highest
peak of Helikon—lovely, desirable!—and they dance with power.°
Leaping up from there, hidden in a thick mist, they go
forth at night, sending forth their most beautiful song, singing
of Zeus who carries the goatskin fetish, and divine Hera of Argos,
who walks in golden sandals, and the daughter of Zeus who carries
the goatskin fetish, flashing-eyed Athena, and Phoibos Apollo,
and Artemis who thrills to shoot arrows, and Poseidon, who holds
the earth, lord of earthquake, and holy Themis and Aphrodite,
who twinkles with her eyes, and golden-crowned Hebê, and beautiful
Dionê, and Leto, and Iapetos, and crooked-counseling Kronos,
and Dawn, and great Helios and shining Moon, and Earth, and great
Ocean, and dark Night, and the sacred race of the other deathless
5
10
15
3. . . . son of Kronos: This is Zeus, who must have had an altar on Mount Helikon.
Helikon is a snow-capped mountain around 6,000 feet high, ten miles inland from the
north coast of the Gulf of Corinth, halfway between Thebes and Delphi. It is the
tallest mountain in Boeotia. The Muses (perhaps “thinkers”) are goddesses personifying
the spirit of the oral tradition that allows the singer to compose his song. Hesiod feels
that his song comes from outside himself, a common impression among great artists.
(Bob Dylan speaks of “that creative something out there.”) Hesiod’s Theogony begins with
a proem that is similar to the Homeric Hymns to various gods, which also seem to have
introduced other songs.
6. . . . with power: Permessos, Spring of the Horse, and Olmeios are local names for actual
springs or watercourses near the top of Helikon. Later the name Spring of the Horse
(hippokrenê in Greek) was explained as deriving from the winged horse Pegasos’ striking
the earth there with his hoof, causing a spring to rise up.
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AN: 1513035 ; Hesiod.; The Poems of Hesiod : Theogony, Works and Days, and The Shield of Herakles
Account: s3652670.main.eds
Figure 4. A Muse playing the lyre. A bird perches on the
ground before her. She wears a gown that shows beneath
a robe wrapped around her waist. The lyre has seven
strings and a wooden sounding box. Written on the rock,
beneath her, is the word HLIKON, an explicit reference
to Hesiod’s poem. Above the Muse is a kalos inscription,
“So-and-So is handsome.” Of uncertain purpose, kalos
(“handsome”) inscriptions were part of the culture of
sexual love between older men and boys in the Greek
symposium and are often found on Athenian pottery
between roughly 550 and 430 b.c. This one reads:
AXEIOPEITHES [is] HANDSOME [and so is]
ALKIMACHO[S]. Athenian white-ground oil jar, ca.
440–430 b.c. Staatliche Antikensammlungen, Munich
(Photo: Bibi Saint-Pol; https://upload.wikimedia.org
/wikipedia/commons/6/63/Mousai_Helikon_Staatliche_Antikensammlungen_Schoen80_n1.jpg)
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ones, who never die.° These Muses once taught Hesiod beautiful
song while he looked after his sheep beneath sacred Helikon.
First of all the goddesses spoke this word to me, the Muses
who live on Olympos, the daughters of Zeus who carries the goatskin
fetish: “You, rough shepherds! Wretched objects of reproach—nothing
but bellies!—we know how to speak many false things that look like
the truth, and we know how, when we wish, to speak the truth.”
So spoke the eloquent daughters of great Zeus. They plucked
and gave me a staff, the shoot of a blooming laurel,° a thing of wonder,
and they breathed into me a marvelous voice so that I might celebrate
what came before and what will come after. And they commanded me to sing
of the race of the blessed gods who never die, to sing of them first
of all, and last.
But why do I talk about an oak or a rock? ° So come you,
let us begin with the Muses, who delight with song the great mind
of their father Zeus in Olympos, telling in harmony of how things
are now, and how they will be, and how they once were. Untiring,
18. . . . who never die: The Muses’ song begins with Zeus and his wife, Hera, who had a famous
temple near Argos. The meaning of the Greek aigiochos, “aegis-bearing,” here translated as
“who carries the goatskin fetish,” is unclear, but it seems to refer to a magical shield usually
carried by Zeus or worn as a cloak by Athena, made of goatskin (aigis means “goat”) with
snakes for tassels. The Muses’ song passes then to Zeus’s daughter, Athena, and Zeus’s children,
Apollo and Artemis. Then comes the great god Poseidon and the mighty goddesses Themis,
“law” (she is actually a Titan), and Aphrodite, who suggests Hebê, “youth,” and Dionê, a
feminine form of “Zeus,” who in Homer is Aphrodite’s mother (but in Hesiod she is some
kind of nymph). Then comes the powerful goddess Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis,
and two Titans: Iapetos, probably the same name as the biblical Japheth (but they are not at
all the same character), the father of Prometheus; and Kronos. Kronos’ epithet “CrookedCounseling” (angkylometis) may originally have meant “he of the curved sickle.” Finally come
the elemental gods: Dawn (Eos), Sun (Helios), Moon (Selenê), Earth (Gaia), Ocean (Okeanos),
and Night (Nyx). Hesiod gives us a catalogue of gods in a generally sensible order. His poetry
is much given to the making of lists, and there are several such in the Theogony.
26. laurel: The laurel was sacred to Apollo, the god of song. Ordinarily such hexametric
poetry was sung to the lyre. Perhaps the meaning is that Hesiod is so rustic that he could
not play the lyre.
30. . . . a rock: This phrase has never been explained, but must refer to some proverb. Its
meaning is “why avoid our main topic by talking of irrelevant things.”
theogony
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20
25
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their sweet voice flows from their mouths, and the house of father
Zeus, the thunderer, laughs at the delicate voice of the goddesses
as it spreads across the room, and the peaks of snowy Olympos ring,
and the houses of the deathless ones.
And they, sending forth
an undying voice, celebrate first of all in their song the holy race
of the gods from the beginning, those whom Earth and broad Sky °
first begot, and the gods who came forth from them, the bestowers
of good things.
Second, they celebrate Zeus, the father of gods and men,
both in the beginning of their song and at its end: how he is the greatest
of the gods, and most mighty in power. And again, the Muses, the daughters
of Zeus who carries the goatskin fetish, who dwell on Olympos,
delight the mind of Zeus in Olympos by singing of the race of men,
and of the powerful Giants.°
For Mnemosynê, who rules over the hills
of Eleutherai, bore the Muses in Pieria after sleeping with the son
of Kronos, to be a respite from evil and a cessation of sorrow.°
For nine nights did Zeus the Counselor mix with her in love,
entering her holy bed set apart from the deathless ones. And when
a year had passed, and the seasons were turned as the months waned,
and many days came to completion, she bore nine daughters
of like mind who care for song in their hearts, their spirits
39. Sky: The Greek for Earth is Gaia; and for Sky, Ouranos (Latin Uranus); but they seem
more principles than personalities.
46. Giants: But Hesiod never mentions the Battle of the Gods and the Giants, an important
myth not clearly attested until the fifth century b.c. (in Pindar, Nemean 1.67–69), three
hundred years after Hesiod. In Homer and Hesiod, the Giants are obscure, powerful beings
about whom few details are told, seemingly halfway between men and gods.
48. . . . of sorrow: Mnemosynê, “memory,” is the mother of the Muses because the Muses pass
on the stories of olden times, knowledge of which depends on memory. Eleutherai is on
Mount Kithairon, near Helikon, in Boeotia. Pieria is the region north of Olympos,
sacred to the Muses, where the gods first alight when descending from Mount Olympos.
Apparently there was an ancient cult to the Muses in Pieria; they often are called Pierides.
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theogony
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without care, a little bit away from the topmost peak of snowy
Olympos. There are their brilliant dancing places and their beautiful
houses. Beside them dwell the Graces, and Desire,° in joyous festivities.
Sending forth a lovely sound from their mouth, they sing of the laws
of all, and they celebrate the cherished habits of the deathless ones,
sending forth their lovely voice. Then they went to Olympos, rejoicing
in their beautiful voice, their ambrosial° song, and the black earth
resounded about them as they sang, and a lovely sound rose up
beneath their feet as they went to their father. He ruled over the sky,
himself holding the thunderbolt and the flashing lightning, having
overcome through strength his father, Kronos. And he fairly allotted
every portion to the deathless ones, and he established their ranks.
So of these things the Muses sang, who have their houses on
Olympos, the nine daughters begotten of great Zeus—Kleio and Euterpê
and Thaleia and Melpomenê and Terpsichorê and Erato and Polyhymnia
and Ourania and Kalliopê, who is the foremost of all, for she too attends
upon respected princes.°
Whomever of the god-nourished princes the daughters of great
Zeus honor and behold at birth, they pour sweet dew upon his tongue,
and from his mouth words flow like honey. All the people look toward him
as he settles cases with true judgments. And he, speaking convincingly,
56. Graces and Desire: The Greek terms are Charites and Himeros: They dwell beside the
Muses on Mount Olympos, because they have much in common.
60. ambrosial: Usually “ambrosial” means “immortal,” but here probably just “pleasant,”
“fragrant.”
70. . . . respected princes: Hesiod perhaps invented these names of the Muses, which
correspond to the functions of song as Hesiod understands them. Later, the Muses were
assigned to specific genres: Kleio (“making famous”), history; Euterpê (“giving delight”),
elegiac poetry; Thalia(“blooming”), comedy; Melpomenê (“of sweet song”), tragedy;
Terpsichorê (“delighting in dance”), dance; Erato (“of love”), lyric poetry; Polyhymnia
(“much-hymned”), hymns; Ourania (“heavenly”), astronomy; Kalliopê (“of beautiful
voice”), epic poetry. Hesiod’s poem is pitched to the social elite, the princes who require
the services of the Muses in maintaining their hold on power.
theogony
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60
65
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90
95
100
quickly, and knowingly puts an end to even a great quarrel. For this reason
there are wise princes, who turn matters around when the people go astray
in assembly, persuading them with gentle words. And when the prince passes
through a crowd, people seek his favor with honeyed respect. He stands
out when people are assembled: Such is the sacred gift of the Muses to men.
From the Muses and Apollo, who shoots from afar, come singers
upon the earth, and the lyre players, but from Zeus come the kings:
That man is blessed, whomever the Muses love—sweet is the voice that flows
from his mouth. For if someone has recent pain in his breast and groans,
troubled in heart, but a singer, servant of the Muses, sings of the great deeds
of men of olden times and of the blessed gods who live on Olympos—
then quickly that man forgets his troubles, unconcerned with his sorrows.
The gifts of the goddesses quickly turn him away from these.
So greetings, children of Zeus! Give me lovely song! Celebrate
the holy race of the deathless ones , who last forever, who came forth
from Earth and starry Sky, and dark Night, and those whom salty Sea
nourished. Tell us how the gods and Earth first came into being,
and the rivers and the endless sea raging with swells, and the shining
stars, and the broad heaven up above. And tell which gods came from them,
the bestowers of good things, and how they divided their wealth,
and how they divided their spheres of influence, and how they first took
possession of Olympos with its many valleys.°
Sing to me these things,
Muses who live on Olympos! From the beginning, tell me which
gods first came into being!
First of all Chaos came into being,
then broad-breasted Earth, the ever-safe foundation of all the deathless ones,
who live on the peaks of snowy Olympos, and shadowy Tartaros
in a hiding place of the earth with its wide ways, and Eros, who is the most
beautiful of all the deathless gods, who relaxes the limbs and overwhelms
95. . . . valleys: Hesiod does not really fulfill this program, never again mentioning the
gods’ wealth or the division of powers or how the gods first took possession of Olympos.
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theogony
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the mind and wise counsel in the breasts of all the gods and men.°
From Chaos came Darkness and black Night, and from Night came
Brightness and Day, whom Night conceived and bore by uniting in love
with Darkness. Earth bore starry Sky first, like to her in size, so that
he covered her all around, everywhere, so that there might always
be a secure seat for the blessed gods. And Earth gave birth to the blessed
Mountains, the pleasant halls of the gods, the nymphs who live in the wooded
hills. She bore the barren waters, raging with its swell, Sea, without making
delightful love.
But then, uniting with Sky, Earth bore deep-swirling Ocean,
and Koios, and Kreios, and Hyperion, and Iapetos, and Theia, and Rhea,
and Themis, and Mnemosynê, and golden-crowned Phoibê, and beloved
Tethys. After them was born crooked-counseled Kronos, the youngest
and most terrible of these children, who hated his powerful father.°
102. . . . and men: Chaos means “chasm” and is related to the English word “gap.” Chaos is
a being but embodies the notion that in the beginning there was a separation, as when you
open your mouth and a gap appears. Earth and Tartaros then appear (out of Chaos?), both
beings too, but also something that one can stand on (Earth), and a dark, mysterious place
beneath that something (Tartaros). Eros is sex, the force the makes things happen in the
world, that makes one forget what is wise. He is never mentioned again in the Theogony
(except once in a different connection, in line 164) but is present throughout as the
principle of generation.
105. Darkness: The Greek for Darkness is Erebos; Night is Nyx, Brightness is Aither, and
Day is Hemera. In the beginning is darkness, but darkness produces its opposite, light,
which is progress.
114. . . . father: These twelve gods are the mysterious Titans, a word of uncertain meaning.
The story that once there were older gods, overthrown by a younger generation, originated
in Mesopotamia, whence arrived much Greek myth and the general outlines of Hesiod’s
story. Except for Kronos and Rhea, who will replace Sky and Earth as masters of the
universe, most of these gods are just names. Ocean was the river that surrounds the
world, from which all other rivers come. All that we know of Koios is that he was the
father of Leto, the sixth wife of Zeus and mother of Apollo and Artemis. Nothing is
known about the obscure Kreios. Hyperion (“he who goes above”) is the father of Sun
(Helios). Iapetos, evidently the same as the biblical Japeth, a son of Noah (but there are
no other obvious connections), is the father of Prometheus. Theia (“goddess”) is the
wife of Hyperion. Themis (“law”) and Mnemosynê (“memory”) are early consorts of
theogony
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105
110
Chaos
Earth (Gaia) ≈Tartaros
Eros
Typhon (later in the poem)
Darkness (Erebos) ≈ Night
(Nyx)
Brightness
(Aither)
Sky
(Ouranos)
Mountains
Sea
(Pontos)
Day
(Hemera)
Genealogical Chart 1. The primordial gods.
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She bore too the Cyclopês with their overweening spirit—Brontês
and Steropês and mighty Argês, who gave to Zeus the thunderbolt
and manufactured the lightning. These creatures were like the gods
in all other ways, but they had a single eye in the middle of their foreheads:
So they were called “Round-Eyes,” because there was a single round
eye in their foreheads. Strength and power and device were in their works.°
Earth and Sky had three other children, great and strong,
scarcely to be named—Kottos and Briareos and Gygês, prodigal children.
One hundred arms sprang from their shoulders, scarcely to be imagined,
and fifty heads grew out of the shoulders of each, mounted on powerful
limbs. Their strength was unapproachable, mighty in their great forms.
Of all the offspring of Earth and Sky, these were the most terrible children.
Their father, Sky, hated them from the beginning. And as soon
as one of his children was born, he would hide them all away in a hiding place
of Earth and would not allow them to come into the light, and Sky took
delight in his evil deed. But huge Earth groaned within from the strain,
and she devised an evil trick. Quickly making a gray unconquerable
substance,° she fashioned a huge sickle, and she spoke to her dear children.
She said, encouragingly, but sorrowing in her own heart: “My children,
begotten by a mad father, if you are willing to listen to me,
(114. continued) Zeus. Phoibê (“brilliant goddess,” not to be confused with Phoibos
Apollo) is the wife of Koios and mother of Leto. Tethys (“nourisher”?) is probably the
same as Mesopotamian Tiamat, a goddess of the primordial waters from which the world
emerged. Kronos’ epithet as “crooked-counseled” and as the youngest, and the last
mentioned, mark him out as the successor to Sky; the meaning of his name is unknown.
120. . . . works: Cyclopês means “with round eyes.” Brontês means “thunderer”; Steropês
means “flasher,” and Argês means “brightener.” Scholars have been unable to clarify the
relation between these Cyclopês, the armorers of Zeus, and the race of lonely shepherds
who persecute Odysseus (Odyssey 9). Homer never says that his Cyclops (named
Polyphemos) has one eye, but the story requires it.
122. . . . Gygês: Briareos may mean “powerful one,” but the meanings of Kottos and Gygês
are not clear.
132. substance: The “unconquerable substance” is adamant, probably meteoric iron or a
kind of steel, but the meaning is unclear.
theogony
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115
120
125
130
Earth (Gaia) ≈ Sky (Ouranos)
12 Titans
3 Cyclopês
3 Hundred-Handers
Genealogical Chart 2. The children of Earth and Sky.
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let us take vengeance for your father’s wicked outrage. For he first
devised unseemly deeds.”
So she spoke, but fear seized them all, nor did
any of them speak. Then, taking courage, the crooked-counseling Kronos
answered his excellent mother: “Mother, I will undertake this deed,
and I will bring it to completion, for I do not like our father and his evil
name. It was he who first began unseemly deeds.”
So he spoke,
and vast Earth rejoiced greatly in her heart. She took Kronos and hid
him in an ambush. She placed the saw-toothed sickle in his hands.
She laid out the whole plot. Great Sky came, dragging night, and he lay
all over Earth, wanting to make love, and he was spread out all over her.
Then the child reached out from his ambush with his left hand,
and with his right hand he held the huge sickle, long and saw-toothed,
and furiously he cut off his father’s genitals, and he threw them away,
to fall backwards. They did not flee from his hand for nothing!
Earth received all the bloody drops that shook free, and as the years
rolled around, she bore Erinys and the great and mighty Giants, shining
in their armor and holding long spears in their hands, and she bore
the nymphs that people call the Ash Nymphs upon the boundless earth.°
When he first cut off the genitals with his sickle made of an unconquerable
substance, he threw them from the land into the churning sea, where they
152. . . . boundless earth: The image is inconsistent. Sky and Earth are apparently locked in
perpetual intercourse, so that her children cannot escape from her womb, the “hiding
place,” but still Sky comes along desiring sex. The castration of Sky, coming soon in the
story, explains how Sky and Earth were separated and the children liberated. According
to the pattern of the Succession Myth (see the General Introduction), the son, noted
for his cleverness, will overthrow his stupid and brutish father. A sickle is the standard
weapon against monsters, used by Perseus against the Gorgon Medusa, and by Herakles
against the Lernaean Hydra. Drops from the severed genitals are like semen, fertilizing
the Earth to produce Erinys (er-in-is), the vengeful spirit of violated oath (especially
oaths of obligation toward one’s parents), and the Giants, “Earth-born ones,”
distinguished not so much by their size as by their ferocity as warriors. The Ash-Tree
Nymphs (Meliai) are the spirits of ash trees, for some reason singled out here as
primordial beings.
theogony
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140
145
150
155
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165
170
were borne for a long time over the waves, and a white foam [aphros]
arose around the deathless flesh. And in it a young woman was raised up.
She first came to holy Cythera, and then from there she arrived in
Cyprus, wrapped in waves. She came forth an awful and beautiful goddess,
and around her slender feet grass grew. Men and gods call her Aphrodite,
a goddess born from the foam, and also lovely-crowned Cythereia—
because she was born of the foam, and Cythereia because she came
to Cythera. And Cyprogenea, because she was born on stormy Cyprus,
and Lover of Laughter because she came to light from the genitals.°
Eros accompanied her, and beautiful Desire, when she first came
into being and went among the tribe of the gods. She has this honor from
the beginning, and has attained her portion among men and the deathless
gods—the whisperings of young girls, and their smiles and deceptions,
and sweet delight, and making love, and gentleness. Great Sky
called these offspring the Titans, insulting his own children, because,
he said, “tightening” with folly they undertook a great deed, for which
vengeance was soon to follow.°
And Night bore hateful Doom and black
Fate and Death, and she bore Sleep, and she bore the tribe of Dreams.
Then she bore Blame and painful Misery—dark Night did, the goddess,
163. . . . genitals: Aphrodite is in origin the Eastern goddess of fertility and war, variously called
Astartê, Ishtar, Inanna. Somehow “Aphrodite” comes from the Eastern name, but Hesiod
provides a folk etymology for the name and derives it from the story of the castration of Sky,
from aphros, the Greek word for “foam.” Aphrodite seems to have entered the Greek world via
the island of Cyprus, where Semitic-speaking people lived. She had a cult center at Paphos
in the southwestern part of the island. There was also a cult of the goddess on the island of
Cythera, off the southern coast of mainland Greece, no doubt brought by Semitic-speaking
sailors—that is, Phoenicians. Her epithet “laughter-loving” (philommeidês) looks in Greek as
if it means “genital-loving” (“genitals” in Greek is medea), hence Hesiod’s explanation that she
came forth “from the genitals.” Hesiod is much interested is such folk etymologies.
165. . . . of the gods: Here Eros seems transmuted from the cosmic principle of generative
energy into the Eros that means simply “sexual attraction,” which goes with Desire
(Himeros) as a quality of Aphrodite.
171. . . . to follow: Again Hesiod puns, now on titaino, “to tighten,” which really means “to
stretch,” as when drawing a bow.
42
theogony
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Figure 5. The birth of Aphrodite from the so-called Ludovisi Throne. Found in
southern Italy, the marble slab was probably part of an altar. The naked goddess
rises in the middle, received by two nymphs who stand on the rocky shore at either
side. Museo Nazionale Romano of Palazzo Altemps, Rome (Photo: Sailko; https://
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/Ludovisi_Throne_%288504016347
%29.jpg)
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Earth ≈ Sky’s blood
Erinys
Giants
Ash Nymphs (Meliai )
Sky’s genitals
Aphrodite
Genealogical Chart 3. The offspring of Earth, the blood of Sky, and the
birth of Aphrodite.
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without having sex with anyone—and the Hesperidês, who care for the
beautiful golden apples and the fruit-bearing trees beyond famous Ocean.°
And Night gave birth to the Destinies and the mercilessly punishing
Fates [Kêres], Klotho and Lachesis and Atropos, who give good and bad
to mortals at their birth, who follow the offenses of men and gods: Nor do
the goddesses ever lay off their terrible anger before they take an evil
vengeance against anyone who goes astray.°
And dread Night bore Nemesis,
a burden to mortal men, and afterwards Deceit and Lovemaking
and wretched Old Age, and she bore soul-shaking Strife. And wicked
Strife bore painful Labor and Forgetfulness and Starvation and tearful
Pains and Disturbances and Battles and Murders and Mankillings
and Quarrels and Lying Words and Doubletalk and Corruption
and Mad Folly—all related to one another; and Oath, which most
afflicts mortals upon the earth with pain, when someone knowingly
swears a false oath.°
And Sea begot Nereus, who never lies, and always
tells the truth, the oldest of his children, but they call him the Old Man
because he is unerring and kind, nor does he forget what laws are laid down,
175. . . . famous Ocean: Fate (Kêr) seems in origin to be a spirit of death, as we say “Lord Death,”
a kind of being. Then Kêr comes to mean “mortal allotment,” “Fate,” and in the plural, the
Fates. The Hesperidês, “nymphs of the West,” guarded a magical tree that grew in the west at
the end of the world. On this tree grew the Golden Apples of Immortality. One of Herakles’
labors was to retrieve these apples. As dwellers in the western seas, where the sun sets, the
Hesperidês were tantamount to spirits of death; hence they are the offspring of Night.
Nemesis, “she who gives what is due,” is the spirit of retribution against excess, whether of
good or evil.
180. . . . goes astray: Klotho means “spinner”; Lachesis, “disposer of lots”; and Atropos,
“unbending.” The image of the Fates (here Kêres) is that they are like spinners, measuring
out a length of thread, then cutting it off. They are also punitive spirits, aware of
wrongdoing. Later (line 708–9) Hesiod says that Klotho, Lachesis, and Atropos are the
names of the Moirai, “apportioners” or “destinies,” hence “Fates.”
188. . . . a false oath: These typical offspring of Night include Lovemaking because in adultery
all manner of evils are made, including the Trojan War through the adultery of Paris with
Helen. In origin an oath is a curse that one lays upon oneself, which will come to fruition if
what one declares is false: If you swear falsely, then you invite punishment by Oath.
theogony
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45
175
180
185
190
Night (Nyx)
Doom
Fate (Kêr)
Death
(Thanatos)
Misery Hesperidês
Destinies
(Moirai )
Nemesis Deceit Lovemaking
Labor
Disturbances
Mankillings
Doubletalk
Sleep
(Hypnos)
Dreams
Blame
Fates
(Kêres: Klotho, Lachesis, Atropos)
Old Age
Forgetfulness (Lethê )
Strife (Eris)
Starvation
Battles (Machai )
Pains
Murders
Quarrels
Corruption
Lying Words
Mad Folly (Atê )
Oath
Genealogical Chart 4. The descendants of Night (Nyx) and Strife (Eris).
EBSCOhost – printed on 3/9/2022 11:23 AM via UNIVERSITY OF MEMPHIS. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use
but his thoughts are just and kind. Uniting with Earth, Sea then begot
great Thaumas and noble Phorkys, and Keto with beautiful cheeks,
and Eurybia, who has a heart of an unconquerable substance in her breast.°
Of Nereus and Doris of the lovely locks, daughter of Ocean, the circling
river, were born children in the restless sea, lovely among the goddesses—
Protho and Eukrantê and Sao and Amphitritê and Eudorê and Thetis
and Galenê and Glaukê and Kymothoê and swift Speo and darling
Thalia and Pasithea and Erato and Eunikê with arms like roses, and graceful
Melitê and Eulimenê and Agavê and Doto and Proto and Pherousa
and Dynamenê and Nesaiê and Aktaiê and Protomedeia and Doris
and Panopê and beautiful Galateia and darling Hippothoê
and Hipponoê with arms like roses, and Kymodokê, who together
with Kymatolegê and Amphitritê, who has fine ankles, easily calms
the waves on the misty sea and the blasts of savage winds, and Kymo
and Eionê and Halimedê with the fine crown, and Glaukonomê,
lover of laughter, and Pontoporeia and Leiagorê and Euagorê
and Laomedeia and Poulynoê and Autonoê and Lysianassa
and Euarnê, lovely in appearance and blameless in form, and Psamathê,
charming in her figure, and the divine Menippê and Neso and Eupompê
and Themisto and Pronoê and Nemertês, who has the mind
of her deathless father. These were the daughters of blameless Nereus,
fifty in number, knowing faultless crafts.°
Thaumas united with Elektra,
193. . . . in her breast: Hesiod mixes up personifications with mythical figures: Thaumas
(“wonder”) is a personification of a quality of the Sea. Phorkys is an old spirit of the sea, its
powers and dangers, just like Nereus, with whom he is often confused. Keto is “sea
monster,” though with beautiful cheeks. Eurybia means “wide of strength,” but otherwise
we know nothing about her.
212. . . . faultless crafts: The list of the fifty Nereids, the daughters of Nereus and Doris (a
daughter of Ocean) is a tour de force, the sort of catalogue in which Hesiod excelled. The
names mainly denote positive aspects of the sea: for example, Pasithea “all-divine”; Melitê
“like honey”; Galenê “calm”; Kymothoê “wave-swift”; Pontoporeia “making for easy
passage on the sea.” Mostly they are just names, but Thetis (of unknown meaning) is the
mother of Achilles, and Amphitritê (meaning unknown) is the consort of Poseidon.
theogony
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47
195
200
205
210
Figure 6. Amphitritê stands before Poseidon, her hand raised, as he holds a trident
(most of the sea god is broken away). The inscription on the plaque reads, in
Corinthian script, APHIRITAEMIPO—that is, “I am A[m]phirita [wife of ]
Po[seidon].” A[M]PHIRITA is Corinthian dialect for “Amphitritê.” Probably the
letters in front of the trident, crowned with a circlet, spell out THR[IAINA]: that
is, “trident.” Painted plaque, ca. 560 b.c., from Polyskouphia. Musée du Louvre,
Paris (Photo: Marie-Lan Nguyen; https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia
/commons/5/5f/Amphitrite_Penteskouphia_Louvre_MNC208.jpg)
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the daughter of Ocean with his deep waves, and gave birth to swift
Iris and the Harpies who have nice hair, Storm Wind and Fast Flier,
who follow together the blasts of the winds and the birds on their
swift wings, for they soar high in the air.°
And Keto bore the Gray Old
Ladies, with beautiful cheeks, to Phorkys—gray from birth, whom
the deathless gods and men who live on the earth call the Old Ladies,
Pemphredo with the lovely gown and Enyo with the saffron gown—
and the Gorgons, who live beyond famous Ocean at the edge of Night,
where are the Hesperidês, with their high-pitched voices, Sthenno
and Euryalê and Medusa, who came to a bad end. She was mortal,
but the others were deathless and ageless, the two of them.
The Blue-haired god° slept with Medusa on the gentle meadow
amidst the spring flowers. And when Perseus cut off her head,
great Chrysaor leaped out, and the horse Pegasos, so called because
he was born near the springs [pegai] of Ocean. Chrysaor was called
that because he held a golden [chryseion] sword in his hands.°
Now Pegasos flew off from the earth, the mother of sheep, and came
to the deathless ones. He dwells in the house of Zeus, carrying the thunder
and the lightning flash for Zeus the Counselor. Chrysaor begot three-headed
Geryon, having united in love with Kallirhoê, the daughter of famous Ocean.
216. . . . high in the air: Elektra the daughter of Ocean, is not to be confused with Elektra
the daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, or with Elektra the daughter of Atlas, one
of the Pleiadês (plē-a-dēz). Elektra means “amber-colored.” Iris (“rainbow”) is the usual
messenger of the gods in Homer’s Iliad (but not in the Odyssey). The Harpies, “snatchers,”
are storm winds who, like the spirits of death, sweep one away. The Greek for “storm wind”
is Aello, and “fast flier” is Okypetê.
223. . . . two of them: The Gray Old Ladies are the Graiai, Pemphredo (perhaps “wasp”) and
Enyo (“warlike”). Two of the Gorgons (“fierce ones”) are immortal: Sthenno (“strength”)
and Euryalê (perhaps “she of the wide salt sea”). One is mortal: Medusa (“ruler”).
224. Blue-haired god: Poseidon.
228. . . . in his hands: Perseus’ decapitation of Medusa is the central event in his legend.
Chrysaor means “he of the golden sword.”
theogony
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49
215
220
225
230
Earth (Gaia) ≈ Sea (Pontos)
Phorkys
Keto
Eurybia
(“wide-ruling”)
Doris ≈ Nereus
(“Old Man of the Sea”)
Thetis
Amphitritê
48 other
Nereids
Elektra ≈Thaumas
(“wonder”)
Iris
Harpies
Genealogical Chart 5. The descendants of Earth and Sea.
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Figure 7. The head of Medusa, from an Etruscan temple in Orvieto, Italy, ca.
380 b.c. The head is typical for its boar’s tusks, lolling tongue, fearsome eyes
and expression, and snaky hair. The temple in which the terra-cotta face was
found appears to have been dedicated to Tinia, the Etruscan Zeus. The
Etruscans admired Greek myth and adopted many of its main stories. Museo
Claudio Faina, Italy (Photo: Sailko; https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki
/Category:Gorgoneia#/media/File:Gorgoneion_dal_tempio_di_belvedere
,_orvieto,_fine_V_sec._ac..JPG)
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235
240
245
250
The mighty Herakles killed Geryon beside his shamble-footed cattle
in Erytheia, surrounded by water, on the day when he rustled the broadbrowed cattle and drove them to holy Tiryns, crossing the stream
of Ocean, and he killed Orthos and Eurytion the herdsman in the misty
farmstead beyond famous Ocean.°
She° bore another irresistible monster,
not like mortal men, nor like the deathless gods, in a hollow cave,
the divine and mighty Echidna, half a young girl with dashing eyes,
of beautiful cheeks, and half a savage snake, huge and terrible,
nimble and flesh-eating, beneath the hidden parts of the sacred earth.
There she ° has a cave deep under the hollow rock, far from the deathless
gods and mortal men, where the gods appointed a famous house
for her to live in.
Gloomy Echidna dwells among the Arimoi
beneath the earth, the deathless young girl, ageless for all her days.°
They say that Typhon—awful, violent, living without laws—made love
with the glancing-eyed girl, and that she conceived and brought forth
ferocious children. First she gave birth to Orthos, the hound of Geryon;
then she gave birth to Kerberos, irresistible, indescribable, the devourer
of raw flesh, the brazen-voiced hound of Hades with fifty heads,
ruthless and powerful. Third, she brought forth the Hydra of Lerna,
knowing only evil things, whom the goddess white-armed Hera
237. . . . famous Ocean: Erytheia, “the red land,” is an island somewhere in the far West.
Herakles, obeying the commands of his tyrannical cousin, Eurystheus, could reach it only
by borrowing the “cup of the sun,” a special vessel by which the sun travels over the sky.
Kallirhoê, “beautiful-flowing,” is an Oceanid, belonging to a group parallel to the Nereids
but far greater in number (3,000: line 290). Orthos, “true,” was a savage, two-headed hound
that with Eurytion (“easily flowing”) protected Geryon’s cattle (the meaning of “Geryon” is
unknown).
237. She: Presumably Keto.
242. there she: Presumably Echidna, but because Hesiod goes on to speak otherwise of
Echidna’s home, “she” may mean Keto.
245. . . . all her days: It is unclear what is meant by “among the Arimoi,” but perhaps “among the
Aramaeans”: that is, the inhabitants of ancient Syria, from where this story may have come.
52
theogony
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Phorkys ≈ Keto
Gray Old Ladies
(Graiai )
Gorgons: Sthenno
Euryalê
Medusa ≈ Poseidon
Chrysaor ≈ Kallirhoê
Pegasos
Geryon
Genealogical Chart 6. The descendants of Phorkys and Keto.
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255
260
265
270
raised up, being extremely angry with Herakles. Herakles, the son
of Zeus of the family of Amphitryon, killed the Hydra with his pitiless
bronze, joined by war-loving Iolaos, through the plans of Athena,
leader of the war host.°
She° gave birth to Chimaira, breathing deadly
fire, terrible, huge, swift-footed, and powerful. She had three heads:
one of a savage lion, one of a goat, one of a snake, a mighty serpent.
In the front she was a lion, in the back a serpent, in the middle a goat,
breathing out the awful strength of blazing fire. Pegasos and noble
Bellerophon killed her.
Chimaira gave birth to the Sphinx, the bane
of the Kadmeians, seduced in love by Orthos; and the Nemean Lion,
that Hera, glorious wife of Zeus, raised up and settled in the hills of Nemea,
a plague to men. Dwelling there he preyed on the tribes
of people, having power over Tretos in the territory of Nemea
and Apesas, but the might of Herakles overcame him.°
Keto united
in love with Phorkys and begot as her youngest child the dreadful
snake that guards the apples all of gold in the crannies of the dark
earth at its great limits.° These are the offspring of Keto and Phorkys.
Tethys bore to Ocean the swirling rivers, Nile and Alpheios
and deep-eddying Eridanos and Strymon and Maiandros and beautiful256. . . . of the war host: It was not until the fifth century b.c. that the adventures of Herakles
were canonized as twelve in number. Hesiod here mentions the contest with Geryon, Kerberos,
and the Lernaean Hydra, all children of the monstrous Typhon, who later in the poem will be
Zeus’s most formidable enemy (lines 646–85.). Lerna is a swamp in the southwestern Argive
Plain. Iolaos, who assisted Herakles on this adventure, is Herakles’ nephew.
256. She: Echidna or Hydra; it is not clear which.
266. . . . overcame him: “She” could be Echidna or Chimaira (“she-goat”) but is probably
Chimaira. The Kadmeians, “descendants of Kadmos,” are the Thebans, whom the Sphinx
persecuted. Tretos and Apesas are mountains between Mycenae and Corinth. After
killing the Nemean Lion, Herakles wore his skin as a cloak and helmet.
269. . . . great limits: That is, the snake who guards the Golden Apples of the Hesperidês on
the tree that grows at the edge of the world (elsewhere the snake is called Ladon, the name
of a river that Hesiod is about to mention).
54
theogony
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Figure 8. The Chimaira, a monster with the body of a lion, a goat growing from its
back, and a serpent for a tail. South Italian red-figure dish, ca. 350–340 b.c., Musée
du Louvre, Paris (Photo: Jastrow; https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia
/commons/b/b3/Chimera_Apulia_Louvre_K362.jpg)
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Keto ≈ Phorkys
Typhon ≈ Echidna
Chimaira ≈ Orthos
Sphinx
Kerberos
snake, guardian of the
Golden Apples
Hydra
of Lerna
Nemean Lion
Genealogical Chart 7. Other descendants of Keto and Phorkys.
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flowing Ister and Phasis and Rhesos and silver-swirling Acheloös
and Nessos and Rhodios and Haliakmon and Heptaporos and Granikos
and divine Aisepos and Simoeis and Peneios and broad Hermos
and the fair stream of Kaïkos and great Sangarios and Ladon
and Parthenios and Euenos and divine Ardeskos and Skamandros.°
She gave birth to a holy race of daughters, who care for youths
over the earth, along with Apollo the king, and the Rivers, and they
have this lot from Zeus: Peitho and Admetê and Ianthê
and Elektra and Doris and Prymno and godlike Ouraniê
and Hippo and Klymenê and Rhodeia and Kallirhoê and Zeuxo
and Klytiê and Eiduia and Pasithoê and Plexaurê and Galaxaurê
and lovely Dionê and Melobosis and Thoê and handsome Polydorê
and Kerkeïs, lovely in appearance, and cow-eyed Plouto, Perseïs
and Ianeira and Akastê and Xanthê and fair Petraiê and Menestho
and Europê and Metis and Eurynomê and Telesto with the saffron
gown and Chryseïs and Asiê and desirable Kalypso and Eudorê
and Tychê and Amphiro and Okyrhoê and Styx, who stood out
from all the rest.°
275
280
285
276. . . . Skamandros: The Nile is not mentioned in Homer, where the river is called
Aigyptos, Eridanos was later identified with the Po River in northern Italy; Strymon is in
Thrace; Ister is the Danube; Phasis is a legendary river thought to be at the eastern end
of the Black Sea; Rhesos is unknown but perhaps a tributary of the Granikos, northeast
of Troy; several rivers were named Acheloös, but probably what is meant is the one in the
southwestern mainland, the largest river in Greece; Rhodios is in the Troad, flowing down
from Mount Ida; Haliakmon is in Macedonia; Heptaporos is in the Troad, a tributary
of Skamandros; Granikos, Aisepos, and Simoeis are in the Troad; Peneios is in
Thessaly; Hermos is in Lydia, flowing past Sardis, and the Kaïkos is farther north;
Sangarios is in Phrygia; Ladon is in Arcadia, a tributary of Alpheios; Parthenios is a
small river on the southern shore of the Black Sea; Euenos is in western mainland Greece,
where Herakles fought the centaur Nessos, but the Nessos River appears to be in Thrace;
Ardeskos is someplace in Thrace; Skamandros is in the Troad. There is little order in this
list, reflecting Hesiod’s ignorance of real geography.
289. . . . all the rest: The Oceanids listed here have a variable importance, or none at all;
many seem to have been invented for this catalogue. Some may be the names of real springs;
some have no connection with water at all. Their only function, according to Hesiod, is to
care for the young. Peitho, “persuasion,” is a nymph who adorns Pandora, along with the
Graces (Works and Days, line 75); Admetê, “unbroken,” is appropriate to a nourisher of
theogony
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57
290
295
300
These were the oldest offspring of Ocean and Tethys,
but there are many more besides. There are three thousand slender-ankled
Oceanids, who, dispersed abroad over the earth and the depth
of the waters, in every place serve alike, the glorious children
of goddesses. As many other rivers as there are, babbling along,
the sons of Ocean, whom the revered Tethys bore—of them
it would be hard for a mortal man to tell all the names, but those people
know who live near them.
And Theia, submitting in love to Hyperion,
bore great Helios and shining Moon and Dawn, who shines for all
upon the earth and for the deathless gods who possess broad heaven.
Eurybia, the awesome goddess, mixing in love with Kreios begot
great Astraios and great Pallas and Persês, who stands out among
(289. continued) youths; Ianthê, “violet,” may refer to the color of a spring; Elektra,
“amber-colored,” was wife of the sea god Thaumas and the mother of the messenger
goddess Iris and the Harpies; Doris, “giver,” was the mother of the Nereids; Prymno,
“undermost,” was perhaps a nymph of the groundwater; Ouraniê, “heavenly,” was also the
name of one of the Muses. Aquatic deities are often associated with horses, or represented
as them, hence Hippo, “horse.” Klymenê, “famous one,” was the wife of the Titan Iapetos
and mother of Prometheus; Rhodeia means “rose-colored”; Kallirhoê, “fair-flowing,” was
the mother of Geryon; Zeuxo’s name, “she who joins,” marks her as a goddess of marriage;
Eiduia, “knowing,” was wife to King Aietês of Colchis and the mother of Medea,
perhaps a goddess of witchcraft; Pasithoê, “all-swift,” may refer to a fast-flowing spring;
Plexaurê perhaps means “water-weaver,” and Galaxaurê means “water like milk”; Dionê,
“female Zeus,” was Zeus’s consort at the oracular shrine of Dodona in northwestern
Greece; Melobosis, “sheep feeder,” is probably a nymph of grassy pastures; Thoê means
“swift”; Polydorê is “much-giver,” and Plouto is “wealth”; Kerkeïs is obscure; Perseïs,
“destroyer,” is the mother by Helios of the Eastern despot Aietês and the witch Circe
(“hawk”); Ianeira is perhaps goddess of the Ionians; Akastê, “irregular,” Xanthê, “yellow,”
Petraiê, “rocky,” and Menestho, perhaps “lasting,” refer to qualities of springs; Europa is
goddess of the continent and the name of a spring in Dodona. Metis, “mind,” is Zeus’s first
consort; Eurynomê, “wide-ruling,” is Zeus’s third consort and mother of the Graces;
Telesto means “accomplisher”; Chryseïs is “golden”; Asia, perhaps “muddy,” is the goddess
of the territory of Lydia, the sister of Europa, and the wife of Prometheus; Kalypso,
“concealer,” is probably not the Kalypso (the daughter of Atlas, not of Ocean) who
imprisoned Odysseus for seven years in the Odyssey (7.259); Eudorê is “well-giving”; Tychê
is “chance,” “luck,” a great goddess in later times; Amphiro is “flowing-around,” and
Okyrhoê is “swift-flowing.” Styx, “hateful,” is the famous river of the underworld.
58
theogony
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Ocean ≈ Tethys
Rivers (25 named)
3,000 Oceanids (41 named)
Genealogical Chart 8. The children of Ocean and Tethys.
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all wise men.°
305
310
315
320
Dawn bore to Astraios the powerful winds,
the brightening West Wind and swift North Wind and South Wind,
a goddess lying in love with a god. After these Early-Born bore the star
Dawn Bringer and the shining Stars that crown the heaven.°
And Styx,
the daughter of Ocean, sleeping with Pallas, begot Emulation
and Victory, with slender ankles, in the house. And Styx begot Strength
and Power, splendid children.° They have no house apart from Zeus,
nor any seat, nor any path except that whereon the god leads them,
but always they take their seat beside loud-thundering Zeus.
For so did Styx, the deathless Oceanid, decide on that day when
the Olympian who hurls the lightning° called together all
the deathless gods to high Olympos, and he said that whoever
of the gods would fight along with him against the Titans,
that they would not be deprived of their reward, but would have,
each of them, the honor that he had before among the deathless gods.
He said too that whoever was without honor and reward under
the reign of Kronos would receive honor and reward, as is right.
Deathless Styx first came to Olympos with her children through
the devising of her father. Zeus honored her and gave her exceptional
gifts. He made her to be the great oath of the gods,° and her children
301. . . . all wise men: The Sun is Helios, the Moon is Selenê, and Dawn is Eos. The children
of Kreios are nonentities: Astraios, “starry,” is perhaps invented as the father of the stars.
Pallas is utterly obscure, as is his relationship to Pallas Athena, to a Giant of the same name
whom she killed, and to an early Athenian hero of the same name. Persês is the father of
Hekatê.
304. . . . the heaven: West Wind is Zephyros; North Wind is Boreas; South Wind is Notos.
Early-Born is Erigeneia, a title of Dawn (Eos); Dawn Bringer is Eosphoros: that is, Venus,
the only planet mentioned in Greek literature before the fourth century b.c., the brightest
star in the sky, appearing only in the morning and evening.
307. . . . splendid children: Emulation is Zelos; Victory is Nikê; Strength is Kratos; Power is Bia.
311. . . . lightning: Zeus.
320. oath of the gods: Only gods could swear by Styx; such an oath could never be broken.
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Theia ≈ Hyperion Kreios ≈ Eurybia
Sun (Helios )
West Wind
(Zephyros)
Moon
(Selenê )
Dawn (Eos, Erigeneia) ≈ Astraios Pallas Persês
North Wind
(Boreas)
South Wind
(Notos)
Dawn Bringer Stars
(Eosphoros)
Genealogical Chart 9. The descendants of Theia and Hyperion and of Kreios and
Eurybia.
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325
330
335
340
345
to live with him for all their days. And just as he promised,
he brought it about fully for all, for he himself reigns and rules
with power.
Then Phoibê came to the much-beloved bed of Koios.
The goddess, sleeping with the god, conceived and gave birth
to dark-gowned Leto, always gentle, sweet to men and the deathless
gods, gentle from the beginning, the most kindly of those in Olympos.
Phoibê begot the honored Asteria, whom Persês led into his great
house to be called his dear wife.
And Asteria conceived and gave birth
to Hekatê, whom Zeus, the son of Kronos, honored above all others.°
He gave her splendid gifts, to have a share of the earth and of the barren sea.
He allotted her honor in the starry heaven, and she is honored
especially by all the deathless gods. And even now, when someone
of earth-dwelling men makes a lovely holy sacrifice, and prays for favor
according to custom, he calls out to Hekatê. Much honor easily
follows him whose prayers the goddess eagerly follows, and she sends
wealth to him, for she has the power to do so. For among as many
as were born from Earth and Sky, and have received their apportionment
of honor, she has her due. Nor did the son of Kronos do her violence
nor take anything away from what she had been apportioned among
the former Titan gods, but she holds her reward upon the earth
and in heaven and on the sea, as much as was the first division
from the beginning. Nor, because she was an only child, did the goddess
receive less honor, but she holds even much more, because Zeus
honors her. As she wishes, she stands at one’s side and assists
with all her power. She sits beside respected chiefs in judgment
329. . . . above all others: Asteria was also a name of the island of Delos, where Leto gave
birth to Apollo and Artemis. In later times Hekatê was a goddess of the crossroads, of
witchcraft, magic, and the occult arts, but in Hesiod she is a great goddess of boundless
benevolence, with whom Hesiod perhaps had a personal relationship. Her cult seems to
come from Caria, in southern Asia Minor, where Hesiod’s father may have had
connections. Perhaps for this reason he named Hesiod’s brother Persês (in Works and
Days), the name of Hekatê’s father. Hekatê plays little role in Greek myth.
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Pallas ≈ Styx (an Oceanid)
Emulation
(Zelos)
Victory
(Nikê )
Strength
(Kratos)
Genealogical Chart 10. The children of Pallas and Styx.
Koios ≈ Phoibê
Leto
Asteria ≈ Persês
Hekatê
Genealogical Chart 11. The descendants of Koios and Phoibê.
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Power
(Bia)
350
355
360
365
and, in the assembly, that man stands out among the people, whomever
she wishes.
And when men arm themselves for man-destroying war,
then the goddess is there, and she happily grants victory and extends
glory to whomever she wishes. Good is she to stand by horsemen,
whomever she wishes, and also when men contend at the games: There
the goddess stands at their side and gives assistance. And when someone
conquers with strength and power, he easily carries the noble contest,
rejoicing, and he brings glory to his parents.
And to those who work the blue
distempered sea, who pray to Hekatê and to the loud-crashing Earthshaker,°
the reverend goddess easily grants an abundant catch, and she easily
takes it back when it appears, if she wishes. She is good at increasing,
with the help of Hermes, the flocks in the fold. She increases from
a few the herds of cattle and the broad herds of goats and the flocks
of fleecy sheep, if she wishes, or makes the many to be less.
Thus, though
her mother begot but one child, she is honored by all the deathless gods.
The son of Kronos made her to be a nurse of youths who after her see
with their eyes the light of the all-seeing Dawn. And so from the beginning
she is the nurse of the young, and such are her spheres of influence.
Rhea, sleeping with Kronos, bore splendid children, Hestia and Demeter
and Hera with the golden sandals and powerful Hades, who dwells
beneath the earth with his pitiless heart, and loud-crashing, earthshaking
Poseidon, and wily Zeus, the father of gods and men, who shakes
the broad earth with his thunder.°
And great Kronos swallowed them
354. Earthshaker: Poseidon.
368. . . . with his thunder: Hestia is the goddess of the hearth, the focus (Latin for “hearth”)
of household activity; she has few myths. Demeter is the goddess of the grain harvest,
whose daughter, Persephone, was snatched away by Hades (“unseen”), god of the
underworld, to be his bride. Hera is the wife of Zeus, the goddess of marriage, who
persecutes Zeus’s illegitimate offspring (especially Herakles). Poseidon is lord of the sea
and is besides god of earthquakes and horses. Zeus is the Greek storm god. All ancient
pantheons had a storm god, the power that causes rain and lightning.
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Kronos ≈ Rhea
Hestia
Demeter
Hera
Hades
Poseidon
Genealogical Chart 12. The children of Kronos and Rhea.
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Zeus
370
375
380
385
down as each came forth from the holy womb at the knees of its mother.°
His intention was to prevent one of the illustrious descendants of Sky
from taking the kingly honor among the gods. For Kronos had learned
from Earth and starry Sky that he was destined to be overthrown
by his own son, strong though he himself was, through the devices of great
Zeus. He kept no blind man’s watch, but keeping alert he swallowed
down his children.
Unceasing pain took hold of Rhea. But when
she was about to give birth to Zeus, the father of gods and men,
then she begged her own dear parents, Earth and starry Sky,
to concoct some plan whereby she might secretly conceal the birth
of her dear child, and make the great wily Kronos pay the Erinys
of her father, Sky, and of the children whom he had swallowed.°
They readily listened to their daughter and obeyed her, and they
advised her about what was destined to happen to King Kronos
and his powerful son. They sent her to Lyktos, in the rich land of Crete,
when she was about to give birth to her youngest child, great Zeus.
Great Earth received him from Rhea in broad Crete to raise up
and to nourish. There Earth came, carrying him through the swift
black night, to Lyktos first, and she took him up in her hands and hid
him in a remote cave beneath the crannies of the holy earth, in a wood,
thick with trees, on Mount Aigaion.° But for the great ruling son of Sky,
369. . . . its mother: Greek women gave birth in a squatting position.
380. . . . he swallowed: Erinys (or the Erinyes) came into being when Kronos castrated his
father, Sky, emerging from the drops of blood that fell on Earth (lines 149–50). Erinyes
represent (sometimes) the spirits of vengeance when a wrong has been done, in this case by
a father against his children. Sky and Kronos’ children have Erinyes because of Kronos’ evil
behavior.
389. . . . Mount Aigaion: Hesiod’s Succession Myth, inherited from the Near East, here
attaches to local Cretan traditions, wherein a male year-spirit, who is born and dies
annually, is raised in a cave and celebrated by young men banging shields. The Greeks
identified this Minoan, non-Greek god with their own Zeus; the supposed grave of Zeus
was shown in Crete during the Classical period. Lyktos is in east-central Crete, on the
western slope of Mount Lasithi. The cave that Hesiod refers to may be the Psychro Cave,
off the high plateau of Mount Lasithi fairly near Lyktos, where votive offerings have been
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king of the earlier gods, she wrapped a huge stone in swaddling clothes
and gave it to him. He took it in his hands and pushed it down into his belly
—the wretch! He did not know in his heart that, instead of the stone,
his own son was left behind safe and sound. That son was soon to overcome
Kronos by force and might and take away his office and himself rule
among the deathless ones.
Then the strength and shining limbs of this king
increased quickly. And as the year rolled around, the great wily Kronos,
deceived by the eloquent suggestions of Earth, vomited up his offspring,
overcome by the arts and power of his own son.° First he vomited
up the stone, which he had swallowed last. Zeus set it up in the wide-pathed
earth in most holy Pytho,° beneath the valleys of Parnassos, to be a sign
in later times, a wonder for mortal men.
And he loosed his uncles,
the children of Sky, from their deadly bonds, whom their own father
had bound in his madness. They were mindful of his kindness, and they
gave him the thunder and the shining thunderbolt and the lightning.
Before that, huge Earth had hidden them. Trusting in them, Zeus rules
over mortals and the deathless ones.°
Iapetos took to wife the nymph
Klymenê with the slender ankles, daughter of Ocean, and he went up
into her bed. She gave birth to the child Atlas with his powerful mind,
and she bore the very famous Menoitios and the versatile Prometheus,
his mind filled with tricks, and scatterbrained Epimetheus, who from
the beginning gave birth to evil for bread-nourished men. For he first
(389. continued) found, but others place the cave on Mount Ida, in central Crete. Mount
Aigaion, “goat mountain,” is otherwise unattested but may be an ancient name for Mount
Lasithi.
398. . . . own son: Hesiod does not say how Zeus forced Kronos to vomit up his children,
but later reports say that he administered an emetic drug.
400. Pytho: Delphi.
406. . . . deathless ones: Zeus’s uncles are the Cyclopês, who forged the thunderbolt by
which Zeus overcame the Titans. Earlier they were imprisoned in Tartaros by Sky.
theogony
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390
395
400
405
410
415
420
425
430
received from Zeus the molded virgin as his wife.° Far-seeing Zeus
threw down the violent Menoitios into Erebos,° hitting him with a smoking
thunderbolt because of his foolishness and his horrendous pride.
Atlas holds the broad sky from powerful necessity, standing at the ends
of the earth near the shrill-voiced Hesperidês, with his inexhaustible
head and arms; for wily Zeus assigned this fate for him.
He bound
the clever Prometheus in unbreakable bonds, savage chains, and drove
a shaft through his torso, and he sent a long-winged eagle upon him,
who devoured his immortal liver. But it grew back in the night,
as much as the long-winged bird ate in the whole day. Herakles,
the powerful son of Alkmenê with the beautiful ankles, killed the eagle
and warded off the evil affliction from the son of Iapetos, freeing
him from his suffering, and not against the will of Olympian Zeus,
who reigns on high, so that the glory of Theban-born Herakles might
be still more than before upon the rich earth.
Thinking of this, Zeus honored
his excellent son, and though he was angry he gave up his anger that
he held before because Prometheus had matched wits with the mighty
son of Kronos. For when gods and mortal men disputed at Mekonê,
Prometheus divided up and set before them the portions of a great
bull with eager heart, deceiving the mind of Zeus.° For he set out before him
412. . . . as his wife: Atlas is later punished—we do not know why—by being forced to hold
up the sky on his shoulders. Menoitios (the same name as the father of Patroklos in the
Iliad) is utterly obscure. The etymology of “Prometheus” is unclear, but Hesiod seems to
have understood it as “forethinker.” Epimetheus, who may be Hesiod’s invention, means
“afterthinker.” Epimetheus acts like a man, not a god, and in other accounts he is the
husband of Pandora and the father of Pyrrha, who marries the son of Prometheus,
Deukalion, the Greek Noah. Pandora is “molded” because Hephaistos made her from earth.
413. Erebos: Darkness: that is, the underworld.
431. . . . mind of Zeus: Mekonê is an old name for Sikyon, a town to the west of Corinth
on the Gulf of Corinth in the Peloponnesus. This etiological myth, set in a time when
men and gods dined together, explains why in Greek sacrificial ritual the gods are given the
bones wrapped in fat, but men eat the delicious flesh and the entrails. The myth marks the
division between men and gods.
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Iapetos ≈ Klymenê
Atlas
Menoitios
Prometheus
Epimetheus
Genealogical Chart 13. The descendants of Iapetos and Klymenê.
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Figure 9. The punishments of Atlas and Prometheus. Atlas, accompanied by a
snake, holds the world on his shoulders. Prometheus is bound to a pillar
surmounted by a crow while an eagle plucks at his chest. Athenian black-figure
wine cup, ca. 550 b.c. Vatican Museums, Vatican City (Photo: Karl-Ludwig G.
Poggemann; https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a8
/Atlas_Typhon_Prometheus.pdf/page1–1258px-Atlas_Typhon_Prometheus
.pdf.jpg)
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on the hide the flesh and the entrails rich with fat, concealing them with
the bull’s stomach, and then he set out before him in turn the white bones
of the bull as a cunning trick, attractively concealing them with shining fat.
Then the father of men and gods said to Prometheus: “O son of Iapetos,
most excellent of all the gods—wow! How you have divided the portions
unequally!” So Zeus spoke with a sneer, knowing all things forever.
But wily Prometheus answered him, with a slight smile, not forgetting
his cunning deception: “Most glorious and greatest of the everlasting gods,
of this offering take whatever your spirit within urges you to.”
So he spoke,
keeping his trick in mind. Zeus, who knows all things forever, knew
and recognized the trick, but he intended evil for mortal man, which
was to come to pass.° He took up in both his hands the white fat,
and he was angry in his heart, and anger overcame his spirit when
he saw the white bones of the bull cunningly decked out. And this
is the reason that the tribes of men upon the earth burn the white bones
to the gods on the smoking altars.
Greatly enraged, cloud-gathering Zeus
spoke to Prometheus: “O son of Iapetos, always up to your tricks!
So, you have still not let up from your trickery!” Thus spoke Zeus
in anger, who knows all things forever. From that time, always mindful
of the trick, he has not given to ash trees the strength of untiring fire
for mortal men.°
But the brave son of Iapetos deceived him when he stole
the far-seeing gleam of untiring fire in a hollow stalk of fennel.°
This act stung him to the depths of his spirit, Zeus, who thunders on high,
443. . . . to pass: No doubt in an earlier version Zeus was deceived by the trick, but Hesiod
wants to preserve the great god’s omniscience.
452. . . . for mortal men: Evidently referring to a widespread belief that fire lies hidden
within trees, so that when you rub pieces of wood together vigorously you can start a fire.
Also, lightning that strikes trees will often start a fire. The ash is a common tree in Greece.
453. fennel: Not actually a fennel, the Giant Fennel (narthex) is a common plant near the
Mediterranean. It has a brilliant yellow flower and a thick stalk whose pith can hold a coal
without burning through to the outer rind. It was often used, and still is, to transport fire.
theogony
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435
440
445
450
455
460
465
470
475
480
and his heart grew angry when he saw the far-seeing gleam of fire
among men. He immediately fashioned an evil for men, to balance
out the fire.
The famous crippled god, Hephaistos, made from earth
the likeness of a modest young woman through the devisings of the son
of Kronos. Flashing-eyed Athena wrapped and adorned her in silvery
cloth, and with her hands she drew down over her head an embroidered
veil, a marvel to see. And around her head Pallas Athena placed garlands,
the flowers of fresh-blooming grass, seductive. And around her head
she placed a golden band that the very clever lame god himself had made,
working it in his hands, giving pleasure to Father Zeus. He worked
into it many ingenious designs, a wonder to see, of wild animals
of the kind that inhabit the sea and the dry land—of these wonderful
things he placed many examples, like living things with voices,
and a great beauty shone from it.
But when he had made the beautiful
evil as the price for the good,° he brought her forth to where the other
gods were, and men, rejoicing in the finery of the flashing-eyed daughter
of loud-thundering Zeus.° Amazement filled the deathless gods and mortal
men when they saw the bitter deception, which men could not withstand.
From her comes the race of tender women, who dwell among men as a great
affliction for mortals, not bearing up well in Poverty, but happy in Plenty.°
As when bees in roofed hives feed the drones, always up to their evil
deeds—the bees are busy by day, and all day long until the sun goes down
they lay out the white honeycombs while the drones stay inside the roofed
hives and gather the labor of others into their bellies—even so Zeus,
who thunders on high, made women an evil for mortal men, conspirators
in harsh deeds.
And he gave a second evil in return for the good:
469. for the good: The gift of fire.
471. . . . loud-thundering Zeus: The “daughter” is Athena.
474. . . . Plenty: Here Poverty and Plenty are personified, as if they were gods.
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For whoever flees from marriage and the oppressive ways of women
and wishes not to marry, then a wretched old age comes upon him,
and no one to care for him. And although he lives with sufficient substance,
when he dies distant relatives divide up his estate. As for the man
who chooses marriage as his lot, and takes a pleasant wife suited
to his own mind, from the beginning evil goes with the good.
Whoever happens to have a troublemaking wife, he lives with
endless sorrow in his heart and his breast—this evil cannot be cured!
And so you cannot deceive or get around the mind of Zeus.
For not even the generous Prometheus, the son of Iapetos, escaped
his heavy anger, but by necessity, though he knew many things, great
bonds hold him down.
When first Father Sky grew angry in his heart
at Briareos and Kottos and Gygês,° he bound them in powerful bonds,
amazed at their extraordinary manliness and their good looks and their size.
He made them live beneath the wide-wayed earth. There, dwelling beneath
the earth at the end of creation, at the limits of its greatness, they were
afflicted for a long time, having great suffering in their hearts.
But the son of Kronos and the other deathless gods, which bright-haired
Rhea begot in lovemaking with Kronos, brought them up again
into the light on Earth’s cunning advice.
Earth went through the whole
thing thoroughly with them, explaining how they could be victorious
and win splendid fame; for the Titans and the gods, as many as were
begotten by Kronos, were fighting furiously with one another, the bold
Titans from forested Mount Othrys, and the gods, the givers of good
things, from Mount Olympos—those whom bright-haired Rhea
had given birth to, after bedding with Kronos.° They had fought
493. . . . Gygês: The Hundred-Handers. Apparently Sky imprisoned them in Tartaros at the
time of his oppression of Earth and her children.
506. . . . bedding with Kronos: Mount Othrys (6,560 feet high), lies on the southwestern
plain of Thessaly, and Mount Olympos (9,600 feet high) to its north, so that the battle
between the gods and the Titans, the Titanomachy, must have taken place on the plain itself.
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485
490
495
500
505