Golden age. Birth of Prometheus. War with the Titans. New people. Titans and Olympians Ten-year battle of the gods with the titans

Retelling by V.N. Vladko
Per. from Ukrainian A.I. Belinsky

Golden age

In ancient times, when the titan gods lived in the sky and Kron ruled the world, gods and people differed little from each other, since they came from the same mother - Gaia-Earth. The gods then often descended to earth, to people, and people lived like gods, and did not know exhausting work and grief. The earth generously fed them, and old age did not dare to approach them. All their lives, much longer than those of modern people, they were young and strong, and death came to them unnoticed and painlessly, like a dream. This time is called the Golden Age.

Birth of Prometheus

More and more new gods were born in the sky, the glorious offspring of the Titans - the Titanides. Prometheus stood out among them for his intelligence and nobility. His father was the Titan Iapetus, the brother of Cronos, and his mother was the great Themis, the goddess of justice and justice.

Victory of Zeus

Cronus, fearing that one of his children would take away his royal power, swallowed every newborn baby, which his wife Rhea, according to custom, lowered into his lap.

For a long time Rhea was humble and silent, but when the baby Zeus was born, her heart could not stand it, and she prayed to her mother Gaia to help her. And Gaia taught her unfortunate daughter to hide the baby Zeus in a deep cave on the island of Crete, and to place a large stone wrapped in swaddling clothes on Kron’s lap. Rhea did just that. The titan did not notice the deception and swallowed the stone.

Gaia-Earth herself fed and nurtured her grandson. Years passed. Zeus grew up, his powerful body filled with strength, and he decided to deprive his cruel father of power.

One day, when Cronus, having descended to earth, fell asleep under an oak tree, Zeus attacked him and shackled his formidable father in indestructible shackles. The defeated king of the Titans, at the request of Zeus, returned all the children he had swallowed. And then Zeus threw Cronus into the dark underground abyss of Tartarus.

War with the Titans

The Titans refused to submit to the new ruler. Then Zeus ascended the high Mount Olympus, the top of which is forever shrouded in clouds, and called all the inhabitants of heaven to him.

“Whoever comes with me to the Titans,” proclaimed the new ruler of the gods, “will retain his former power.” Those who did not have power will receive it.

The first to answer this call was the Titanide Styx, the daughter of the Ocean. She brought with her her sons Strength and Power. Oceanus himself, the eldest of the Titans, also went over to the side of Zeus.

Prometheus at first remained loyal to the Titans and tried to convince them to use not only brute force, but also intelligence and cunning in the fight against Zeus. But the Titans scoffed at his advice.

The offended Prometheus realized that the Titans would be defeated in the fight against Zeus. Then he heeded the advice of his mother Themis, who foresaw the destinies of people and gods, and bowed with her before the conqueror of the titan Cronus.

For ten years the titan gods and the gods of Kronida fought, and there was no end in sight to the war. In the eleventh year of the struggle, Prometheus and Themis gave Zeus saving advice: to free the six giants still languishing underground, the sons of Uranus and Gaia - three Cyclopes, who, unlike the other titans, had only one eye in the middle of their foreheads, and three hundred-armed giants. Rescued from the underground abyss, the Cyclones joyfully presented Zeus with the fiery lightning arrows that they had forged in prison. The hundred-armed giants Kott, Briareus and Gies immediately rushed to battle the titans and threw three hundred huge stones at them at a time. Zeus used his new weapon - and frequent lightning rained down from Olympus onto the titans. The forest caught fire, the sea boiled, waves rose to the sky - and the titans trembled and submitted. The hundred-armed brothers put strong shackles on them and threw them into Tartarus.

Lot

When the Titans were overthrown, the younger gods, to whom Zeus had promised power, argued: each praised his own merits and exploits, and each demanded more power for himself.

The Thunderer - this is how the all-powerful ruler of the gods Zeus was nicknamed when he learned the power of the fiery lightning given to him by the Cyclopes - was confused, not knowing who to listen to and what to do. Prometheus helped him out, offering to decide the matter by lot. Everyone liked Prometheus's invention, and there was no one who would not agree to submit to chance. So, by lot, the gods peacefully divided the inheritance of the vanquished. The sky remained with Zeus, the sea went to Poseidon, and Hades became the god of the underworld.

New people

During the battle with the titans, Zeus' lightning burned out all life on the earth - and it was empty. The Thunderer instructed Prometheus to revive life from the ashes. Prometheus kneaded clay and began, together with his brother Epimetheus, to sculpt mortals, starting with the smallest ones. But then Zeus called Prometheus to consult on some important matter, and, leaving, Prometheus ordered Epimetheus to stop working. However, Epimetheus disobeyed, deciding that he could handle it himself.

When Prometheus returned, he saw that the unlucky sculptor had already exhausted almost all the clay, and the main thing - the tribe of people - had not yet been created. I had to pinch off a piece of clay from ready-made animals, birds and fish.

The created creatures lay motionless, drying out under the hot sun, until the beloved daughter of Zeus, the goddess Athena, descending from Olympus, touched each creature with her spear. Instantly everyone who was touched by the wise, skillful and brave daughter of the Thunderer came to life. People also came to life.

The ancient Greek state existed for several thousand years; the history of this world is rich in events, inventions and discoveries that were fateful for humanity. Much that is now familiar to us was invented in this country: the basics of medicine, politics, astrology, philosophy and literature. And the images of the gods, the stories of their lives and the struggle for power are still present to one degree or another in the culture of all countries. Most people can easily answer which gods lived on Olympus, who the Titans or Cyclops were.

First ideas about the world

The entire mythology of the ancient Greeks is a desire to understand and explain natural phenomena. The gods of Mount Olympus known to most of us - Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Ares, Artemis, Apollo and others - were already the embodiment of the ideas of the later period of the existence of Greece. At a time when the people had already formed statehood, comfortable cities appeared, science and thought were developing.

But in the so-called dark times, during the period of the Aegean civilization, man was still completely dependent on the whims of nature, they worshiped it, tried to appease it with offerings and sacrifices. According to researchers, it was at this time that myths about the origin of the world arose. The basis of the belief is stories about Chaos, the universe from which everything came: light and darkness, the first goddess of the earth Gaia, and the ruler of the sky - Uranus. Some are starting to get confused in history here, forgetting who the titans are and identifying them with the rest

Six brothers

In fact, this is not true at all. The Titans are the children of Uranus and Gaia, gods of the second generation. The images of these first monsters were far from the aesthetic perfection that we are accustomed to seeing in the literature of Ancient Greece. The six giant brothers were the embodiment of human fears, instilling horror.

In fact, who the titans are is difficult to understand unambiguously from Ancient Greek mythology. Thanks to the works of Homer, Hesiod, and the tragedies of Aeschylus, we know their names and sphere of activity.

The ocean is the ruler of the world's rivers, personifying the element of water.
Kay (Koi) is a god who embodies the axis of the sky.
Krios is Astraeus' father.
Iapetus - according to one version, the progenitor of the Aryan tribe, his sons were Atlas and Prometheus.
Hyperion - sun god, father of Helios.
Kronos is the main titan. Greece is an ancient country, its history cannot be understood without knowledge of traditions, customs, culture, and a huge layer of the latter is mythology, tales and legends, including about this character. There are several options for identifying it. Most likely, it is identified with time - chronos. Father of the first Olympians.

Six sisters

In addition to the male gods, Gaia and Uranus gave birth to the same number of Titanides, who were destined to become the wives of their brothers:

Tethys. In their marriage with the Ocean, three thousand sons were born - these are rivers, and the same number of daughters. Later in literature it acquired the meaning of one of the epithets of the ocean.
Rhea is the mother of the Olympian gods, both the sister and wife of Kronos.
Theia is the wife of Hyperion, the ruler of the night luminary. In the union of the Sun and Moon, Helios, Eos and Selene appeared.
Themis is traditionally considered the patroness of truth, justice and observance of the law.
Mnemosyne - memory, personified with the universal understanding of existence, the parent of the nine Muses.
Phoebe is the wife of Coy, the mother of Leto and Asteria.

War

All gods were distinguished by one essential feature - the struggle for power. Great Uranus saw in the offspring a threat to himself and his sole rule, and therefore decided to overthrow the offspring back into the earth. What their mother, Gaia, opposed. To protect the children, she persuaded her youngest son Kronos to take a sickle and castrate his murderous father.

From this story it is easy to understand who the titans are; this is a symbol of the victory of the new over the old, in a word, the triumph of progress.

Moreover, this practice of inheriting the world continued with the gods of the third generation. As noted earlier, the host of Olympian rulers is a more mature attempt to understand the surrounding reality among the Greeks.

Like his father Uranus, Kronos, having become king, did not want to give up rule to anyone, so he swallowed all the children born to his sister Rhea immediately after their birth. The mother managed to save one of her sons, Zeus. He was raised in secret from his parents on the island of Crete. Having come into power, the new god planned to overthrow the cruel king.

Knowing who the Titans were and how dangerous they were, Zeus called upon all his brothers and sisters, whom he freed from the womb of Kronos, to help. For ten years there was a battle for power over the world, the future head of Olympus emerged victorious, and overthrew the old titan to Tartarus.

Embodiment in art

The history of the struggle of three generations of ancient gods is described in the epic “Titanomachy” by an unknown author; this work itself has not survived to this day, but according to some sources its content has been partially restored. During the classical period of the development of Greece, many famous writers and poets reproduced certain legends in their books.

In the Middle Ages, a whole cult of worship of ancient Greek history and mythology formed in Europe. Hundreds of authors around the world have looked for inspiration in the legends of this country; there are an endless number of versions, assumptions about who the gods, cyclops, giants are, and what the titans are.

Now the legends of Ancient Greece are experiencing a new round of popularity. Dozens of films on this topic are produced around the world every year.

The wealth of images and pictures of the special beliefs of the Greek people somewhat overshadow the more ancient myths; perhaps now not everyone knows who the titans are, but they are the beginning of the history of this amazing imaginary world.

Zeus is considered a truly Greek supreme deity. He is the father of men and the head of the Olympian family of gods. His name means "bright sky". But his path to Olympus, to the highest level of the supreme deity, was not easy. He, a native of the third generation of gods, took part in a fierce struggle against the second generation of gods - the titan gods. Titans were cruel and largely mindless creatures. For example, Zeus's father Kronus feared that his own children might overthrow him, and devoured their newly born ones. Zeus was saved by Rhea's mother. She gave Kron a stone wrapped in white cloth to swallow, and sent the child to the island of Crete.

Zeus grew up and matured in Crete. The nymphs fed little Zeus with the milk of the divine goat Amalthea. The bees brought him honey from the slopes of the high mountain Dikta. At the entrance to the cave, young demigods struck their shields with their swords when little Zeus cried, so that his father would not hear him cry and the fate of his brothers and sisters would not befall him.

Zeus quickly realized his strength and realized that in order to gain god's power over the world, he would have to fight with his parent. But in this fight he will need allies. Who could be better than siblings? This means that the first thing he had to do was free the swallowed sisters and brothers.

In the stomach of his father Kron there were already five children, future gods. Hestia is the goddess of sacrificial fire and hearth fire, called Vesta by the Romans; Demeter - the great goddess of the fertility of the earth (among the Romans Ceres); Hera - the supreme Olympian goddess (among the Romans Juno); Hades is the god of the underground (among the Romans Pluto) and Poseidon is the ruler of the seas and oceans (among the Romans Neptune).

Zeus decided to go against his father. He agreed with the goddess Metis, the daughter of Ocean and Tethys, that she would make a special drink that would force Cronus to regurgitate the children he had swallowed. The potion was prepared and delivered to Kron. The Titan God drank it with pleasure. And he was turned inside out. The first one he burped was a stone wrapped in a white cloth, followed by all the children in turn. They were born again safe and sound. And united with Zeus, they began a war against their father Cronus and other titans for the right to rule the world.

First of all, they established themselves on high Olympus. Some of the titans went over to their side: Ocean with her daughter Styx and her daughters Zeal, Power and Victory. They wanted to overthrow the hated and evil titans. The struggle was long and brutal. The one-eyed giants, the Cyclopes, sons of Uranus and Gaia, representatives of the elemental forces of nature, decided to help young Zeus.

The Cyclopes forged thunder and lightning for Zeus. There were a huge number of them. And Zeus began to throw them at the titans. But he was unable to immediately defeat the harsh and powerful gods. This stubborn struggle continued for ten years, with the advantage now in one direction or the other. It was necessary to look for new assistants. And Zeus freed the hundred-armed giants Hecatoncheires from the bowels of the earth. They were terrible to look at: huge as mountains, powerful and black as the very bowels of the earth. They grabbed huge rocks and threw them at the titans. From such a massacre the earth groaned, the air shook, the water boiled in the seas, and fires broke out all around. But the titans did not retreat; they held on to the base of Olympus with a death grip.

And then Zeus began to throw fiery lightning and roaring thunder at them with redoubled force. All nature around was on fire, and a heavy stench covered the entire space with a thick veil. It became impossible to breathe. The Titans could not withstand such pressure, they were tired, their strength was exhausted. And they retreated from Olympus and stopped fighting.

This was a victory for Zeus and his allies. The Olympian gods grabbed the exhausted titans, bound them in chains and threw them into the very depths of gloomy Tartarus - into eternal darkness. There they were locked behind copper gates, which were guarded by the hundred-armed giants Hecatoncheires. The Titans were completely eliminated, and a new galaxy of gods appeared on Olympus, led by the supreme god Zeus.

Very early, attempts began to group the myths about the numerous gods of Ancient Greece through genealogies, to bring ideas about them into a system corresponding to the course of phenomena in the real world. In these theosophical constructions of religious concepts, physical revolutions, traces of which were still visible or preserved by echoes of ancient myths, were presented in the form of wars that different tribes or generations of gods waged among themselves, and from which Zeus and other Olympian gods emerged victorious, taking possession of the universe and who gave it its current order. So, the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece represented the cosmos in the current perfection of its improvement as the result of a long development from rough elemental principles into a harmonious organism; The course of the history of the universe, according to the Greeks, was an ascension, not a descent, an improvement, perfection, and not corruption. The light region of the ether (sky) was the most important department of the universe in all the myths about the gods of Ancient Greece; whoever possesses the shining throne of the kingdom of heaven is the ruler of the rest of the universe; everything in the entire universe receives a form consistent with the qualities of the one who rules in the realm of the ether. The most ancient myths about the origin of the gods and the universe were collected by Hesiod. He was from the Boeotian city of Askra. His systematic collection of myths is called "Theogony". This is a poem. The summary of the Theogony is as follows:

The beginning of the origin of the gods

Initially, before the emergence of the gods, there was Chaos, a formless primeval space in which Tartarus (matter, the dark void) and Eros (Eros, Eros, the generative force) were located. The movements of Tartarus under the influence of Eros gave birth to Erebus (primordial fog) and Night. Eros began to act in them, and they gave birth to Ether and day (Hemera). Matter, which was in Chaos, formed into the first goddess - the “broad-breasted” Gaia (earth), the mother and nourisher of everything, producing all living things, and receiving everything produced again into her dark bosom. Gaia, having risen, gave birth to Uranus (the starry sky), and he spread his arch over her; having descended, she gave birth to the sea (Pontus), and it spread out under her; She also gave birth to mountains.

Origin of the Titans

Then the next stage in the origin of the ancient Greek gods began. Eros began to act in the universe again, attracting the male and female elements to unite, and she, combining with Uranus spread over her, gave birth to the gods; these gods were the Titans, Cyclops and Hecatoncheires - volcanic and neptunian forces of nature, whose activity still continued on the continent of Greece, and especially on the islands, but seemed weakened compared to what it had been before. There were twelve Titans: six male and six female. Some of them chose the sky as their home, others the earth, and others the sea. The titan and titan who settled in the sea were Oceanus and Tethys (water), from which, according to other theogonic systems, everything came. According to the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece, the Ocean is a river flowing around the earth and the sea covered by the earth; it is a deep and ring-shaped belt of flowing water; its flow is circular; he is the boundary of the world, and he himself is limitless. When the concept of the Ocean River is personified in the image of Titan, this god, who retains the name Ocean, is a kind, gentle old man. This titan and his wife, the progenitor of rivers and streams, live in the far west, which was generally a wonderland in ancient Greek myths. All rivers rushing through gorges, like mighty bulls or victorious heroes making their way through the barriers of mountains, all quiet rivers of the plains, all streams and springs were considered in the myths of Ancient Greece to be the sons and daughters of the gods Ocean and Tethys. Their first-born children were Styx and Aheloy. The Styx (in Greek, a feminine name) was the Black River; her personification, the ancient Greek goddess Styx, lived in the distant west, where the sun hides, where the land of night is; her home was a magnificent house standing between the rocks with silver columns that rose to the very sky. In the myths of Ancient Greece, she was the guardian of the sacred river flowing in a dark gorge, the waters of which the gods swore when they made an unbreakable promise. – Achelous, the “silver river,” was in mythology a representative of rivers that feed vegetation. Ancient Greek myths located the source of this sacred, great river at Dodona, and the Dodona region, irrigated by Achelous, the homeland of the Pelasgians, was “full of grass and bread, goats, sheep and herds of heavy-paced cattle.” At the Ocean, where the garden of the Hesperides and where the sources of ambrosia are, Zeus combined with Hera, the goddess of the clouds, the queen of the sky, who was raised by Ocean and Tethys.

In the shining sky, according to ancient Greek mythology, lived the Titan Hyperion “high-walking” and the Titan Theia (shine); from them were born the gods Helios (Sun), Selene (Moon) and Eos (Dawn; Eos is a feminine word in Greek); Also in the sky lived another couple, Kay and Phoebe (the bright one), the parents of Leto (the silence of the night) and Asteria (the Starlight). The children of the Titan Eos were the Wind gods; there were four of them: Zephyr, Boreas, Noth and Eurus.

According to the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece, of the titans and titans who lived on earth, some were personifications of human qualities and phases of human development; This was the significance of Iapetus and his sons, who are also called titans: Atlas (or Atlas), supporting the sky; arrogant Menoetius; the cunning Prometheus; the feeble-minded Epimetheus; ideas about them provided rich material for thoughtful myths and great works of ancient Greek poetry. The Titans who lived on earth were personifications of beneficial forces that gave human life prosperity or noble pleasures; These were Themis, the goddess of justice and legal order; her daughters and Zeus were in the myths about the gods of Ancient Greece Ora (Horai, hours of the day, seasons), the goddess of the correct course of annual changes in nature and the correct structure of human life; Eurynome, mother of Charit (Grace), goddesses of everything sweet, attractive in nature and in human life: fun, beauty, grace; Mnemosyne, whose daughters from her union with Zeus were the goddesses of singing, the muses; the formidable Hecate, the goddess of fate, who was very highly respected; She was the first of all deities to be prayed to by those offering sacrifices of atonement; good and evil came from her to people. Subsequently, Hecate became the goddess of roads and crossroads in the myths of Ancient Greece; crossroads were burial places, and on them, near the tombs, in the mysterious light of the moon, ghosts appeared; therefore Hecate became the terrible goddess of witchcraft and ghosts, accompanied by the howling of dogs.

Cyclops and Hecatonchires

In the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece, Gaia, in addition to the Titans, gave birth to the Cyclops and Hecatoncheires from her marriage with Uranus. Cyclops, giants with a large, round, fiery eye in the middle of their forehead, were personifications of clouds sparkling with lightning. There were three of them. There were also three Hecatoncheires, the “Hundred-Handed” giants, who personified earthquakes and stormy waves of the sea that flooded the earth. These huge monsters were so strong that, according to myths about the origin of the gods, Uranus himself began to fear them; therefore he bound them and cast them into the depths of the earth; They are now raging in its depths, producing eruptions of fire-breathing mountains and earthquakes.

Cyclops Polyphemus. Painting by Tischbein, 1802

Castration of Uranus by Cronus

Gaia, suffering from this, decided to take revenge on Uranus. She made a large sickle out of iron and gave it to Krona, the youngest of the titans, who alone of all of them agreed to fulfill his mother’s plan. When Uranus descended at night on the bed of Gaia, Cronus, hiding near that place, cut off his father’s penis with a sickle and threw it away. Gaia took the drops of blood that fell at the same time, and from them gave birth to three Erinyes, giants and Melian nymphs. In the myths of Ancient Greece, Erinyes, who had snakes instead of hair on their heads, walk with torches throughout the earth, pursuing and punishing evildoers; there are three of them: Tisiphone (the killing avenger), Alecto (the tireless pursuer) and Megaera (the terrible). Giants and Melian nymphs were personifications of vengeance, violence, and bloodshed in the myths of Ancient Greece. The penis cut off from Uranus fell into the sea and was carried along the waves; from the white foam of these waves, Aphrodite (Anadyomene, “rising from the water”) was born, who formerly formed part of the being of Uranus (formerly Urania), now becoming a special being. Uranus cursed the Titans. – According to the scientist Preller, Cronus was initially the god of the ripening of bread in Ancient Greece and became the personification of time, moving imperceptibly towards the time of ripening, and quickly cutting off what was ripe, “the god of the withering heat, which stops the rains of his father, the sky.”

Uranus and Gaia. Ancient Roman mosaic 200-250 AD.

Origin of Nereus and the Sea Deities

According to the myths about the origin of the gods, Gaia also had children from cohabitation with Pontus, the sea. The first of these children of hers was Nereus, a kind, favorable sea god, the father of numerous daughters, the Nereids, beautiful sea nymphs who were personifications of the calm sea, quiet bays, and bright life near safe bays. The next children of Gaia from cohabitation with Pontus, the sons Thaumas and Phorcys and the daughter Keto, were personifications of the majestic and terrible phenomena of the sea. The daughter of Phorcys and the oceanid Electra (“brilliant”) was Iris, the rainbow; their other daughters were in ancient Greek myths the Harpies, the goddess of destructive storms, whirlwinds, and deaths.

Hercules and Nereus. Boeotian vessel ca. 590-580 BC.

Graia, Scylla and Gorgons

From the cohabitation of Phorkidas and Keto, the ugly Graias, the terrible monsters Scylla and Gorgons were born; they lived on the edge of the universe, where the sun sets, in the land of Night and its children. - The Grays, three sisters, were already gray-haired old women at birth; all three, they had only one eye and one tooth, which they used alternately. The Gorgons, of which the most terrible was Medusa, were winged monsters with human heads, on which there were snakes instead of hair, and with such a terrible expression on their faces that from their gaze all living things turned to stone.

Scylla. Boeotian red-figure crater of the second half of the 5th century. BC

Hesperides and Atlas

Not far from the Gorgons, at the border of eternal darkness, lived the Hesperides, daughters of Night; their singing was beautiful; they lived on a charming island, which was not reached by sailors, and where the fertile land produces its most excellent gifts to the gods”; The Hesperides guarded the golden apples that grew on this island. Next to the Hesperides gardens stood the titan Atlas (Atlas), the personification of the Atlas Range; he held on his head, supporting him with his hands, “the wide vault of heaven.” – Mother of the Hesperides, Night, was a good goddess who gave birth to light; at the end of each day, she covers the earth with her moist wings and gives sleep to all nature.

Moira

Moira, goddesses of the birth and death of people, were either also daughters of Night, or daughters of Zeus and Themis. In the myths of Ancient Greece there were three of them: Clotho spun the beginning of the thread of human life, Lachesis continued spinning the thread started by her sister, Atropos (inevitable) cut the thread. Goddesses of human destiny, they were the guardians of the laws of necessity, on the action of which order and improvement in nature and in human society are based.

Thanat and Kera

The children of the night were also the inexorable god of death, Thanat, and the terrible Kera, goddesses of fate, mainly the fate that gives people death in battles; on the battlefields they were “terrible in appearance, in bloody clothes,” dragging and tormenting the wounded and killed.

God Kron

Uranus, the sky that gives the rain that fertilizes the earth, was, according to the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece, deprived of dominion by Cronus, the personification of that power of the sky that gives ripening to the fruits of the earth. Cronus became ruler; his reign was a golden age; then “the fruit was ripe forever, and the harvest was forever.” But his father’s curse took away from him the power to be renewed with youth, so in the myths about the origin of the gods he is a symbol of old age, a pale, withered old man, with gray hair and a long beard, bent over, gloomy. It was predicted to him that his children would overthrow him, just as he overthrew his father; therefore, he absorbed all the children that his wife, Rhea, bore to him, the personification of the productive power of mountains and forests, “mother mountain,” later identified with the Phrygian goddess of nature, Cybele, the founder of cities, who wore a crown made in the form of a city wall.

Zeus and the fight of the gods with the titans

According to ancient Greek myths, Cronus absorbed all his children; but when the last son, Zeus, was born, the mother gave Cronus a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes to swallow and hid the beautiful baby in a cave. The nymphs fed him there with milk and honey, and the Curetes and Corybantes - the personification of thunderclouds - danced around, striking their spears on their shields so that the baby’s cry could not be heard by the parent. Zeus quickly grew up and, with the help of Rhea’s cunning, forced his father to disgorge the devoured children. The stone he had swallowed was also thrown out; Zeus placed it "for eternal remembrance at Delphi" on the winding slope of Parnassus. Zeus freed the Cyclopes; they gave him thunder and lightning, and he, according to ancient Greek myths about the origin of the gods, began a fight with Cronus for dominion over the universe.

"Zeus from Otricoli". Bust of the 4th century BC

All the gods of Ancient Greece took part in the struggle; some took the side of Cronus, others took the side of Zeus. The war of the gods lasted ten years. The titans' camp was on Othrid, the younger generation's deities' camp was on Olympus. The ancient Greek myth about this “war with the Titans” (Titanomachy) is based, perhaps, on memories of earthquakes during which a breach of the seaside ridge, the Tempeian Gorge, was formed, and the waters of the Thessalian plain flowed into the sea. Under the feet of the fighting gods the earth shook to the depths of Tartarus. God Zeus finally showed all his power, continuously throwing lightning, so that all the forests were on fire, the whole earth was on fire, the sea was boiling; the eyes of the titans were blinded by the brilliance of lightning, and the ancient Chaos itself stirred in its depths, thinking that the hour of its dominion had come, that both heaven and earth would be cast into it. But the titans still held out irresistibly. Zeus summoned the hundred-armed, fifty-headed Hecatoncheires to his aid; They began to throw huge rocks at the titans, three hundred rocks at a time, and overthrew the titans into Tartarus, which is as deep below the earth as the sky is high from it. According to ancient Greek myths, the overthrown titans were bound there in chains. But not all the Titans were against Zeus; Themis, Oceanus and Hyperion fought for him and were accepted among the celestials.

Division of the universe between Zeus, Poseidon and Hades

The victory was celebrated with a brilliant holiday, with military dances and games. After that, the myths about the origin of the gods of Ancient Greece continue, the sons of Cronus divided among themselves, either by lot or by choice, dominion over the universe. Zeus received supreme power in heaven and on earth, Poseidon dominion over the sea and all waters; Hades (Pluto) became the ruler in the depths of the earth, where the dark dwellings of the dead are. Earth and Olympus remained the common possession of all gods and goddesses. But some of them took under their special protection those countries and cities that they especially loved and in which they were especially honored. The titans thrown into Tartarus remained there, bound in chains. Poseidon fenced Tartarus with a strong wall with copper gates. Hecatoncheires, the terrible forces of earthquakes, in ancient Greek myths guard the titans so that they do not break out of Tartarus and destroy the bright world of the Olympian gods. And the titans, the children of the angry earth, the disorderly, evil elements of nature, who opposed the rule of the gods and the moral improvement of life, remained forever in Tartarus. This is how the most ancient myths told about the origin of the gods. But when the morals of the ancient Greeks softened, poetry freed the titans from darkness and bondage, transferred them to the Islands of the Blessed, and installed there the “ancient” god Kronus as king over the chosen dead of the ancient blessed times.

Poseidon (Neptune). Antique statue of the 2nd century. according to R.H.

Typhon

Zeus had to defend his dominion against new enemies. Gaia combined with Tartarus and gave birth to her last child, the most terrible of all, Typhon (or Typheus), the personification of gases bursting from the bowels of the earth and causing volcanic upheavals. In ancient Greek myths, it was a colossal monster that had a hundred dragon heads with black tongues, flaming eyes and the hissing of its heads was terrible. Typhon was the most terrible of all the enemies who fought with the Olympians. He almost took over the universe. Zeus struck him with lightning. The struggle was such that it shook the heights of Olympus and the bowels of the earth to its deepest foundations. Zeus finally beat off all the heads of the monster with lightning, and it fell; his body burned with such fire that the earth became hot, like burning iron, and melted and flowed. Zeus cast the headless but living monster into Tartarus. But even from there Typhon sends destruction to land and sea, emitting scorching winds and other harmful effects of heat.

The fight of gods with giants. Pergamon Altar

A series of battles over ten years in Thessaly between two camps of deities long before the existence of the human race: the Titans, based on Mount Ophrys, and the Olympians who would come to rule, based on Mount Olympus. The Titanomachy is also known as the Clash of the Titans, the Battle of the Gods, or simply the Titan War. The battlefield was located between Mount Ophrys and Mount Olympus in Thessaly. The Olympians were victorious with the help of the Cyclops and Hecatoncheires.

From Greek literature of the classical period there are several poems about the war between the gods and many of the Titans. At the same time, the dominant poem, and the only one that has survived to this day, is Theogony, whose author is considered to be Hesiod. The lost epic, the Titanomachy, whose author was said to be the legendary blind Thracian singer Thamyris, is mentioned in passing in the treatise On Music, a work previously attributed to Plutarch. The Titans also played a prominent role in the poems attributed to Orpheus. Although only fragments of Orpheus' stories have come down to us, they show interesting differences from the Hesiodian tradition.

These Greek Titanomachy stories are one variant in a whole class of similar myths from Europe and the Middle East, where one generation or group of gods as a whole opposes the dominant god. Sometimes the Elder Gods are forced out of their positions. Sometimes the rebels lose, and are either driven out of power completely or entered into the pantheon. Other examples would be the wars of the Aesir with the Vanir and Jotun in Norse mythology, the Babylonian epic Enuma Elish, the Hittite Kingdom in Heaven about Kumarbi, the struggle between the Tuatha Dé Danann and the Fomorians in Celtic mythology, and the vague conflict of generations in the Ugaritic fragments.

Previous Events

The groundwork for this important battle was laid after the young titan Kronos overthrew his father, Uranus, lord of the heavens, with the help of his mother, Gaia (Γαία - Earth). Uranus aroused the enmity of Gaia when he imprisoned her children Hecatoncheires and Cyclopes in Tartarus. Gaia created a large sickle and gathered Kronos and his brothers to convince them of the need to castrate Uranus. Only Kronos agreed to do this, so Gaia gave him a sickle and placed it in a bush and, having done this, Kronos became the king of the Titans.

When Uranus met Gaia, Kronos attacked Uranus and, cutting off his genitals with a sickle, threw them into the sea. Uranus predicted that the children of Kronos would rebel against his rule, just as Kronos rebelled against his own father. The blood of Uranus, spilled on the earth, gave birth to the Giants, Erinyes, and Melia, and from his seed from the cut off genitals, Aphrodite arose from the sea:

Kronos took over his father's throne after the murder of Uranus. He then consolidated his power by re-imprisoning his Hecatoncheires and Cyclops siblings and his (newly created) Giant siblings in Tartarus.

Kronos now turned into a terrible king like his father Uranus was, he swallowed each of the children as they were born from his sister-wife Rhea. Rhea, however, managed to hide her child Zeus by tricking Kronos into swallowing a stone wrapped in a blanket instead.

Rhea brought Zeus to a cave on the island of Crete, where he was raised to adulthood by Amalthea. Metis later gave Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, causing him to vomit all the children he had swallowed. Zeus led the freed brothers and sisters in a rebellion against the Titans.

According to Hyginus, the reason for the Titanomachy is as follows - “After Hera saw that Epaphus, born of a concubine, ruled such a large kingdom (Egypt), she wanted him to be killed during the hunt, and also called on the Titans to drive Zeus out of the kingdom and return the throne to Kronos (Saturn). When the Titans tried to establish the sky, Zeus, with the help of Athena, Apollo and Artemis, threw them straight into Tartarus. On Atlas, who was their leader, he laid the vault of heaven; even now he is ordered to support the sky on his shoulders.”

Titanomachy

The lost epic of the Titanomachy, which deals with the struggle waged by Zeus and his siblings, the Olympian Gods, in overthrowing their father Cronus and his Divine Generation of Titans, is traditionally attributed to Eumelus of Corinth, a semi-legendary singer of the Bacchiades, the ruling family in ancient Corinth, who valued as the traditional composer of the Prosody, the ceremonial anthem of Messenian independence, which was sung on Delos.

Even in Antiquity, many authors mentioned the Titanomachy without the name of the author. M. L. West, in an analysis of the evidence, concluded that the name "Eumelus" was attached to the poem as the only name available. From the most fragmentary evidence, it seems that the mention of Eumelus in the Titanomachy was different from the mention in Hesiod's theogony. It is impossible for the date of the poem to be the eighth century BC; M. L. West dates it to the late seventh century or earlier.

The Titanomachy was divided into two books. The battle of the Olympians and the Titans was preceded by some kind of theogony, or genealogy of the Primitive Gods, in which, as the Byzantine writer Lydus noted, the author of the Titanomachy placed the birth of Zeus, not in Crete, but in Lydia, which must mean Mount Sipylus.

Literature

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Synonyms:

See what "Titanomachy" is in other dictionaries:

Noun, number of synonyms: 1 battle (20) ASIS Dictionary of Synonyms. V.N. Trishin. 2013… Synonym dictionary

titanomachy- titanium ahiya, and (mythological) ... Russian spelling dictionary

Eumelus of Corinth was an ancient Greek poet of the archaic era, of whose works only minor fragments have survived. Author of the epic poems "Corinthiac" ("Corinthian Tales"), "Europia" and, possibly, "Titanomachy", and a hymn for the Delian ... ... Wikipedia

Teaches... Wikipedia

This term has other meanings, see Ether. Ether (Αἰθήρ) ... Wikipedia

Not to be confused with Titanomachy. Gigantomachy (ancient Greek: γιγαντομαχία) battle of the Olympian gods with the giants. The battle of the Olympian gods with the Titans is appropriately called the Titanomachy. The course of the battle is described in detail by Apollodorus in his “Peri... ... Wikipedia

Arctinus, ancient Greek poet of the 8th century BC. e., son of Teles from Miletus, was considered the author of the epic poems “Ethiopida” and “The Destruction of Ilion”. Arctinus (or Eumelus of Corinth) was also credited with the authorship of the poem Titanomachy. Eusebius attributes it either ... Wikipedia

Chiron teaches Achilles to play the lyre Chiron (ancient Greek Χείρων, Heiron) in ancient Greek Thessalian mythology, a centaur, the son of Kronos and Philyra, initially endowed with immortality. The poem “Instructions of Chiron” was attributed to Hesiod ... Wikipedia

Books

Myths and legends of Ancient Greece. World creation. Titanomachy. Olympian gods. Bilingual Greek-Russian, Beletskaya I.G.. This publication, which has no analogues in the past, organically combines Greek-Russian bilingualism and an art album with 279 drawings, is dedicated to a new, modern interpretation of ancient Greek...