[134][179] Chariclo's son Tiresias happened to be hunting on the same mountain and came to the spring searching for water. She fastened the head of the gorgon Medusa to the shield to scare others in battle. In every city and village in ancient Greece Athena, the goddess of war and wisdom, was one of the most venerated beings in the entire pantheon. Thus, Plato believed that Athena's name was derived from Greek , Atheonawhich the later Greeks rationalised as from the deity's (, thes) mind (, nos). [43][40] She was also the patron of metalworkers and was believed to aid in the forging of armor and weapons. [citation needed], The aegis of Athena is referred to in several places in the Iliad. She is the daughter of Zeus and Metis, and is said to have been born fully grown and armored from the . Athena, in Greek mythology, is widely known as the goddess of wisdom and warfare. [213], Attic black-figure exaleiptron of the birth of Athena from the head of Zeus (c. 570560 BC) by the C Painter[208], Attic red-figure kylix of Athena Promachos holding a spear and standing beside a Doric column (c. 500-490 BC), Restoration of the polychrome decoration of the Athena statue from the Aphaea temple at Aegina, c.490 BC (from the exposition "Bunte Gtter" by the Munich Glyptothek), The Mourning Athena relief (c. 470-460 BC)[211][208], Attic red-figure kylix showing Athena slaying the Giant Enceladus (c. 550500 BC), Relief of Athena and Nike slaying the Giant Alkyoneus (?) In a late rendering by Gaius Julius Hyginus (Poetical Astronomy ii. [42] Athena was worshipped at festivals such as Chalceia as Athena Ergane,[43][40] the patroness of various crafts, especially weaving. [197] Aphrodite, Hera, and Athena all claimed to be the fairest, and thus the rightful owner of the apple. [citation needed] Athena deflects his blow with her aegis, a powerful shield that even Zeus's thunderbolt and lightning cannot blast through. [117] Although Agamemnon attempted to placate her anger with sacrifices, Athena sent a storm at Cape Kaphereos to destroy almost the entire Greek fleet and scatter all of the surviving ships across the Aegean. Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Dewing Greek Numismatic Foundation Also in the Iliad, Zeus, the chief god, specifically assigned the sphere of war to Ares, the god of war, and Athena. Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom and war, was known by a number of attributes and symbols. [216] Some even viewed the Virgin Mary as a warrior maiden, much like Athena Parthenos;[216] one anecdote tells that the Virgin Mary once appeared upon the walls of Constantinople when it was under siege by the Avars, clutching a spear and urging the people to fight. [226] Instead, Athena was transformed into the personification of freedom and the republic[226] and a statue of the goddess stood in the center of the Place de la Revolution in Paris. "Athene's garments and aegis were borrowed by the Greeks from the Libyan women, who are dressed in exactly the same way, except that their leather garments are fringed with thongs, not serpents."[11]. [46] Some have described Athena, along with the goddesses Hestia and Artemis as being asexual, this is mainly supported by the fact that in the Homeric Hymns, 5, To Aphrodite, where Aphrodite is described as having "no power" over the three goddesses. [207] Ajax later commits suicide as a result of his humiliation. [120] In another version of the story, Pallas was a Giant;[106] Athena slew him during the Gigantomachy and flayed off his skin to make her cloak, which she wore as a victory trophy. Also in the Iliad, Zeus, the chief god, specifically assigns the sphere of war to Ares, the god of war, and Athena. 70),[6] or as a chlamys. [101] Then Zeus experienced an enormous headache. [227], A statue of Athena stands directly in front of the Austrian Parliament Building in Vienna,[228] and depictions of Athena have influenced other symbols of Western freedom, including the Statue of Liberty and Britannia. [141] An almost exact story was said about another girl, Elaea, who transformed into an olive, Athena's sacred tree. [117], Athena also gets into a duel with Ares, the god of the brutal wars, and her male counterpart [203] Ares blames her for encouraging Diomedes to tear his beautiful flesh. [105][98][101] He was in such pain that he ordered someone (either Prometheus, Hephaestus, Hermes, Ares, or Palaemon, depending on the sources examined) to cleave his head open with the labrys, the double-headed Minoan axe. He turns her to stone. [109] Pindar, in his "Seventh Olympian Ode", states that she "cried aloud with a mighty shout" and that "the Sky and mother Earth shuddered before her. 1332x850 Wallpaper bird, God, helmet, spear, shield, goddess, Athena, greek mythology images for desktop, section - download Download 1920x1200 Free Norse Wallpaper Downloads, [100+] Norse Wallpapers for FREE | Wallpapers.com [10][17] However, any connection to the city of Athens in the Knossos inscription is uncertain. She was a child of Zeus and Metis (Titaness), Zeus' first wife. Full of contradictions, Athena was a female deity overseeing traditionally male domains. [225] A series of paintings by Peter Paul Rubens depict Athena as Marie de' Medici's patron and mentor;[226] the final painting in the series goes even further and shows Marie de' Medici with Athena's iconography, as the mortal incarnation of the goddess herself. [197][134], The goddesses chose to place the matter before Zeus, who, not wanting to favor one of the goddesses, put the choice into the hands of Paris, a Trojan prince. [178] According to Pindar, Athena gave the aulos to mortals as a gift. [183][182][134], Myrmex was a clever and chaste Attic girl who became quickly a favourite of Athena. Athenas association with the acropolises of various Greek cities probably stemmed from the location of the kings palaces there. [125] Athena was infuriated by this violation of her protection. [57], Athena was also credited with creating the pebble-based form of divination. Athena's origin story in Greek mythology is one of particular interest. [46] Burkert notes that the Athenians sometimes simply called Athena "the Goddess", h thes ( ), certainly an ancient title. [139] The serpent in the story may be the same one depicted coiled at Athena's feet in Pheidias's famous statue of the Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon. She is most famous for being the patron god of the city of Athens. [citation needed] Athena taunted the gods who supported Troy, saying that they will too eventually end up like Ares and Aphrodite, which scared them, therefore proving her power and reputation among the other gods. Hurt by the girl's betrayal, Athena transformed her into the small insect bearing her name, the ant. Her emergence there as city goddess, Athena Polias (Athena, Guardian of the City), accompanied the ancient city-states transition from monarchy to democracy. [37][38], In her aspect of Athena Polias, Athena was venerated as the goddess of the city and the protectress of the citadel. The most renowned sculpture of Athena, the gold and ivory Athena Parthenos that once stood in the Parthenon, included two gorgoneia: one on her aegis and one on her shield. [199][134] This woman was Helen, who was already married to King Menelaus of Sparta. Occasionally, another god used ite.g., Apollo in the Iliad, where it provoked terror. [56] This role is expressed in several stories about Athena. As the guardian of the welfare of kings, Athena became the goddess of good counsel, of prudent restraint and practical insight, as well as of war. Athena became the goddess of crafts and skilled peacetime pursuits in general. [94][95][96] The earliest mention is in Book V of the Iliad, when Ares accuses Zeus of being biased in favor of Athena because "autos egeinao" (literally "you fathered her", but probably intended as "you gave birth to her"). Her major symbols include owls, olive trees, snakes, and the Gorgoneion. The head itself had been a gift from the Gorgon's slayer, Perseus. [6] A vestige of that appears in a portrait of Alexander the Great in a fresco from Pompeii dated to the first century BC, which shows the image of the head of a woman on his armor that resembles the Gorgon. That she ultimately became allegorized to personify wisdom and righteousness was a natural development of her patronage of skill. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. According to Edith Hamilton's Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes,[7] the Aegis is the breastplate of Zeus, and was "awful to behold". 13), Zeus is said to have used the skin of a pet goat owned by his nurse Amalthea (aigis "goat-skin") which suckled him in Crete, as a shield when he went forth to do battle against the Titans.[6]. [130] On the eve of the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC, the serpent did not eat the honey cake[130] and the Athenians interpreted it as a sign that Athena herself had abandoned them. The daughter of Zeus, the king of the gods, and the Titaness Metis. [70] In a temple at Phrixa in Elis, reportedly built by Clymenus, she was known as Cydonia (). A virgin, she had no children of her own but occasionally befriended or adopted others. The handicrafts she is most known. [90], She was the daughter of Zeus, produced without a mother, and emerged full-grown from his forehead. [148][151] When Perseus swung his blade to behead Medusa, Athena guided it, allowing his scythe to cut it clean off. [229] The Great Seal of California bears the image of Athena kneeling next to a brown grizzly bear. Athena is customarily portrayed wearing an aegis, body armor, and a helmet and carrying a shield and a lance. [158] When half the jury votes to acquit and the other half votes to convict, Athena casts the deciding vote to acquit Orestes[158] and declares that, from then on, whenever a jury is tied, the defendant shall always be acquitted.[159]. She was widely worshipped, but in modern times she is associated primarily with Athens, to which she gave her name. Out of envy, the other athletes murdered her, but Athena took pity in her and transformed her dead body into a myrtle, a plant thereafter as favoured by her as the olive was. [152][153], In ancient Greek art, Athena is frequently shown aiding the hero Heracles. 27 (trans. [185][190] Arachne scoffed and wished for a weaving contest, so she could prove her skill. Similarly, in the Greek mythology and epic tradition, Athena figures as a daughter of Zeus ( ; cfr. Athena in Greek Mythology. [211][7][209] Her shield bears at its centre the aegis with the head of the gorgon (gorgoneion) in the center and snakes around the edge. In Greek mythology, Athena was a maiden goddess and was often depicted as abstaining from romantic and sexual relationships. But how did Athena get the name Pallas? "Athena, by the time she appears in art," Jane Ellen Harrison remarks, "has completely shed her animal form, has reduced the shapes she once wore of snake and bird to attributes, but occasionally in black-figure vase-paintings she still appears with wings. [18] A sign series a-ta-no-dju-wa-ja appears in the still undeciphered corpus of Linear A tablets, written in the unclassified Minoan language. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). [160][145] For the first part of the poem, however, she largely is confined to aiding him only from afar, mainly by implanting thoughts in his head during his journey home from Troy. As the goddess of both wisdom and war, Athena was one of the most important deities in ancient Greek mythology. [72][73], The Greek biographer Plutarch (AD 46120) refers to an instance during the construction of the Propylaia of her being called Athena Hygieia (, i.e. personified "Health") after inspiring a physician to a successful course of treatment. She was the daughter of Zeus, produced without a mother, so that she emerged full-grown from his forehead. This was supposedly the origin of calling Athena's sacred olive tree moria, for Halirrhotius's attempt at revenge proved fatal (moros in Greek). [6][tone] "Aegis-bearing Zeus", as he is in the Iliad, sometimes lends the fearsome aegis to Athena. Dewing 1595, silver Athenian tetradrachm (=4 drachmas), ca. Athena taught Arachne the art of weaving and Phalanx the art of war, but when brother and sister laid together in bed, Athena was so disgusted with them that she turned them both into spiders, animals forever doomed to be eaten by their own young. Athena, or Athene, In ancient Greek religion, the goddess of war, handicraft, and wisdom and the patroness of Athens.Her Roman counterpart was Minerva. [62] An Ionic-style temple to Athena Polias was built at Priene in the fourth century BC. It bore the head of a Gorgon and made a terrible roaring sound during the battle. [161][146][162] It is not until he washes up on the shore of the island of the Phaeacians, where Nausicaa is washing her clothes that Athena arrives personally to provide more tangible assistance. In the later writings of the Roman poet Ovid, Athena was said to have competed against the mortal Arachne in a weaving competition, afterward transforming Arachne into the first spider; Ovid also describes how she transformed Medusa into a Gorgon after witnessing her being raped by Poseidon in her temple. Born from Zeus's head, she was his favorite daughter and possessed great wisdom, bravery, and resourcefulness. She was thought to have had neither consort nor offspring. Perseus used this shield to see Medusa's reflection in order to fight her without looking at . [6] The name Athenai is likely of Pre-Greek origin because it contains the presumably Pre-Greek morpheme *-n-.[8]. Athena, like the other characters in Homer's epic, comes from a rich and vivid cultural tapestry of ancient Greek myth. Her superiority also derived in part from the vastly greater variety and importance of her functions and the patriotism of Homer's predecessors, Ares being of foreign origin. Nor shall we be far wrong in supposing that the author of it wished to identify this Goddess with moral intelligence [ , en thei nesin], and therefore gave her the name Etheonoe; which, however, either he or his successors have altered into what they thought a nicer form, and called her Athena. Also known as Pallas Athena, she wore a breastplate made out of goatskin called the Aegis, which was given to her by her father, Zeus. [46] Athena was frequently equated with Aphaea, a local goddess of the island of Aegina, originally from Crete and also associated with Artemis and the nymph Britomartis. [148][149] Athena gave Perseus a polished bronze shield to view Medusa's reflection rather than looking at her directly and thereby avoid being turned to stone. [135] Differing reports say that they either found that the child itself was a serpent, that it was guarded by a serpent, that it was guarded by two serpents, or that it had the legs of a serpent. [222][221][223] Athena is also used as the personification of wisdom in Bartholomeus Spranger's 1591 painting The Triumph of Wisdom or Minerva Victorious over Ignorance. It established their descent from earlier deities considered to remain powerful. [54][55][45][53][56] Athena's most famous temple, the Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis, takes its name from this title. 13).[2]. [192] It represented the unjust and discrediting behavior of the gods towards mortals. [178] The aulos was picked up by the satyr Marsyas, who was later killed by Apollo for his hubris. Athena was probably a pre-Hellenic goddess and was later taken over by the Greeks. Zeus, sympathizing with Apollo's grievances, discredited the pebble divination by rendering the pebbles useless. Athena's Introduction Athena is the Greek goddess of wisdom and war. Since the Renaissance, Athena has become an international symbol of wisdom, the arts, and classical learning. In art, she is generally depicted wearing a helmet and holding a spear. The qualities that led to victory were found on the aegis, or breastplate, that Athena wore when she went to war: fear, strife, defense, and assault. [f] Based on these similarities, the Sinologist Martin Bernal created the "Black Athena" hypothesis, which claimed that Neith was brought to Greece from Egypt, along with "an enormous number of features of civilization and culture in the third and second millennia". [201][202] When the Trojan women go to the temple of Athena on the Acropolis to plead her for protection from Diomedes, Athena ignores them. [207], Athena appears frequently in classical Greek art, including on coins and in paintings on ceramics. [62] Bells made of terracotta and bronze were used in Sparta as part of Athena's cult. At the end of the day she was viewed as a monster and had her head decapitated by Perseus only to be used as an item on Athena's Aegis Shield. However, Athena did have a relationship with the hero and hunter, Hercules, which resulted in the birth of their son, named Perses. [130] Another version of the myth of the Athenian maidens is told in Metamorphoses by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BC17 AD); in this late variant Hermes falls in love with Herse. The shield of a deity as described above. [27][28] The cult of Athena may have also been influenced by those of Near Eastern warrior goddesses such as the East Semitic Ishtar and the Ugaritic Anat,[10] both of whom were often portrayed bearing arms. [199][134] The other two goddesses were enraged and, as a direct result, sided with the Greeks in the Trojan War. The aegis appears in works of art sometimes as an animal's skin thrown over Athena's shoulders and arms, occasionally with a border of snakes, usually also bearing the Gorgon head, the gorgoneion. [187] According to Ovid, Arachne (whose name means spider in ancient Greek[188]) was the daughter of a famous dyer in Tyrian purple in Hypaipa of Lydia, and a weaving student of Athena. She was also a warrior goddess, and was believed to lead soldiers into battle as Athena Promachos. She was essentially urban and civilized, the antithesis in many respects of Artemis, goddess of the outdoors. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. [87] Michael Janda has connected the myth of Trita to the scene in the Iliad in which the "three brothers" Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades divide the world between them, receiving the "broad sky", the sea, and the underworld respectively. [200] Numerous passages in the Iliad also mention Athena having previously served as the patron of Diomedes's father Tydeus. In this context, Graves identifies the aegis as clearly belonging first to Athena. [125] When the Greeks captured Troy, Cassandra, the daughter of Priam, clung to the palladium for protection,[125] but Ajax the Lesser violently tore her away from it and dragged her over to the other captives. [50], In her aspect as a warrior maiden, Athena was known as Parthenos ( "virgin"),[45][52][53] because, like her fellow goddesses Artemis and Hestia, she was believed to remain perpetually a virgin. [204] Then, Hector throws his spear at Achilles and misses, expecting Deiphobus to hand him another,[205] but Athena disappears instead, leaving Hector to face Achilles alone without his spear. However, Zeus is normally portrayed in classical sculpture holding a thunderbolt or lightning, bearing neither a shield nor a breastplate. [43] During the late fifth century BC, the role of goddess of philosophy became a major aspect of Athena's cult. In a founding myth reported by Pseudo-Apollodorus,[113] Athena competed with Poseidon for the patronage of Athens. Athena appears in Homer's Odyssey as the tutelary deity of Odysseus, and myths from later sources portray her similarly as the helper of Perseus and Heracles (Hercules). An alternative story was that Zeus swallowed Metis, the goddess of counsel, while she was pregnant with Athena so that Athena finally emerged from Zeus. [232] Freud once described Athena as "a woman who is unapproachable and repels all sexual desires - since she displays the terrifying genitals of the Mother. Hesiod told how Athena sprang in full armour from Zeus's forehead. [176] Poseidon lusted after Medusa, and raped her in the temple of Athena,[176] refusing to allow her vow of chastity to stand in his way. Athena, goddess of wisdom Though Hercules had an enemy, Hera, on Mount Olympus, he also had a friend. [156] In Aeschylus's tragedy Orestes, Athena intervenes to save Orestes from the wrath of the Erinyes and presides over his trial for the murder of his mother Clytemnestra. [128], Afterwards, Poseidon was so angry over his defeat that he sent one of his sons, Halirrhothius, to cut down the tree. Another possible meaning may be "triple-born" or "third-born", which may refer to a triad or to her status as the third daughter of Zeus or the fact she was born from Metis, Zeus, and herself; various legends list her as being the first child after Artemis and Apollo, though other legends identify her as Zeus' first child. After he and his mother were exiled from their homeland, Perseus was raised on a remote island where he grew up protecting his mother from the cruel King Polydectes. [197] Hera tried to bribe Paris with power over all Asia and Europe,[197][134] and Athena offered fame and glory in battle,[197][134] but Aphrodite promised Paris that, if he were to choose her as the fairest, she would let him marry the most beautiful woman on earth. [64] The temple was dedicated by Alexander the Great[65] and an inscription from the temple declaring his dedication is now held in the British Museum. [178], A myth told by the early third-century BC Hellenistic poet Callimachus in his Hymn 5 begins with Athena bathing in a spring on Mount Helicon at midday with one of her favorite companions, the nymph Chariclo. This article was most recently revised and updated by, From Athena to Zeus: Basics of Greek Mythology, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Athena-Greek-mythology, Roman and Greek Gods - Facts about Athena, Ancient Origins - Athena: Fiercely Feminine Goddess of War and Wisdom, Athena - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Athena - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). [134][179] He inadvertently saw Athena naked, so she struck him blind to ensure he would never again see what man was not intended to see. [4] Athena was regarded as the patron and protectress of various cities across Greece, particularly the city of Athens, from which she most likely received her name. [29] Athena's birth from the head of Zeus may be derived from the earlier Sumerian myth of Inanna's descent into and return from the Underworld. While the specifics of. [127] They agreed that each would give the Athenians one gift[127] and that Cecrops, the king of Athens, would determine which gift was better. She is also associated with craftsmanship and handiwork. [178] Later, this version of the story became accepted as canonical[178] and the Athenian sculptor Myron created a group of bronze sculptures based on it, which was installed before the western front of the Parthenon in around 440 BC. [193] Arachne's tapestry featured twenty-one episodes of the deities' infidelity,[191][192][190] including Zeus being unfaithful with Leda, with Europa, and with Dana. In ancient Greek mythology, the goddess Athena kept an owl on her shoulder that revealed truths to her and represented wisdom and knowledge. [136] In Pausanias's story, the two sisters were driven mad by the sight of the chest's contents and hurled themselves off the Acropolis, dying instantly,[137] but an Attic vase painting shows them being chased by the serpent off the edge of the cliff instead. Dyeus). Her superiority also derives in part from the vastly greater variety and importance of her functions and from the patriotism of Homers predecessors, Ares being of foreign origin. Updates? [44], As Athena Promachos, she was believed to lead soldiers into battle. In ancient Greek religion, Athena was a goddess of war, handicraft, and practical reason. [47][48] Athena was believed to only support those fighting for a just cause[47] and was thought to view war primarily as a means to resolve conflict.
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