• The Ancient Greeks were polytheists

• The Gods and Goddesses were:

• immortal, yet they had human emotions e.g. anger, jealously, lust

• connected to each other through relationships and stories

• associated with aspects of nature e.g. Zeus with thunder

• associated with certain cities e.g. Athena with Athens

• seen to intervene in human affairs & interact with humans

• subject to Fate

Ancient Greek Beliefs

The Greek Pantheon

• ‘Pantheon’ definition:

• All the gods of a people or religion collectively.

• (esp. in ancient Greece and Rome) A temple dedicated to all

the gods.

• Key groups:

• The Titans

• The Olympians (gained supremacy by destroying The Titans)

War of the Gods/War of the Titans/Titanomachy

• Ten year battle in the ancient region of Thessaly between the Titans &

the Olympians

• The story:

• Cronus (a Titan) became King of the Gods after overthrowing (and

castrating) his Father, Uranus.

• Cronus was an evil king and ate his children (also, his wife was his

sister)

• His wife/sister hid their youngest child, Zeus, on Crete & fed Cronus a

rock. Zeus was suckled by a goat and raised by a nymph.

• Zeus grew up and became a cupbearer for Cronus…

War of the Gods cont.

• Zeus fed Cronus mustard and wine and Cronus vomited up his

children

• Zeus led his siblings in the battle against the Titans

• Zeus and his siblings won and divided the world amongst

themselves: Zeus took the sky and the air and became god of gods,

Poseidon took the sea & Hades was given the Underworld.

Key Source: Theogony by Hesiod

• Hesiod: Greek poet, lived circa 750-650 BC.

• Theogony is his earliest work

• Looks at:

• origins of the gods

• origins of the universe

• genealogy of the gods

But Rhea was subject in love to Cronos and bare splendid children, Hestia, Demeter, and gold-shod Hera and strong

Hades, pitiless in heart, who dwells under the earth, and the loud-crashing Earth-Shaker, and wise Zeus, father of

gods and men, by whose thunder the wide earth is shaken. These great Cronos swallowed as each came forth from

the womb to his mother's knees with this intent, that no other of the proud sons of Heaven should hold the kingly

office amongst the deathless gods. For he learned from Earth and starry Heaven that he was destined to be overcome

by his own son, strong though he was, through the contriving of great Zeus. Therefore he kept no blind outlook, but

watched and swallowed down his children: and unceasing grief seized Rhea. But when she was about to bear Zeus,

the father of gods and men, then she besought her own dear parents, Earth and starry Heaven, to devise some plan

with her that the birth of her dear child might be concealed, and that retribution might overtake great, crafty Cronos

for his own father and also for the children whom he had swallowed down. And they readily heard and obeyed their

dear daughter, and told her all that was destined to happen touching Cronos the king and his stout-hearted son. So

they sent her to Lyetus, to the rich land of Crete, when she was ready to bear great Zeus, the youngest of her

children. Him did vast Earth receive from Rhea in wide Crete to nourish and to bring up. Thither came Earth

carrying him swiftly through the black night to Lyctus first, and took him in her arms and hid him in a remote cave

beneath the secret places of the holy earth on thick-wooded Mount Aegeum; but to the mightily ruling son of

Heaven, the earlier king of the gods, she gave a great stone wrapped in swaddling clothes.

Theogony – Hesiod http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/hesiod/theogony.htm

“When she had said this

Minerva went away to Olympus,

which they say is the

everlasting home of the gods.

Here no wind beats roughly, and

neither rain nor snow can fall;

but it abides in everlasting

sunshine and in a great

peacefulness of light, wherein

the blessed gods are illumined

for ever and ever.”

– Homer, The Odyssey

Mount Olympus, mythical home of the Twelve

Olympians (Dodekatheon)

http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/odyssey.mb.txt

1. Zeus

2. Hera

3. Poseidon

4. Demeter

5. Athena

6. Hephaestus

7. Hestia

8. Apollo

9. Artemis

10. Ares

11. Aphrodite

12. Hermes

Who

is Hercules?

• Hercules is the Roman name for Heracles, son of Zeus and a mortal

• Known for the Twelve Labours

• Attested in art, poetry & early fragments (3rd Century AD “Heracles

Papyrus” shown above, featuring the first labour – the killing of the lion)

http://www.theoi.com/