159-516: The Athena Giustiniani or Minerva Giustiniani is a Roman marble statue of Pallas Athena , based on a Greek bronze sculpture of the late 5th–early 4th century BCE. Formerly in the collection of Vincenzo Giustiniani , it is now in the Vatican Museums (inv. 2223). The statue, of Parian marble , is 2.25 m high. It depicts Athena standing, wearing a thin chiton covered by a heavier himation draped over her left shoulder. On her breast
318-461: A founding myth reported by Pseudo-Apollodorus, Athena competed with Poseidon for the patronage of Athens. They agreed that each would give the Athenians one gift and that Cecrops , the king of Athens, would determine which gift was better. Poseidon struck the ground with his trident and a salt water spring sprang up; this gave the Athenians access to trade and water. Athens at its height
477-404: A symposium . One rite of passage was the amphidromia , celebrated on the fifth or seventh day after the birth of a child. Childbirth was extremely significant to Athenians, especially if the baby was a boy. One ceremony was pharmakos , a ritual involving expelling a symbolic scapegoat such as a slave or an animal, from a city or village in a time of hardship. It was hoped that by casting out
636-534: A "terrifying warrior goddess" and that both goddesses were closely linked with creation. 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 . Plato notes that the citizens of Sais in Egypt worshipped a goddess known as Neith , whom he identifies with Athena. Neith was the ancient Egyptian goddess of war and hunting, who
795-486: A certain city. Athena was associated with Athens , Apollo with Delphi and Delos , Zeus with Olympia and Aphrodite with Corinth . But other gods were also worshipped in these cities. Other deities were associated with nations outside of Greece; Poseidon was associated with Ethiopia and Troy , and Ares with Thrace . Identity of names was not a guarantee of a similar cultus ; the Greeks themselves were well aware that
954-453: A chaste girl who outdid all her fellow athletes in both the palaestra and the race. 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. An almost exact story was said about another girl, Elaea , who transformed into an olive, Athena's sacred tree. According to Pseudo-Apollodorus's Bibliotheca , Athena advised Argos ,
1113-466: A cleansing ritual within the Erechtheion , a sanctuary devoted to Athena and Poseidon. Here Athena's statue was undressed, her clothes washed, and body purified. Athena was worshipped at festivals such as Chalceia as Athena Ergane , the patroness of various crafts, especially weaving . She was also the patron of metalworkers and was believed to aid in the forging of armor and weapons. During
1272-465: A collection of beliefs, rituals , and mythology , in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices . The application of the modern concept of "religion" to ancient cultures has been questioned as anachronistic . The ancient Greeks did not have a word for 'religion' in the modern sense. Likewise, no Greek writer known to us classifies either the gods or the cult practices into separate 'religions'. Instead, for example, Herodotus speaks of
1431-505: A connection to the Rigvedic god Trita , who was sometimes grouped in a body of three mythological poets. 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. Janda further connects the myth of Athena being born of
1590-552: A disembodied soul. Some Greeks, such as the philosophers Pythagoras and Plato , also embraced the idea of reincarnation , though this was only accepted by a few. Epicurus taught that the soul was simply atoms which were dissolved at death, so one ceased to exist on dying. Greek religion had an extensive mythology . It consisted largely of stories of the gods and how they interacted with humans. Myths often revolved around heroes and their actions, such as Heracles and his twelve labors , Odysseus and his voyage home, Jason and
1749-422: A few gods, and supported a statue of the particular deity. Votive deposits were left at the altar, such as food, drinks, as well as precious objects. Sometimes animal sacrifices were performed here, with most of the flesh taken for eating and the offal burnt as an offering to the gods. Libations , often of wine, would be offered to the gods as well, not only at shrines, but also in everyday life, such as during
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#17327974665301908-459: A good deal about cult but very little about creed, in no small measure because the Greeks in general considered what one believed to be much less importance than what one did. The Greeks believed in an underworld inhabited by the spirits of the dead. One of the most widespread areas of this underworld was ruled by Hades, a brother of Zeus, and was also known as Hades (originally called 'the place of Hades'). Other well-known realms are Tartarus ,
2067-551: A just cause and was thought to view war primarily as a means to resolve conflict. The Greeks regarded Athena with much higher esteem than Ares. Athena was especially worshipped in this role during the festivals of the Panathenaea and Pamboeotia , both of which prominently featured displays of athletic and military prowess. As the patroness of heroes and warriors, Athena was believed to favor those who used cunning and intelligence rather than brute strength. In her aspect as
2226-588: A major role in forming the relationship between humans and the divine. It has been suggested that the Chthonic deities, distinguished from Olympic deities by typically being offered the holocaust mode of sacrifice, where the offering is wholly burnt, may be remnants of the native Pre-Hellenic religion, and that many of the Olympian deities may come from the Proto-Greeks who overran the southern part of
2385-423: A male-dominated Indo-European hierarchy, has been proposed for Greece as for Minoan Crete and other regions, but has not been in favor with specialists for some decades, though the question remains too poorly evidenced for a clear conclusion; at the least the evidence from Minoan art shows more goddesses than gods. The Twelve Olympians , with Zeus as sky father , certainly have a strong Indo-European flavor; by
2544-644: A man injured during the construction of the gateway to the Acropolis . Mechanitis (Μηχανῖτις), meaning skilled in inventing, was one of the epithets of her. At Athens there is the temple of Athena Phratria , as patron of a phratry , in the Ancient Agora of Athens . Athena's epithet Pallas – her most renowned one – is derived either from πάλλω , meaning "to brandish [as a weapon]", or, more likely, from παλλακίς and related words, meaning "youth, young woman". On this topic, Walter Burkert says "she
2703-695: A map to the afterlife , a communal worship, and a band of spiritual fellowship. Some of these mysteries, like the mysteries of Eleusis and Samothrace , were ancient and local. Others were spread from place to place, like the mysteries of Dionysus . During the Hellenistic period and the Roman Empire , exotic mystery religions became widespread, not only in Greece, but all across the empire. Some of these were new creations, such as Mithras , while others had been practiced for hundreds of years before, like
2862-403: A perceived whim of the deity. In some places visitors were asked to show they spoke Greek; elsewhere Dorians were not allowed entry. Some temples could only be viewed from the threshold. Some temples are said never to be opened at all. But generally Greeks, including slaves, had a reasonable expectation of being allowed into the cella . Once inside the cella it was possible to pray to or before
3021-471: A place of torment for the damned, and Elysium , a place of pleasures for the virtuous. In the early Mycenaean religion all the dead went to Hades, but the rise of mystery cults in the Archaic age led to the development of places such as Tartarus and Elysium. A few Greeks, like Achilles , Alcmene , Amphiaraus , Ganymede , Ino , Melicertes , Menelaus , Peleus , and a great number of those who fought in
3180-415: A recognition of her role as enforcer of rules of sexual modesty and ritual mystery. Even beyond recognition, the Athenians allotted the goddess value based on this pureness of virginity, which they upheld as a rudiment of female behavior. Kerényi's study and theory of Athena explains her virginal epithet as a result of her relationship to her father Zeus and a vital, cohesive piece of her character throughout
3339-607: A single transcendent deity . The worship of these deities, and several others, was found across the Greek world, though they often have different epithets that distinguished aspects of the deity, and often reflect the absorption of other local deities into the pan-Hellenic scheme. The religious practices of the Greeks extended beyond mainland Greece, to the islands and coasts of Ionia in Asia Minor , to Magna Graecia ( Sicily and southern Italy), and to scattered Greek colonies in
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#17327974665303498-531: A singular notion about her; and indeed calls her by a still higher title, "divine intelligence" [ θεοῦ νόησις , theoũ nóēsis ], as though he would say: This is she who has the mind of God [ ἁ θεονόα , a theonóa ]. Perhaps, however, the name Theonoe may mean "she who knows divine things" [ τὰ θεῖα νοοῦσα , ta theia noousa ] better than others. Nor shall we be far wrong in supposing that the author of it wished to identify this Goddess with moral intelligence [ εν έθει νόεσιν , en éthei nóesin ], and therefore gave her
3657-445: A symbol of Athenian economic prosperity. Robert Graves was of the opinion that "Poseidon's attempts to take possession of certain cities are political myths", which reflect the conflict between matriarchal and patriarchal religions. Afterwards, Poseidon was so angry over his defeat that he sent one of his sons, Halirrhothius , to cut down the tree. But as he swung his axe, he missed his aim and it fell in himself, killing him. This
3816-471: A temple at Phrixa in Elis , reportedly built by Clymenus , she was known as Cydonia (Κυδωνία). Pausanias wrote that at Buporthmus there was a sanctuary of Athena Promachorma (Προμαχόρμα), meaning protector of the anchorage . The Greek biographer Plutarch describes Pericles's dedication of a statue to her as Athena Hygieia (Ὑγίεια, "Health") after she inspired, in a dream, his successful treatment of
3975-664: A temple of Minerva. A later family tradition among the Giustiniani held that the statue's head had been found separately during the construction of the Collegio Romano and sold to them by the Jesuits at an exorbitant price. The statue was bought by Lucien Bonaparte in 1805 and placed in the grand hall of his Roman residence, the Palazzo Nunez. In 1817 he sold it to Pope Pius VII , who in 1822 installed it in
4134-448: A temple was built to her at Las . In Pergamon, Athena was thought to have been a god of the cosmos and the aspects of it that aided Pergamon and its fate. She was the daughter of Zeus, produced without a mother, and emerged full-grown from his forehead. There was an alternate story that Zeus swallowed Metis, the goddess of counsel, while she was pregnant with Athena and when she was fully grown she emerged from Zeus' forehead. Being
4293-458: A temple was ever built there. The tenemos might include many subsidiary buildings, sacred groves or springs, animals dedicated to the deity, and sometimes people who had taken sanctuary from the law, which some temples offered, for example to runaway slaves. The earliest Greek sanctuaries probably lacked temple buildings, though our knowledge of these is limited, and the subject is controversial. A typical early sanctuary seems to have consisted of
4452-468: A tenemos, often around a sacred grove, cave, rock ( baetyl ) or spring, and perhaps defined only by marker stones at intervals, with an altar for offerings. Many rural sanctuaries probably stayed in this style, but the more popular were gradually able to afford a building to house a cult image, especially in cities. This process was certainly under way by the 9th century, and probably started earlier. The temple interiors did not serve as meeting places, since
4611-436: A term for lesser attendants. As priestesses, they gained social recognition and access to more luxuries than other Greek women who worked or stayed in the home. They were mostly from local elite families; some roles required virgins, who typically only served for a year or so before marriage, while other roles went to married women. Women who voluntarily chose to become priestesses received an increase in social and legal status to
4770-543: A type of museum. Some sanctuaries offered oracles , people who were believed to receive divine inspiration in answering questions put by pilgrims. The most famous of these by far was the female priestess called the Pythia at the Temple of Apollo at Delphi , and that of Zeus at Dodona , but there were many others. Some dealt only with medical, agricultural or other specialized matters, and not all represented gods, like that of
4929-527: A typical human. They interacted with humans, sometimes even spawning children—called demigods —with them. At times, certain gods would be opposed to others, and they would try to outdo each other. In the Iliad , Aphrodite , Ares , and Apollo support the Trojan side in the Trojan War, while Hera , Athena , and Poseidon support the Greeks (see theomachy ). Some gods were specifically associated with
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5088-565: A warrior maiden, Athena was known as Parthenos ( Παρθένος "virgin"), because, like her fellow goddesses Artemis and Hestia , she was believed to remain perpetually a virgin. Athena's most famous temple, the Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis , takes its name from this title. According to Karl Kerényi , a scholar of Greek mythology, the name Parthenos is not merely an observation of Athena's virginity, but also
5247-499: A young priestess who served in the temple of Athena in Athens. Poseidon lusted after Medusa, and raped her in the temple of Athena, refusing to allow her vow of chastity to stand in his way. Upon discovering the desecration of her temple, Athena transformed Medusa into a hideous monster with serpents for hair whose gaze would turn any mortal to stone . Ancient Greek religion Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed
5406-425: Is Glaukopis ( γλαυκῶπις ), which usually is translated as, "bright-eyed" or "with gleaming eyes". The word is a combination of glaukós ( γλαυκός , meaning "gleaming, silvery", and later, "bluish-green" or "gray") and ṓps ( ὤψ , "eye, face"). The word glaúx ( γλαύξ , "little owl") is from the same root, presumably according to some, because of the bird's own distinctive eyes. Athena
5565-422: Is an aegis with a gorgoneion . Her left arm reaches across the front of her body to hold the edge of the himation; the right arm is bent upward at the elbow to clasp a spear. On her head is a Corinthian helmet , and on the ground to her right is a coiled serpent, which may allude to the story of Erichthonios , the authochthonous king of Athens. The forearms and parts of the fingers are modern restorations, as are
5724-629: Is believed to be dead, but Odysseus lies back to her, employing skillful prevarications to protect himself. Impressed by his resolve and shrewdness, she reveals herself and tells him what he needs to know to win back his kingdom. She disguises him as an elderly beggar so that he will not be recognized by the suitors or Penelope, and helps him to defeat the suitors. Athena also appears to Odysseus's son Telemachus. Her actions lead him to travel around to Odysseus's comrades and ask about his father. He hears stories about some of Odysseus's journey. Athena's push for Telemachus's journey helps him grow into
5883-458: Is dedicated to her, along with numerous other temples and monuments. As the patron of craft and weaving, Athena was known as Ergane . She was also a warrior goddess , and was believed to lead soldiers into battle as Athena Promachos . Her main festival in Athens was the Panathenaia , which was celebrated during the month of Hekatombaion in midsummer and was the most important festival on
6042-616: Is generally agreed that the cult of Athena preserves some aspects of the Proto-Indo-European transfunctional goddess . 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 , both of whom were often portrayed bearing arms. Classical scholar Charles Penglase notes that Athena resembles Inanna in her role as
6201-402: Is occasionally referred to as "Tritonia". 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. Several scholars have suggested
6360-522: Is served, in times of danger or before some important endeavor to gain the gods' favor. For example, in the Odyssey Eumaeus sacrifices a pig with prayer for his unrecognizable master Odysseus. But in the Iliad , which partly reflects very early Greek civilization, not every banquet of the princes begins with a sacrifice. These sacrificial practices share much with recorded forms of sacrificial rituals known from later. Furthermore, throughout
6519-603: Is the Pallas of Athens, Pallas Athenaie , just as Hera of Argos is Here Argeie ". In later times, after the original meaning of the name had been forgotten, the Greeks invented myths to explain its origins, such as those reported by the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus and the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, which claim that Pallas was originally a separate entity, whom Athena had slain in combat. In one version of
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6678-664: The Acropolis , dying instantly, but an Attic vase painting shows them being chased by the serpent off the edge of the cliff instead. Erichthonius was one of the most important founding heroes of Athens and the legend of the daughters of Cecrops was a cult myth linked to the rituals of the Arrhephoria festival. Pausanias records that, during the Arrhephoria, two young girls known as the Arrhephoroi , who lived near
6837-520: The Balkan Peninsula in the late third millennium BCE. Various religious festivals were held in ancient Greece. Many were specific only to a particular deity or city-state. For example, the festival of Lykaia was celebrated in Arcadia in Greece, which was dedicated to the pastoral god Pan . Like the other Panhellenic Games , the ancient Olympic Games were a religious festival, held at
6996-656: The Epic Cycle and supposedly ending up in Rome, was one of these. The sacred boulder or baetyl is another very primitive type, found around the Mediterranean and Ancient Near East . Many of the Greek statues well known from Roman marble copies were originally temple cult images, which in some cases, such as the Apollo Barberini , can be credibly identified. A very few actual originals survive, for example,
7155-589: The Gerarai or the venerable ones. There were segregated religious festivals in Ancient Greece; the Thesmophoria , Plerosia, Kalamaia, Adonia , and Skira were festivals that were only for women. The Thesmophoria festival and many others represented agricultural fertility, which was considered to be closely connected to women. It gave women a religious identity and purpose in Greek religion, in which
7314-547: The Gorgoneion . In art, she is generally depicted wearing a helmet and holding a spear. From her origin as an Aegean palace goddess , Athena was closely associated with the city. She was known as Polias and Poliouchos (both derived from polis , meaning "city-state"), and her temples were usually located atop the fortified acropolis in the central part of the city. The Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis
7473-904: The Homeric hymns (regarded as later productions today), Hesiod's Theogony and Works and Days , and Pindar 's Odes were regarded as authoritative and perhaps inspired; they usually begin with an invocation to the Muses for inspiration. Plato even wanted to exclude the myths from his ideal state described in the Republic because of their low moral tone. While some traditions, such as Mystery cults, upheld certain texts as canonic within their praxis, such texts were respected but not necessarily accepted as canonic outside their circle. In this field, of particular importance are certain texts referring to Orphic cults : multiple copies, ranging from between 450 BCE and 250 CE, have been found in various parts of
7632-664: The Laconian towns of Mantineia and Tegea . The temple of Athena Alea in Tegea was an important religious center of ancient Greece. The geographer Pausanias was informed that the temenos had been founded by Aleus . Athena had a major temple on the Spartan Acropolis , where she was venerated as Poliouchos and Khalkíoikos ("of the Brazen House", often latinized as Chalcioecus ). This epithet may refer to
7791-626: The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus . The temple was dedicated by Alexander the Great and an inscription from the temple declaring his dedication is now held in the British Museum . She was worshipped as Athena Asia in Colchis -- supposedly on an account of a nearby mountain with that name -- from which her worship was believed to have been brought by Castor and Pollux to Laconia , where
7950-603: The Mycenaean civilization . Both the literary settings of some important myths and many important sanctuaries relate to locations that were important Helladic centers that had become otherwise unimportant by Greek times. The Mycenaeans perhaps treated Poseidon, to them a god of earthquakes as well as the sea, as their chief deity, and forms of his name along with several other Olympians are recognizable in records in Linear B , while Apollo and Aphrodite are absent. Only about half of
8109-589: The Trojan war , make Athena instead the daughter of Cronus , a king of Byblos who visited "the inhabitable world" and bequeathed Attica to Athena. In Homer's Iliad , Athena, as a war goddess, inspired and fought alongside the Greek heroes; her aid was synonymous with military prowess. Also in the Iliad, Zeus, the chief god, specifically assigned the sphere of war to Ares, the god of war, and Athena. Athena's moral and military superiority to Ares derived in part from
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#17327974665308268-513: The epithet Pallas , is an ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva . 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. The Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens is dedicated to her. Her major symbols include owls , olive trees , snakes, and
8427-518: The founding myth of Athens, Athena bested Poseidon in a competition over patronage of the city by creating the first olive tree. She was known as Athena Parthenos "Athena the Virgin". In one archaic Attic myth, the god Hephaestus tried and failed to rape her, resulting in Gaia giving birth to Erichthonius , an important Athenian founding hero. Athena was the patron goddess of heroic endeavor; she
8586-418: The hecatomb (meaning 100 bulls) might in practice only involve a dozen or so, at large festivals the number of cattle sacrificed could run into the hundreds, and the numbers feasting on them well into the thousands. The evidence of the existence of such practices is clear in some ancient Greek literature, especially Homer 's epics. Throughout the poems, the use of the ritual is apparent at banquets where meat
8745-480: The homonymous sea-deity was her parent according to some early myths. One myth relates the foster father relationship of this Triton towards the half-orphan Athena, whom he raised alongside his own daughter Pallas . Kerényi suggests that "Tritogeneia did not mean that she came into the world on any particular river or lake, but that she was born of the water itself; for the name Triton seems to be associated with water generally." In Ovid 's Metamorphoses , Athena
8904-412: The sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them, at altars within the wider precinct of the sanctuary, which might be large. As the centuries passed both the inside of popular temples and the area surrounding them accumulated statues and small shrines or other buildings as gifts, and military trophies, paintings and items in precious metals, effectively turning them into
9063-486: The semen off using a tuft of wool , which she tossed into the dust, impregnating Gaia and causing her to give birth to Erichthonius . Athena adopted Erichthonius as her son and raised him. The Roman mythographer Hyginus records a similar story in which Hephaestus demanded Zeus to let him marry Athena since he was the one who had smashed open Zeus's skull, allowing Athena to be born. Zeus agreed to this and Hephaestus and Athena were married, but, when Hephaestus
9222-460: The year in Athens included some 140 days that were religious festivals of some sort, though they varied greatly in importance. The main Greek temple building sat within a larger precinct or temenos , usually surrounded by a peribolos fence or wall; the whole is usually called a "sanctuary". The Acropolis of Athens is the most famous example, though this was apparently walled as a citadel before
9381-405: The "first fruits" were harvested. The libation , a ritual pouring of fluid, was part of everyday life, and libations with a prayer were often made at home whenever wine was drunk, with just a part of the cup's contents, the rest being drunk. More formal ones might be made onto altars at temples, and other fluids such as olive oil and honey might be used. Although the grand form of sacrifice called
9540-609: The 17th century in the collection of the Italian banker and art collector Vincenzo Giustiniani , from whom it received its modern nickname. It is the first statue illustrated in the Galleria Giustiniana , a luxuriously produced series of engravings of works in the Giustiniani collection, which was published in the 1630s or 1640s. The statue was discovered in Rome, but early sources offer two different opinions about its find spot. According to one tradition, first recorded in
9699-522: The 18th century, it was recovered from the ruins of the nymphaeum on the Esquiline Hill mistakenly identified as a " Temple of Minerva Medica "; according to the other, recorded in the 17th century by Pietro Santi Bartoli and more widely accepted by modern scholars, it was found in the Orto di Minerva , adjacent to the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva , which was thought to have been built over
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#17327974665309858-461: The 5th century BCE, traced many Greek religious practices to Egypt . Robert G. Boling argues that Greek and Ugaritic / Canaanite mythology share many parallel relationships and that historical trends in Canaanite religion can help date works such as Homer 's Iliad and Odyssey . The Great Goddess hypothesis , that a Stone Age religion dominated by a female Great Goddess was displaced by
10017-480: The Artemis worshipped at Sparta , the virgin huntress, was a very different deity from the Artemis who was a many-breasted fertility goddess at Ephesus . Though worship of the major deities spread from one locality to another, and though most larger cities had temples to several major gods, the identification of different gods with different places remained strong to the end. Ancient sources for Greek religion tell
10176-552: The Athenian calendar. In Greek mythology , Athena was believed to have been born from the forehead of her father Zeus . In some versions of the story, Athena has no mother and is born from Zeus' forehead by parthenogenesis . In others, such as Hesiod 's Theogony , Zeus swallows his consort Metis , who was pregnant with Athena; in this version, Athena is first born within Zeus and then escapes from his body through his forehead. In
10335-454: The Athenians sometimes simply called Athena "the Goddess", hē theós (ἡ θεός), certainly an ancient title. After serving as the judge at the trial of Orestes in which he was acquitted of having murdered his mother Clytemnestra , Athena won the epithet Areia (Αρεία). Some have described Athena, along with the goddesses Hestia and Artemis as being asexual, this is mainly supported by
10494-623: The Egyptian mysteries of Osiris . Mainstream Greek religion appears to have developed out of Proto-Indo-European religion and although very little is known about the earliest periods there are suggestive hints that some local elements go back even further than the Bronze Age or Helladic period to the farmers of Neolithic Greece . There was also clearly cultural evolution from the Late Helladic Mycenaean religion of
10653-527: The Elder writes that Hera "rejoices" at Athena's birth "as though Athena were her daughter also". The second-century AD Christian apologist Justin Martyr takes issue with those pagans who erect at springs images of Kore , whom he interprets as Athena: "They said that Athena was the daughter of Zeus not from intercourse, but when the god had in mind the making of a world through a word ( logos ) his first thought
10812-470: The English used to venerate the figure by kissing its hand, which as a result was whiter than the rest of the statue. Its popularity and influence in the 18th century can be traced through a variety of small-scale copies and allusions in other arts: In the 19th and early 20th centuries, when plaster casts of classical sculpture were produced in large quantities for museums, schools, and private collections in
10971-458: The Geometric style (900–750 BCE), but are very rarely mentioned in literature; they were relatively late introductions to Greece, and it has been suggested that Greek preferences in this matter were established earlier. The Greeks liked to believe that the animal was glad to be sacrificed, and interpreted various behaviors as showing this. Divination by examining parts of the sacrificed animal
11130-543: The Greek world. Even the words of the oracles never became a sacred text. Other texts were specially composed for religious events, and some have survived within the lyric tradition; although they had a cult function, they were bound to performance and never developed into a common, standard prayer form comparable to the Christian Pater Noster . An exception to this rule were the already named Orphic and Mystery rituals, which, in this, set themselves aside from
11289-490: The Hellenes as having "common shrines of the gods and sacrifices, and the same kinds of customs." Most ancient Greeks recognized the twelve major Olympian gods and goddesses — Zeus , Hera , Poseidon , Demeter , Athena , Ares , Aphrodite , Apollo , Artemis , Hephaestus , Hermes , and either Hestia or Dionysus —although philosophies such as Stoicism and some forms of Platonism used language that seems to assume
11448-518: The Lesser violently tore her away from it and dragged her over to the other captives. Athena was infuriated by this violation of her protection. 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. In Homer 's epic works , Athena's most common epithet
11607-543: The Linear B Mycenaean expressions a-ta-na po-ti-ni-ja and di-u-ja or di-wi-ja ( Diwia , "of Zeus" or, possibly, related to a homonymous goddess ), resulting in a translation "Athena of Zeus" or "divine Athena". Similarly, in the Greek mythology and epic tradition, Athena figures as a daughter of Zeus ( Διός θυγάτηρ ; cfr. Dyeus ). However, the inscription quoted seems to be very similar to " a-ta-nū-tī wa-ya ", quoted as SY Za 1 by Jan Best. Best translates
11766-603: The Mycenaean pantheon seems to survive the Greek Dark Ages . The archaeological evidence for continuity in religion is far clearer for Crete and Cyprus than the Greek mainland. Greek religious concepts may also have absorbed the beliefs and practices of earlier, nearby cultures, such as Minoan religion , and other influences came from the Near East, especially via Cyprus and Phoenicia . Herodotus , writing in
11925-649: The Mycenaeans, two rows of figures carrying vessels seem to meet in front of a central figure, which is probably the Minoan precursor to Athena. The early twentieth-century scholar Martin Persson Nilsson argued that the Minoan snake goddess figurines are early representations of Athena. Nilsson and others have claimed that, in early times, Athena was either an owl herself or a bird goddess in general. In
12084-492: The Thesmophorion, where women could perform their rites and worship. Those who were not satisfied by the public cult of the gods could turn to various mystery religions that operated as cults into which members had to be initiated in order to learn their secrets. Here, they could find religious consolations that traditional religion could not provide: a chance at mystical awakening, a systematic religious doctrine,
12243-786: The Titans, who then gave birth to the first Olympians. The mythology largely survived and was expanded to form the later Roman mythology . The Greeks and Romans were literate societies, and much mythology, although initially shared orally, was written down in the forms of epic poetry (such as the Iliad , the Odyssey and the Argonautica ) and plays (such as Euripides ' The Bacchae and Aristophanes ' The Frogs ). The mythology became popular in Christian post- Renaissance Europe, where it
12402-558: The Trojan and Theban wars, were considered to have been physically immortalized and brought to live forever in either Elysium, the Islands of the Blessed, heaven, the ocean, or beneath the ground. Such beliefs are found in the most ancient Greek sources, such as Homer and Hesiod . This belief remained strong even into the Christian era. For most people at the moment of death there was, however, no hope of anything but continued existence as
12561-761: The United States, copies of the "Minerva Giustiniani" appear regularly in the catalogues of several commercial cast manufacturers. Such casts representing Europe's great sculpture were exhibited regularly at American world's fairs and other expositions, such as the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo in 1901 and the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis in 1904. Pallas Athena Athena or Athene , often given
12720-579: The Western Mediterranean, such as Massalia (Marseille). Early Italian religions such as the Etruscan religion were influenced by Greek religion and subsequently influenced much of the ancient Roman religion . "There was no centralization of authority over Greek religious practices and beliefs; change was regulated only at the civic level. Thus, the phenomenon we are studying is not in fact an organized "religion". Instead we might think of
12879-475: The aegis as an apology. In another version of the story, Pallas was a Giant ; Athena slew him during the Gigantomachy and flayed off his skin to make her cloak, which she wore as a victory trophy. In an alternative variation of the same myth, Pallas was instead Athena's father, who attempted to assault his own daughter, causing Athena to kill him and take his skin as a trophy. The palladium
13038-462: The aegis, or breastplate, that Athena wore when she went to war: fear, strife, defense, and assault. 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). As the guardian of the welfare of kings, Athena became the goddess of good counsel, prudent restraint and practical insight, and war. In
13197-552: The age of puberty . Some priestly functions, like the care for a particular local festival, could be given by tradition to a certain family. To a large extent, in the absence of "scriptural" sacred texts, religious practices derived their authority from tradition, and "every omission or deviation arouses deep anxiety and calls forth sanctions". Greek ceremonies and rituals were mainly performed at altars , which were never inside temples, but often just outside, or standing by themselves somewhere. These were typically devoted to one or
13356-436: The ages. This role is expressed in several stories about Athena. Marinus of Neapolis reports that when Christians removed the statue of the goddess from the Parthenon , a beautiful woman appeared in a dream to Proclus , a devotee of Athena, and announced that the "Athenian Lady" wished to dwell with him. Athena was also credited with creating the pebble-based form of divination. Those pebbles were called thriai , which
13515-492: The arts , and classical learning . Western artists and allegorists have often used Athena as a symbol of freedom and democracy. Athena is associated with the city of Athens . The name of the city in ancient Greek is Ἀθῆναι ( Athȇnai ), a plural toponym , designating the place where—according to myth—she presided over the Athenai , a sisterhood devoted to her worship. In ancient times, scholars argued whether Athena
13674-526: The arts and handicrafts. Athena was known as Atrytone ( Άτρυτώνη "the Unwearying"), Parthenos ( Παρθένος "Virgin"), and Promachos ( Πρόμαχος "she who fights in front"). The epithet Polias (Πολιάς "of the city"), refers to Athena's role as protectress of the city. The epithet Ergane (Εργάνη "the Industrious") pointed her out as the patron of craftsmen and artisans. Burkert notes that
13833-408: The beliefs and practices of Greeks in relation to the gods as a group of closely related "religious dialects" that resembled each other far more than they did those of non-Greeks." Ancient Greek theology was polytheistic , based on the assumption that there were many gods and goddesses, as well as a range of lesser supernatural beings of various types. There was a hierarchy of deities, with Zeus ,
13992-561: The blade to behead Medusa, Athena guided it, allowing the blade to cut the Gorgon's head clean off. According to Pindar's Thirteenth Olympian Ode , Athena helped the hero Bellerophon tame the winged horse Pegasus by giving him a bit . In ancient Greek art , Athena is frequently shown aiding the hero Heracles . She appears in four of the twelve metopes on the Temple of Zeus at Olympia depicting Heracles's Twelve Labors , including
14151-441: The bronze Piraeus Athena (2.35 m (7.7 ft) high, including a helmet). The image stood on a base, from the 5th century often carved with reliefs. It used to be thought that access to the cella of a Greek temple was limited to the priests, and it was entered only rarely by other visitors, except perhaps during important festivals or other special occasions. In recent decades this picture has changed, and scholars now stress
14310-636: The builder of the Argo , the ship on which the hero Jason and his band of Argonauts sailed, and aided in the ship's construction. Pseudo-Apollodorus also records that Athena guided the hero Perseus in his quest to behead Medusa . She and Hermes , the god of travelers, appeared to Perseus after he set off on his quest and gifted him with tools he would need to kill the Gorgon. Athena lent Perseus her polished bronze shield to view Medusa's reflection without becoming petrified himself. Hermes lent Perseus his harpe to behead Medusa with. When Perseus swung
14469-441: The chest, but did not explain to them why or what was in it. Aglauros, and possibly one of the other sisters, opened the chest. 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. In Pausanias's story, the two sisters were driven mad by the sight of the chest's contents and hurled themselves off
14628-401: The concealed knife led the way. After various rituals, the animal was slaughtered over the altar. As it fell, all the women present "[cried] out in high, shrill tones". Its blood was collected and poured over the altar. It was butchered on the spot and various internal organs, bones and other inedible parts burnt as the deity's portion of the offering, while the meat was removed to be prepared for
14787-503: The cult image, and sometimes to touch it; Cicero saw a bronze image of Heracles with its foot largely worn away by the touch of devotees. Famous cult images such as the Statue of Zeus at Olympia functioned as significant visitor attractions. In addition to the role that women performed in sacrifices, the only public roles that Greek women could perform were priestesses ; either hiereiai , meaning "sacred women", or amphipolis ,
14946-604: The earliest Linear B archive anywhere. Although Athana potnia is often translated as "Mistress Athena", it could also mean "the Potnia of Athana", or the Lady of Athens . However, any connection to the city of Athens in the Knossos inscription is uncertain. 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 . This could be connected with
15105-601: The etymological roots of Athena's names to be aether , air , earth , and moon . Athena was originally the Aegean goddess of the palace, who presided over household crafts and protected the king. A single Mycenaean Greek inscription 𐀀𐀲𐀙𐀡𐀴𐀛𐀊 a-ta-na po-ti-ni-ja appears at Knossos in the Linear B tablets from the Late Minoan II-era "Room of the Chariot Tablets"; these comprise
15264-593: The eve of the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC, the serpent did not eat the honey cake and the Athenians interpreted it as a sign that Athena herself had abandoned them. Another version of the myth of the Athenian maidens is told in Metamorphoses by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BC – 17 AD); in this late variant Hermes falls in love with Herse. Herse, Aglaulus, and Pandrosus go to
15423-482: The fact that cult statue held there may have been made of bronze, that the walls of the temple itself may have been made of bronze, or that Athena was the patron of metal-workers. Bells made of terracotta and bronze were used in Sparta as part of Athena's cult. An Ionic-style temple to Athena Polias was built at Priene in the fourth century BC. It was designed by Pytheos of Priene , the same architect who designed
15582-552: The fact that in the Homeric Hymns, 5, To Aphrodite , where Aphrodite is described as having "no power" over the three goddesses. Athena was sometimes given the epithet Hippia (Ἵππια "of the horses", "equestrian"), referring to her invention of the bit , bridle , chariot , and wagon . The Greek geographer Pausanias mentions in his Guide to Greece that the temple of Athena Chalinitis ("the bridler") in Corinth
15741-510: The fact that she represented the intellectual and civilized side of war and the virtues of justice and skill, whereas Ares represented mere blood lust. 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. In the Iliad, Athena was the divine form of the heroic, martial ideal: she personified excellence in close combat, victory, and glory. The qualities that led to victory were found on
15900-501: The favorite child of Zeus, she had great power. In the classical Olympian pantheon, Athena was regarded as the favorite child of Zeus, born fully armed from his forehead. The story of her birth comes in several versions. 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"). She
16059-400: 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. Her guiding actions reinforce her role as the "protectress of heroes", or, as mythologian Walter Friedrich Otto dubbed her, the "goddess of nearness", due to her mentoring and motherly probing. It is not until he washes up on
16218-534: The first, in which she passively watches him slay the Nemean lion , and the tenth, in which she is shown actively helping him hold up the sky. She is presented as his "stern ally", but also the "gentle ... acknowledger of his achievements". Artistic depictions of Heracles's apotheosis show Athena driving him to Mount Olympus in her chariot and presenting him to Zeus for his deification. In Aeschylus 's tragedy Orestes , Athena intervenes to save Orestes from
16377-554: The god of the sun, stopped his chariot in the sky. 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". Hesiod states that Hera was so annoyed at Zeus for having given birth to a child on his own that she conceived and bore Hephaestus by herself , but in Imagines 2. 27 (trans. Fairbanks), the third-century AD Greek rhetorician Philostratus
16536-561: The gods were certainly not all-good or even all-powerful . They had to obey fate , known to Greek mythology as the Moirai , which overrode any of their divine powers or wills. For instance, in mythology, it was Odysseus ' fate to return home to Ithaca after the Trojan War , and the gods could only lengthen his journey and make it harder for him, not stop him. The gods had human vices and many behaved with arguably less morality than
16695-520: The head (i. e. the uppermost part) of Zeus, understanding Trito- (which perhaps originally meant "the third") as another word for "the sky". In Janda's analysis of Indo-European mythology, this heavenly sphere is also associated with the mythological body of water surrounding the inhabited world ( cfr. Triton's mother, Amphitrite ). Yet another possible meaning is mentioned in Diogenes Laertius ' biography of Democritus , that Athena
16854-409: The hero Trophonius at Livadeia . The temple was the house of the deity it was dedicated to, who in some sense resided in the cult image in the cella or main room inside, normally facing the only door. The cult image normally took the form of a statue of the deity, typically roughly life-size, but in some cases many times life-size. In early days these were in wood, marble or terracotta , or in
17013-406: The initial a-ta-nū-tī , which is recurrent in line beginnings, as "I have given". A Mycenean fresco depicts two women extending their hands towards a central figure, who is covered by an enormous figure-eight shield; this may depict the warrior-goddess with her palladium , or her palladium in an aniconic representation. In the " Procession Fresco " at Knossos , which was reconstructed by
17172-649: The king of the gods, having a level of control over all the others, although he was not almighty. Some deities had dominion over certain aspects of nature . For instance, Zeus was the sky-god, sending thunder and lightning, Poseidon ruled over the sea and earthquakes , Hades projected his remarkable power throughout the realms of death and the Underworld , and Helios controlled the sun. Other deities ruled over abstract concepts; for instance Aphrodite controlled love. All significant deities were visualized as "human" in form, although often able to transform themselves into animals or natural phenomena. While being immortal,
17331-403: The late fifth century BC, the role of goddess of philosophy became a major aspect of Athena's cult . As Athena Promachos , she was believed to lead soldiers into battle. Athena represented the disciplined, strategic side of war, in contrast to her brother Ares , the patron of violence, bloodlust, and slaughter—"the raw force of war". Athena was believed to only support those fighting for
17490-418: The man role, that his father once held. She also plays a role in ending the resultant feud against the suitors' relatives. She instructs Laertes to throw his spear and to kill Eupeithes , the father of Antinous . The Gorgoneion appears to have originated as an apotropaic symbol intended to ward off evil. In a late myth invented to explain the origins of the Gorgon, Medusa is described as having been
17649-433: The myth, Pallas was the daughter of the sea-god Triton , and she and Athena were childhood friends. Zeus one day watched Athena and Pallas have a friendly sparring match. Not wanting his daughter to lose, Zeus flapped his aegis to distract Pallas, whom Athena accidentally impaled. Distraught over what she had done, Athena took the name Pallas for herself as a sign of her grief and tribute to her friend and Zeus gave her
17808-419: The name Etheonoe; which, however, either he or his successors have altered into what they thought a nicer form, and called her Athena. Thus, Plato believed that Athena's name was derived from Greek Ἀθεονόα , Atheonóa —which the later Greeks rationalised as from the deity's ( θεός , theós ) mind ( νοῦς , noũs ). The second-century AD orator Aelius Aristides attempted to derive natural symbols from
17967-670: The newly constructed Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican Museums, where it remains today. From the time of its discovery the Athena Giustiniani has been widely admired. It was highly regarded by Goethe , who saw it in the Palazzo Giustiniani in January of 1787, and who records a story told to him by the wife of the custodian that illustrates its high reputation, especially among British visitors: she said that
18126-570: The one-eyed giant Cyclopes , the sea beast Scylla , whirlpool Charybdis , Gorgons, and the half-man, half-bull Minotaur . There was no set Greek cosmogony , or creation myth. Different religious groups believed that the world had been created in different ways. One Greek creation myth was told in Hesiod's Theogony . It stated that at first there was only a primordial deity called Chaos , after which came various other primordial gods, such as Gaia, Tartarus and Eros, who then gave birth to more gods,
18285-511: The participants to eat; the leading figures tasted it on the spot. The temple usually kept the skin to sell to tanners. That humans got more use from the sacrifice than the deity did not escape the Greeks, and was often the subject of humor in Greek comedy . The animals used were, in order of preference, bulls or oxen, cows, sheep (the most common sacrifice), goats, pigs (with piglets being the cheapest mammal), and poultry (but rarely other birds or fish). Horses and asses are seen on some vases in
18444-452: The passage of young women into marriage. These cults were portals of a uniform socialization, even beyond mainland Greece. 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 . In Arcadia , she was assimilated with the ancient goddess Alea and worshiped as Athena Alea . Sanctuaries dedicated to Athena Alea were located in
18603-419: The pebbles useless. Apollo's words became the basis of an ancient Greek idiom. Athena was not only the patron goddess of Athens, but also other cities, including Pergamon , Argos , Sparta , Gortyn , Lindos , and Larisa . The various cults of Athena were all branches of her panhellenic cult and often proctored various initiation rites of Grecian youth, such as the passage into citizenship by young men or
18762-421: The poem, special banquets are held whenever gods indicated their presence by some sign or success in war. Before setting out for Troy, this type of animal sacrifice is offered. Odysseus offers Zeus a sacrificial ram in vain. The occasions of sacrifice in Homer's epic poems may shed some light onto the view of gods as members of society, rather than external entities, indicating social ties. Sacrificial rituals played
18921-628: The priestess, knew what the objects were. 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. Many of the surviving sculptures of Athena show this serpent. Herodotus records that a serpent lived in a crevice on the north side of the summit of the Athenian Acropolis and that the Athenians left a honey cake for it each month as an offering. On
19080-588: The public, and after death, they received a public burial site. Greek priestesses had to be healthy and of a sound mind, the reasoning being that the ones serving the gods had to be as high-quality as their offerings. This was also true of male Greek priests. It is contested whether there were gendered divisions when it came to serving a particular god or goddess, who was devoted to what god, gods and/or goddesses could have both priests and priestesses to serve them. Gender specifics did come into play when it came to who would perform certain acts of sacrifice or worship. Per
19239-710: The quest for the Golden Fleece and Theseus and the Minotaur . Many species existed in Greek mythology. Chief among these were the gods and humans, though the Titans (who predated the Olympian gods) also frequently appeared in Greek myths. Lesser species included the half-man-half-horse centaurs , the nature-based nymphs (tree nymphs were dryads , sea nymphs were Nereids ) and the half-man, half-goat satyrs . Some creatures in Greek mythology were monstrous, such as
19398-446: The rest of the Greek religious system. Finally, some texts called ieri logi ( Greek : ιεροί λόγοι ) (sacred texts) by the ancient sources, originated from outside the Greek world, or were supposedly adopted in remote times, representing yet more different traditions within the Greek belief system. The lack of a unified priestly class meant that a unified, canonic form of the religious texts or practices never existed; just as there
19557-427: The ritual scapegoat, the hardship would go with it. Worship in Greece typically consisted of sacrificing domestic animals at the altar with hymn and prayer. The altar was outside any temple building, and might not be associated with a temple at all. The animal, which should be perfect of its kind, was decorated with garlands and the like, and led in procession to the altar; a girl with a basket on her head containing
19716-460: The role of women in worshipping goddesses Demeter and her daughter Persephone reinforced traditional lifestyles. The festivals relating to agricultural fertility were valued by the polis because this is what they traditionally worked for; women-centered festivals that involved private matters were less important. In Athens the festivals honoring Demeter were included in the calendar and promoted by Athens. They constructed temples and shrines like
19875-477: The sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia . Other festivals centered on Greek theatre , of which the Dionysia in Athens was the most important. More typical festivals featured a procession, large sacrifices and a feast to eat the offerings, and many included entertainments and customs such as visiting friends, wearing fancy dress and unusual behavior in the streets, sometimes risky for bystanders in various ways. Altogether
20034-428: The second century AD, makes Metis Zeus's unwilling sexual partner, rather than his wife. According to this version of the story, Metis transformed into many different shapes in effort to escape Zeus, but Zeus successfully raped her and swallowed her. After swallowing Metis, Zeus took six more wives in succession until he married his seventh and present wife, Hera . Then Zeus experienced an enormous headache. He
20193-554: The shore of the island of the Phaeacians , where Nausicaa is washing her clothes that Athena arrives personally to provide more tangible assistance. She appears in Nausicaa's dreams to ensure that the princess rescues Odysseus and plays a role in his eventual escort to Ithaca. Athena appears to Odysseus upon his arrival, disguised as a herdsman; she initially lies and tells him that Penelope, his wife, has remarried and that he
20352-433: The significance of the male or female role to a particular god or goddess, a priest would lead the priestess or the reverse. In some Greek cults priestesses served both gods and goddesses; Pythia , or female Oracle of Apollo at Delphi , and that at Didyma were priestesses, but both were overseen by male priests. The festival of Dionosyus was practiced by both and the god was served by women and female priestesses known as
20511-418: The spear, the sphinx on the helmet, and the head and part of the coils of the serpent. There is general agreement that the statue is a Roman work that looks back to Classical Greek models of the second half of the 5th and the first half of the 4th century BCE, but beyond this there is no consensus about the precise date or authorship of the Greek sculpture(s) that inspired it. The statue is first attested in
20670-673: The specially prestigious form of a chryselephantine statue using ivory plaques for the visible parts of the body and gold for the clothes, around a wooden framework. The most famous Greek cult images were of this type, including the Statue of Zeus at Olympia , and Phidias 's Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon in Athens, both colossal statues, now completely lost. Fragments of two chryselephantine statues from Delphi have been excavated. Bronze cult images were less frequent, at least until Hellenistic times. Early images seem often to have been dressed in real clothes, and at all periods images might wear real jewelry donated by devotees. The acrolith
20829-413: The temple of Athena Polias, would be given hidden objects by the priestess of Athena , which they would carry on their heads down a natural underground passage. They would leave the objects they had been given at the bottom of the passage and take another set of hidden objects, which they would carry on their heads back up to the temple. The ritual was performed in the dead of night and no one, not even
20988-490: The temple to offer sacrifices to Athena. Hermes demands help from Aglaulus to seduce Herse. Aglaulus demands money in exchange. Hermes gives her the money the sisters have already offered to Athena. As punishment for Aglaulus's greed, Athena asks the goddess Envy to make Aglaulus jealous of Herse. When Hermes arrives to seduce Herse, Aglaulus stands in his way instead of helping him as she had agreed. He turns her to stone. Athena gave her favour to an Attic girl named Myrsine ,
21147-411: The theories of the ancient Athenians and his etymological speculations: That is a graver matter, and there, my friend, the modern interpreters of Homer may, I think, assist in explaining the view of the ancients. Most of these in their explanations of the poet, assert that he meant by Athena "mind" [ νοῦς , noũs ] and "intelligence" [ διάνοια , diánoia ], and the maker of names appears to have had
21306-429: The third and second millennia". The "Black Athena" hypothesis stirred up widespread controversy near the end of the twentieth century, but it has now been widely rejected by modern scholars. Athena was also the goddess of peace. In a similar manner to her patronage of various activities and Greek cities, Athena was thought to be a "protector of heroes" and a "patron of art" and various local traditions related to
21465-493: The third book of the Odyssey , she takes the form of a sea-eagle . Proponents of this view argue that she dropped her prophylactic owl mask before she lost her wings. "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." It
21624-588: The variety of local access rules. Pausanias was a gentlemanly traveller of the 2nd-century CE who declares that the special intention of his travels around Greece was to see cult images, and usually managed to do so. It was typically necessary to make a sacrifice or gift, and some temples restricted access either to certain days of the year, or by class, race, gender (with either men or women forbidden), or even more tightly. Garlic-eaters were forbidden in one temple, in another women unless they were virgins; restrictions typically arose from local ideas of ritual purity or
21783-474: The wrath of the Erinyes and presides over his trial for the murder of his mother Clytemnestra . When half the jury votes to acquit and the other half votes to convict , Athena casts the deciding vote to acquit Orestes and declares that, from then on, whenever a jury is tied, the defendant shall always be acquitted. In The Odyssey , Odysseus ' cunning and shrewd nature quickly wins Athena's favour. For
21942-640: Was Athena." According to a version of the story in a scholium on the Iliad (found nowhere else), when Zeus swallowed Metis , she was pregnant with Athena by the Cyclops Brontes. The Etymologicum Magnum instead deems Athena the daughter of the Daktyl Itonos . Fragments attributed by the Christian Eusebius of Caesarea to the semi-legendary Phoenician historian Sanchuniathon , which Eusebius thought had been written before
22101-515: Was a goddess called Mykene, whose sisterhood was known as Mykenai , whereas at Thebes an analogous deity was called Thebe, and the city was known under the plural form Thebai (or Thebes, in English, where the 's' is the plural formation). The name Athenai is likely of Pre-Greek origin because it contains the presumably Pre-Greek morpheme *-ān- . In his dialogue Cratylus , the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (428–347 BC) gives some rather imaginative etymologies of Athena's name, based on
22260-546: Was a significant sea power, defeating the Persian fleet at the Battle of Salamis —but the water was salty and undrinkable. In an alternative version of the myth from Vergil 's Georgics , Poseidon instead gave the Athenians the first horse. Athena offered the first domesticated olive tree . Cecrops accepted this gift and declared Athena the patron goddess of Athens. The olive tree brought wood, oil, and food, and became
22419-499: Was a statue of Athena that was said to have stood in her temple on the Trojan Acropolis. Athena was said to have carved the statue herself in the likeness of her dead friend Pallas. The statue had special talisman-like properties and it was thought that, as long as it was in the city, Troy could never fall. When the Greeks captured Troy, Cassandra , the daughter of Priam , clung to the palladium for protection, but Ajax
22578-424: Was about to consummate the union, Athena vanished from the bridal bed, causing him to ejaculate on the floor, thus impregnating Gaia with Erichthonius. The geographer Pausanias records that Athena placed the infant Erichthonius into a small chest ( cista ), which she entrusted to the care of the three daughters of Cecrops : Herse , Pandrosos , and Aglauros of Athens. She warned the three sisters not to open
22737-750: Was also associated with weaving; her worship began during the Egyptian Pre-Dynastic period. In Greek mythology, Athena was reported to have visited mythological sites in North Africa, including Libya's Triton River and the Phlegraean plain . 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
22896-406: Was also the collective name of a group of nymphs with prophetic powers. Her half-brother Apollo, however, angered and spiteful at the practitioners of an art rival to his own, complained to their father Zeus about it, with the pretext that many people took to casting pebbles, but few actually were true prophets. Zeus, sympathizing with Apollo's grievances, discredited the pebble divination by rendering
23055-463: Was another composite form, this time a cost-saving one with a wooden body. A xoanon was a primitive and symbolic wooden image, perhaps comparable to the Hindu lingam ; many of these were retained and revered for their antiquity, even when a new statue was the main cult image. Xoana had the advantage that they were easy to carry in processions at festivals. The Trojan Palladium , famous from the myths of
23214-675: Was associated with the owl from very early on; in archaic images, she is frequently depicted with an owl perched on her hand. Through its association with Athena, the owl evolved into the national mascot of the Athenians and eventually became a symbol of wisdom. In the Iliad (4.514), the Odyssey (3.378), the Homeric Hymns , and in Hesiod 's Theogony , Athena is also given the curious epithet Tritogeneia (Τριτογένεια), whose significance remains unclear. It could mean various things, including "Triton-born", perhaps indicating that
23373-480: Was believed to have aided the heroes Perseus , Heracles , Bellerophon , and Jason . Along with Aphrodite and Hera , Athena was one of the three goddesses whose feud resulted in the beginning of the Trojan War . She plays an active role in the Iliad , in which she assists the Achaeans and, in the Odyssey , she is the divine counselor to Odysseus . In the later writings of the Roman poet Ovid , Athena
23532-555: Was called "Tritogeneia" because three things, on which all mortal life depends, come from her. In her aspect of Athena Polias , Athena was venerated as the goddess of the city and the protectress of the citadel. In Athens, the Plynteria , or "Feast of the Bath", was observed every year at the end of the month of Thargelion . The festival lasted for five days. During this period, the priestesses of Athena, or plyntrídes , performed
23691-414: Was essentially urban and civilized, the antithesis in many respects of Artemis, goddess of the outdoors. Athena was probably a pre-Hellenic goddess and was later taken over by the Greeks. In the version recounted by Hesiod in his Theogony , Zeus married the goddess Metis , who is described as the "wisest among gods and mortal men", and engaged in sexual intercourse with her. After learning that Metis
23850-412: 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 . Athena leaped from Zeus's head, fully grown and armed. The "First Homeric Hymn to Athena" states in lines 9–16 that the gods were awestruck by Athena's appearance and even Helios ,
24009-528: Was located near the tomb of Medea 's children. Other epithets include Ageleia , Itonia and Aethyia , under which she was worshiped in Megara . She was worshipped as Assesia in Assesos . The word aíthyia ( αἴθυια ) signifies a "diver", also some diving bird species (possibly the shearwater ) and figuratively, a "ship", so the name must reference Athena teaching the art of shipbuilding or navigation. In
24168-428: Was much less important than in Roman or Etruscan religion , or Near Eastern religions , but was practiced , especially of the liver, and as part of the cult of Apollo . Generally, the Greeks put more faith in observing the behavior of birds . For a smaller and simpler offering, a grain of incense could be thrown on the sacred fire, and outside the cities farmers made simple sacrificial gifts of plant produce as
24327-496: Was named after Athens or Athens after Athena. Now scholars generally agree that the goddess takes her name from the city; the ending - ene is common in names of locations, but rare for personal names. Testimonies from different cities in ancient Greece attest that similar city goddesses were worshipped in other cities and, like Athena, took their names from the cities where they were worshipped. For example, in Mycenae there
24486-412: Was no unified, common sacred text for the Greek belief system, there was no standardization of practices. Instead, religious practices were organized on local levels, with priests normally being magistrates for the city or village, or gaining authority from one of the many sanctuaries. Pausanias notes that the priest of the temple of Athena Alea at Tegea was a boy, who held office only until reaching
24645-457: Was often used as a basis for the works of artists like Botticelli , Michelangelo and Rubens . One of the most important moral concepts to the Greeks was aversion to hubris . Hubris constituted many things, from rape to desecration of a corpse, and was a crime in Athens. Although pride and vanity were not considered sins themselves, the Greeks emphasized moderation. Pride only became hubris when it went to extremes, like any other vice. The same
24804-477: Was pregnant, however, he became afraid that the unborn offspring would try to overthrow him, because Gaia and Ouranos had prophesied that Metis would bear children wiser than their father. In order to prevent this, Zeus tricked Metis into letting him swallow her, but it was too late because Metis had already conceived. A later account of the story from the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, written in
24963-542: Was said to have competed against the mortal Arachne in a weaving competition, afterward transforming Arachne into the first spider; Ovid also describes how Athena transformed her priestess Medusa and the latter's sisters, Stheno and Euryale , into the Gorgons after witnessing the young woman being raped by Poseidon in the goddess's temple. Since the Renaissance , Athena has become an international symbol of wisdom,
25122-626: Was supposedly the origin of calling Athena's sacred olive tree moria , for Halirrhotius's attempt at revenge proved fatal ( moros in Greek). Poseidon in fury accused Ares of murder, and the matter was eventually settled on the Areopagus ("hill of Ares") in favour of Ares, which was thereafter named after the event. Pseudo-Apollodorus records an archaic legend, which claims that Hephaestus once attempted to rape Athena, but she pushed him away, causing him to ejaculate on her thigh. Athena wiped
25281-455: Was thought of eating and drinking. Anything done to excess was not considered proper. Ancient Greeks placed, for example, importance on athletics and intellect equally. In fact many of their competitions included both. Pride was not evil until it became all-consuming or hurtful to others. The Greeks had no religious texts they regarded as "revealed" scriptures of sacred origin, but very old texts including Homer 's Iliad and Odyssey , and
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