athena's shield in greek mythology

[12] Classical scholar Charles Penglase notes that Athena resembles Inanna in her role as a "terrifying warrior goddess"[29] and that both goddesses were closely linked with creation. Her Roman name is Minerva. In some pottery it appears as a tasselled cover over Athena's dress. [125] Athena was said to have carved the statue herself in the likeness of her dead friend Pallas. [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. [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. 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". [178] According to Pindar, Athena gave the aulos to mortals as a gift. [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. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. [41] The festival lasted for five days. 460-357 B.C. [20] Best translates the initial a-ta-n-t, which is recurrent in line beginnings, as "I have given". [5] Now scholars generally agree that the goddess takes her name from the city;[5][7] the ending -ene is common in names of locations, but rare for personal names. [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. [139] The ritual was performed in the dead of night[139] and no one, not even the priestess, knew what the objects were. From her origin as an Aegean palace goddess, Athena was closely associated with the city. The Goddess Athena represents wisdom, justice, and war. [46] These cults were portals of a uniform socialization, even beyond mainland Greece. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. [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. The Twelve Olympians in Greek mythology are the most respected major deities of the Greek pantheon. [106][98][93][108] The "First Homeric Hymn to Athena" states in lines 916 that the gods were awestruck by Athena's appearance[109] and even Helios, the god of the sun, stopped his chariot in the sky. Athena became the goddess of crafts and skilled peacetime pursuits in general. She was particularly known as the patroness of spinning and weaving. [154] She appears in four of the twelve metopes on the Temple of Zeus at Olympia depicting Heracles's Twelve Labors,[155][154] including the first, in which she passively watches him slay the Nemean lion,[154] and the tenth, in which she is shown actively helping him hold up the sky. [224] In his book A Revelation of the True Minerva (1582), Thomas Blennerhassett portrays Queen Elizabeth I of England as a "new Minerva" and "the greatest goddesse nowe on earth". [128] Athens at its height was a significant sea power, defeating the Persian fleet at the Battle of Salamis[128]but the water was salty and undrinkable. It bore the head of a Gorgon and made a terrible roaring sound during the battle. [99][102][98][101] A later account of the story from the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, written in the second century AD, makes Metis Zeus's unwilling sexual partner, rather than his wife. In a founding myth reported by Pseudo-Apollodorus,[113] Athena competed with Poseidon for the patronage of Athens. As the patron of craft and weaving, Athena was known as Ergane. (, "This sanctuary had been respected from early days by all the. [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. [91][92][93][h] The story of her birth comes in several versions. In ancient Greek mythology, the goddess Athena kept an owl on her shoulder that revealed truths to her and represented wisdom and knowledge. [128] In an alternative version of the myth from Vergil's Georgics,[113] Poseidon instead gave the Athenians the first horse. She was essentially urban and civilized, the antithesis in many respects of Artemis, goddess of the outdoors. Athena was the patron goddess of heroic endeavor; she was believed to have aided the heroes Perseus, Heracles, Bellerophon, and Jason. [128], Afterwards, Poseidon was so angry over his defeat that he sent one of his sons, Halirrhothius, to cut down the tree. Athena, like the other characters in Homer's epic, comes from a rich and vivid cultural tapestry of ancient Greek myth. Along with Aphrodite and Hera, Athena was one of the three goddesses whose feud resulted in the beginning of the Trojan War. She was associated with birds, particularly the owl, which became famous as the citys own symbol, and with the snake. She inspired three of Phidiass sculptural masterpieces, including the massive chryselephantine (gold and ivory) statue of Athena Parthenos once housed in the Parthenon; and in Aeschyluss dramatic tragedy Eumenides she founded the Areopagus (Athenss aristocratic council), and, by breaking a deadlock of the judges in favour of Orestes, the defendant, she set the precedent that a tied vote signified acquittal. 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). It was supposed by Euripides (Ion, 995) that the aegis borne by Athena was the skin of the slain Gorgon,[8] yet the usual understanding[9] is that the Gorgoneion was added to the aegis, a votive offering from a grateful Perseus. [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. "[111] 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. In the Iliad she fought alongside the Greek heroes, and she represented the virtues of justice and skill in warfare as opposed to the blood lust of Ares. She is most famous for being the patron god of the city of Athens. [124], The palladium was a statue of Athena that was said to have stood in her temple on the Trojan Acropolis. The answer could be as simple as a descriptive title, but Greek mythology offered other stories for how and why Athena changed her name. [63] It was designed by Pytheos of Priene,[64] the same architect who designed the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. The aegis (/ids/ EE-jis;[1] Ancient Greek: aigs), as stated in the Iliad, is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a shield and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. Athena was customarily portrayed wearing body armour and a helmet and carrying a shield and a lance. [127][53] Cecrops accepted this gift[127] and declared Athena the patron goddess of Athens. Triton's mother, Amphitrite). [174] In a late myth invented to explain the origins of the Gorgon,[175] Medusa is described as having been a young priestess who served in the temple of Athena in Athens. The crossword clue Protection, or Athena's shield. As an important religious site, the temple's designers decorated the Parthenon with various scenes from Greek mythology. The epithet Polias ( "of the city"), refers to Athena's role as protectress of the city. 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 was 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. Aside from Athena, the Twelve Olympians include Greek gods and goddesses Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Apollo, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Hermes, and Hestia. Hermes demands help from Aglaulus to seduce Herse. [208] Athena Polias is also represented in a Neo-Attic relief now held in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts,[211] which depicts her holding an owl in her hand[i] and wearing her characteristic Corinthian helmet while resting her shield against a nearby herma. During this period, the priestesses of Athena, or plyntrdes, performed a cleansing ritual within the Erechtheion, a sanctuary devoted to Athena and Poseidon. [137], Erichthonius was one of the most important founding heroes of Athens[51] and the legend of the daughters of Cecrops was a cult myth linked to the rituals of the Arrhephoria festival. "[233] Feminist views on Athena are sharply divided;[233] some feminists regard her as a symbol of female empowerment,[233] while others regard her as "the ultimate patriarchal sell out who uses her powers to promote and advance men rather than others of her sex. [197] Aphrodite, Hera, and Athena all claimed to be the fairest, and thus the rightful owner of the apple. [163] She appears in Nausicaa's dreams to ensure that the princess rescues Odysseus and plays a role in his eventual escort to Ithaca. [210][208] Copies reveal that this statue depicted Athena holding her shield in her left hand with Nike, the winged goddess of victory, standing in her right. [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 assigned the sphere of war to Ares, the god of war, and Athena. As a war goddess Athena could not be dominated by other goddesses, such as Aphrodite, and as a palace goddess she could not be violated. [208], The Mourning Athena or Athena Meditating is a famous relief sculpture dating to around 470-460 BC[211][208] that has been interpreted to represent Athena Polias. Athena also helped many of the Greek heroes such as Hercules and Odysseus on their adventures. When the Olympian shakes the aegis, Mount Ida is wrapped in clouds, the thunder rolls and men are struck down with fear. [213], During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Athena was used as a symbol for female rulers. Zeus, sympathizing with Apollo's grievances, discredited the pebble divination by rendering the pebbles useless. [106][98][107][104] Athena leaped from Zeus's head, fully grown and armed. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Athena placed on her aegis a symbolic representation of the severed head of the Gorgon Medusa. [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. Being the favorite child of Zeus, she had great power. [185][190] Arachne scoffed and wished for a weaving contest, so she could prove her skill. [140], Athena gave her favour to an Attic girl named Myrsine, a chaste girl who outdid all her fellow athletes in both the palaestra and the race. [citation needed], In Book XXII of the Iliad, while Achilles is chasing Hector around the walls of Troy, Athena appears to Hector disguised as his brother Deiphobus[204] and persuades him to hold his ground so that they can fight Achilles together. [178] Later, the comic playwright Melanippides of Melos (c. 480-430 BC) embellished the story in his comedy Marsyas,[178] claiming that Athena looked in the mirror while she was playing the aulos and saw how blowing into it puffed up her cheeks and made her look silly, so she threw the aulos away and cursed it so that whoever picked it up would meet an awful death. 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. [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. [199][134], In Books VVI of the Iliad, Athena aids the hero Diomedes, who, in the absence of Achilles, proves himself to be the most effective Greek warrior. The qualities that lead to victory are found on the aegis, or breastplate, that Athena wears when she goes to war: fear, strife, defense, and assault. While the specifics of. [197][134] After bathing in the spring of Mount Ida where Troy was situated, the goddesses appeared before Paris for his decision. [191][190][192] Finally, losing her temper, Athena destroyed Arachne's tapestry and loom, striking it with her shuttle. [189] She became so conceited of her skill as a weaver that she began claiming that her skill was greater than that of Athena herself. Athena's name probably comes from the name of the city of Athens. [184], The fable of Arachne appears in Ovid's Metamorphoses (8 AD) (vi.554 and 129145),[185][186][187] which is nearly the only extant source for the legend. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. [106][12][121][122] In an alternative variation of the same myth, Pallas was instead Athena's father,[106][12] who attempted to assault his own daughter,[123] causing Athena to kill him and take his skin as a trophy. [167][166] Impressed by his resolve and shrewdness, she reveals herself and tells him what he needs to know to win back his kingdom. Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Dewing Greek Numismatic Foundation 70),[6] or as a chlamys. [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. [148][150] Hermes gave him an adamantine scythe to cut off Medusa's head. [200] Numerous passages in the Iliad also mention Athena having previously served as the patron of Diomedes's father Tydeus. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. [47][48] Athena was especially worshipped in this role during the festivals of the Panathenaea and Pamboeotia,[49] both of which prominently featured displays of athletic and military prowess. [226] The Flemish sculptor Jean-Pierre-Antoine Tassaert (Jan Peter Anton Tassaert) later portrayed Catherine II of Russia as Athena in a marble bust in 1774.

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