[58], Athena was not only the patron goddess of Athens, but also other cities, including Argos, Sparta, Gortyn, Lindos, and Larisa. No, Athena did not have any known romantic partners or consorts. [20], 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. Medusa is a great representation of a tragic character and she's the most tragic Greek Mythology character of them all. Athena was the patron goddess of heroic endeavor; she was believed to have aided the heroes Perseus, Heracles, Bellerophon, and Jason. The answer could be as simple as a descriptive title, but Greek mythology offered other stories for how and why Athena changed her name. [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". [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. [81] Through its association with Athena, the owl evolved into the national mascot of the Athenians and eventually became a symbol of wisdom.[4]. [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. Athena, or Athene, In ancient Greek religion, the goddess of war, handicraft, and wisdom and the patroness of Athens.Her Roman counterpart was Minerva. READ NEXT: [114] Fragments attributed by the Christian Eusebius of Caesarea to the semi-legendary Phoenician historian Sanchuniathon, which Eusebius thought had been written before the Trojan war, make Athena instead the daughter of Cronus, a king of Byblos who visited "the inhabitable world" and bequeathed Attica to Athena. [130], Herodotus records that a serpent lived in a crevice on the north side of the summit of the Athenian Acropolis[130] and that the Athenians left a honey cake for it each month as an offering. Athena, also known as Pallas Athena or the Virgin Athena, is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and justice, strategic warfare, mathematics, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, and skill in ancient Greek mythology. Legend states that Medusa was once a beautiful, avowed priestess of Athena who was cursed for breaking her vow of celibacy. Athena was probably a pre-Hellenic goddess and was later taken over by the Greeks. [216] During the Middle Ages, however, many attributes of Athena were given to the Virgin Mary,[216] who, in fourth-century portrayals, was often depicted wearing the Gorgoneion. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). [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. [56] Even beyond recognition, the Athenians allotted the goddess value based on this pureness of virginity, which they upheld as a rudiment of female behavior. Athena is associated with the city of Athens. [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]. [30][31], Plato notes that the citizens of Sais in Egypt worshipped a goddess known as Neith,[e] whom he identifies with Athena. As the patron of craft and weaving, Athena was known as Ergane. [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. The Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis is dedicated to her, along with numerous other temples and monuments. [21][22] In the "Procession Fresco" at Knossos, which was reconstructed by 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. [76] The word is a combination of glauks (, meaning "gleaming, silvery", and later, "bluish-green" or "gray")[77] and ps (, "eye, face"). [195] Only Eris, goddess of discord, was not invited. [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, goddess of wisdom Though Hercules had an enemy, Hera, on Mount Olympus, he also had a friend. John Tzetzes says[10] that aegis was the skin of the monstrous giant Pallas whom Athena overcame and whose name she attached to her own. [5] Testimonies from different cities in ancient Greece attest that similar city goddesses were worshipped in other cities[6] and, like Athena, took their names from the cities where they were worshipped. [194], The myth of the Judgement of Paris is mentioned briefly in the Iliad,[195] but is described in depth in an epitome of the Cypria, a lost poem of the Epic Cycle,[196] which records that all the gods and goddesses as well as various mortals were invited to the marriage of Peleus and Thetis (the eventual parents of Achilles). 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. [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. Someone requested that I make an article on this goddess so I hope you like it! [citation needed] He curses her and strikes with all his strength. [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. [70] In a temple at Phrixa in Elis, reportedly built by Clymenus, she was known as Cydonia (). [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. [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. [99][100][98][101] After learning that Metis 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. She is also associated with the olive tree and owl because of her wisdom. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. [101] Then Zeus experienced an enormous headache. She was widely worshipped, but in modern times she is associated primarily with Athens, to which she gave her name. [238] Her owl is also a symbol of the fraternity.[238]. [46] The various cults of Athena were all branches of her panhellenic cult[46] and often proctored various initiation rites of Grecian youth, such as the passage into citizenship by young men or the passage of young women into marriage. She was the patron goddess of Athens, defended many beloved heroes, and even fought alongside the Greeks in the Trojan War. 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 (), whose significance remains unclear. [211] The Roman goddess Minerva adopted most of Athena's Greek iconographical associations,[213] but was also integrated into the Capitoline Triad. [g] The geographer Pausanias was informed that the temenos had been founded by Aleus. [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. When the Olympian deities overtook the older deities of Greece and she was born of Metis (inside Zeus who had swallowed the goddess) and "re-born" through the head of Zeus fully clothed, Athena already wore her typical garments. [126], In Homer's Iliad, Athena, as a war goddess, inspired and fought alongside the Greek heroes; her aid was synonymous with military prowess. [206] Even after Odysseus himself expresses pity for Ajax,[207] Athena declares, "To laugh at your enemies - what sweeter laughter can there be than that?" [173] She also plays a role in ending the resultant feud against the suitors' relatives. Hermes demands help from Aglaulus to seduce Herse. She was widely worshipped, but in modern times she is associated primarily with Athens, to which she gave her name and protection. 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. 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. [11][12][13][14] A single Mycenaean Greek inscription .mw-parser-output .script-Cprt{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Segoe UI Historic","Noto Sans Cypriot",Code2001}.mw-parser-output .script-Hano{font-size:125%;font-family:"Noto Sans Hanunoo",FreeSerif,Quivira}.mw-parser-output .script-Latf,.mw-parser-output .script-de-Latf{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Breitkopf Fraktur",UnifrakturCook,UniFrakturMaguntia,MarsFraktur,"MarsFraktur OT",KochFraktur,"KochFraktur OT",OffenbacherSchwabOT,"LOB.AlteSchwabacher","LOV.AlteSchwabacher","LOB.AtlantisFraktur","LOV.AtlantisFraktur","LOB.BreitkopfFraktur","LOV.BreitkopfFraktur","LOB.FetteFraktur","LOV.FetteFraktur","LOB.Fraktur3","LOV.Fraktur3","LOB.RochFraktur","LOV.RochFraktur","LOB.PostFraktur","LOV.PostFraktur","LOB.RuelhscheFraktur","LOV.RuelhscheFraktur","LOB.RungholtFraktur","LOV.RungholtFraktur","LOB.TheuerbankFraktur","LOV.TheuerbankFraktur","LOB.VinetaFraktur","LOV.VinetaFraktur","LOB.WalbaumFraktur","LOV.WalbaumFraktur","LOB.WeberMainzerFraktur","LOV.WeberMainzerFraktur","LOB.WieynckFraktur","LOV.WieynckFraktur","LOB.ZentenarFraktur","LOV.ZentenarFraktur"}.mw-parser-output .script-en-Latf{font-size:1.25em;font-family:Cankama,"Old English Text MT","Textura Libera","Textura Libera Tenuis",London}.mw-parser-output .script-it-Latf{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Rotunda Pommerania",Rotunda,"Typographer Rotunda"}.mw-parser-output .script-Lina{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Noto Sans Linear A"}.mw-parser-output .script-Linb{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Noto Sans Linear B"}.mw-parser-output .script-Ugar{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Segoe UI Historic","Noto Sans Ugaritic",Aegean}.mw-parser-output .script-Xpeo{font-size:1.25em;font-family:"Segoe UI Historic","Noto Sans Old Persian",Artaxerxes,Xerxes,Aegean} 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";[15][16][10] these comprise the earliest Linear B archive anywhere. As punishment for Aglaulus's greed, Athena asks the goddess Envy to make Aglaulus jealous of Herse. [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. Two Athenians, the sculptor Phidias and the playwright Aeschylus, contributed significantly to the cultural dissemination of Athenas image. 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. 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. [62] Bells made of terracotta and bronze were used in Sparta as part of Athena's cult. [191][190][192] Finally, losing her temper, Athena destroyed Arachne's tapestry and loom, striking it with her shuttle. She was thought to have had neither consort nor offspring. Athena, the daughter of Zeus, was produced without a mother and emerged full-grown from his forehead. In the classical Olympian pantheon, Athena was regarded as the favorite child of Zeus, born fully armed from his forehead. [172] He hears stories about some of Odysseus's journey. Athena's origin story in Greek mythology is one of particular interest. [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". [231], Pallas and the Centaur (c. 1482) by Sandro Botticelli, Minerva Expelling the Vices from the Garden of Virtue (1502) by Andrea Mantegna[222][221][223], Athena Scorning the Advances of Hephaestus (c. 15551560) by Paris Bordone, Minerva Victorious over Ignorance (c. 1591) by Bartholomeus Spranger, Maria de Medici (1622) by Peter Paul Rubens, showing her as the incarnation of Athena[226], Minerva Protecting Peace from Mars (1629) by Peter Paul Rubens, Minerva Revealing Ithaca to Ulysses (fifteenth century) by Giuseppe Bottani, Minerva and the Triumph of Jupiter (1706) by Ren-Antoine Houasse, The Combat of Mars and Minerva (1771) by Joseph-Benot Suve, Minerva Fighting Mars (1771) by Jacques-Louis David, Minerva of Peace mosaic in the Library of Congress, One of Sigmund Freud's most treasured possessions was a small, bronze sculpture of Athena, which sat on his desk. [99][100][98][101] In order to prevent this, Zeus tricked Metis into letting him swallow her, but it was too late because Metis had already conceived. [74], At Athens there is the temple of Athena Phratria, as patron of a phratry, in the Ancient Agora of Athens. We found 20 possible solutions for this clue. [144][145] Pseudo-Apollodorus also records that Athena guided the hero Perseus in his quest to behead Medusa. [10][17] However, any connection to the city of Athens in the Knossos inscription is uncertain. 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. When Hermes arrives to seduce Herse, Aglaulus stands in his way instead of helping him as she had agreed. The Greek aigis, has many meanings including:[3], The original meaning may have been the first, and Zeus Aigiokhos = "Zeus who holds the aegis" may have originally meant "Sky/Heaven, who holds the thunderstorm". When Medusa had an affair with the sea god Poseidon, Athena punished her. [124], The palladium was a statue of Athena that was said to have stood in her temple on the Trojan Acropolis. [237] Pallas Athena is the tutelary goddess of the international social fraternity Phi Delta Theta. For other uses, see, Goddess of wisdom, warfare, and handicraft, Cult statue of Athena with the face of the Carpegna type (late 1st century BC to early 1st century AD), from the Piazza dell'Emporio, Rome, Bust of the Velletri Pallas type, copy after a votive statue of Kresilas in Athens (, In other traditions, Athena's father is sometimes listed as Zeus by himself or, "The citizens have a deity for their foundress; she is called in the Egyptian tongue Neith and is asserted by them to be the same whom the Hellenes call Athena; they are great lovers of the Athenians, and say that they are in some way related to them." Zeus, sympathizing with Apollo's grievances, discredited the pebble divination by rendering the pebbles useless. [91][92][93][h] The story of her birth comes in several versions. How was Athena usually pictured? In art, she is generally depicted wearing a helmet and holding a spear. 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. Occasionally, another god used ite.g., Apollo in the Iliad, where it provoked terror. In Greek mythology, Athena was believed to have been born from the forehead of her father Zeus. Athena is associated with courage and braveness. The owl is one of the most recognizable of these, and is still associated with wisdom and education today. In post-Mycenaean times the city, especially its citadel, replaced the palace as Athenas domain. [33][34] The "Black Athena" hypothesis stirred up widespread controversy near the end of the twentieth century,[35][36] but it has now been widely rejected by modern scholars. [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. [218], During the Renaissance, Athena donned the mantle of patron of the arts and human endeavor;[219] allegorical paintings involving Athena were a favorite of the Italian Renaissance painters. Despite her immense power, she was depicted as highly competitive with both mortals and other gods. [78], The word glax (,[79] "little owl")[80] is from the same root, presumably according to some, because of the bird's own distinctive eyes. [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. In a late rendering by Gaius Julius Hyginus (Poetical Astronomy ii. [61], Athena had a major temple on the Spartan Acropolis,[62][40] where she was venerated as Poliouchos and Khalkoikos ("of the Brazen House", often latinized as Chalcioecus). [128], Afterwards, Poseidon was so angry over his defeat that he sent one of his sons, Halirrhothius, to cut down the tree. [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. Perseus used this shield to see Medusa's reflection in order to fight her without looking at . [199] Paris selected Aphrodite and awarded her the apple. She was depicted as a stately woman armed with a shield and spear, and wearing a long robe, crested helm, and the famed aegis - a snake-trimmed cape adorned with the monstrous visage of the Gorgon Medusa. Her Roman name is Minerva. He turns her to stone. From her origin as an Aegean palace goddess, Athena was closely associated with the city. Medusa wherever you're right now. [186][187] The story does not appear to have been well known prior to Ovid's rendition of it[186] and the only earlier reference to it is a brief allusion in Virgil's Georgics, (29 BC) (iv, 246) that does not mention Arachne by name. Dewing 1595, silver Athenian tetradrachm (=4 drachmas), ca. In Ancient Greece, the Gorgoneion (Greek: ) was a special apotropaic amulet showing the Gorgon head, used by the Olympian deities Athena and Zeus: both are said to have worn the gorgoneion as a protective pendant, and often are depicted wearing it.