The Olympian gods and goddesses came to power at the expense of their father, the Titan Cronus (Saturn). Yes, the very large planet in our solar system known as Saturn is named for this giant, but this brave giant was as nothing compared with his father.
Who Was Uranus?
The father of Cronus was Uranus/Ouranos -- the Sky. His mother wasn't much smaller herself. She was the earth or Gaia. Despite the size difference, Cronus had dared to disfigure his father, which rendered Uranus unfit to rule.
Although in the ancient world, you may occasionally read of a half-blind or lame ruler, it wasn't exceptional to demand physical perfection of one's king, and this disfigurement was particularly distasteful. Although Uranus didn't plan for it, his grandchildren avenged his ousting. This article shows how Uranus got his inevitable revenge.
Zeus Assumes Power
- Summary from Greek Creation Myths:
Uranus Castrated
- Earth (Gaia) and Sky (Uranus/Ouranos) produced numerous offspring:
~100-armed monsters,
~cyclops, and
~the giant Titans.
- Uranus was afraid of his children, so he kept them locked inside the earth (their mother).
Earth was saddened by the fact that Sky wouldn't let her children see the light of day, so she forged the sickle with which her son Cronus unmanned his father. From severed genitals of the dethroned Sky sprang Aphrodite. From his blood dripping on Earth sprang the much needed spirits of Vengeance, who were, so to speak, born on a mission.
Titan Incest
Limited in their choice of suitable anthropomorphic mates from among their fellow Titans**, the 2 humanoid Titans, Cronus and his sister Rhea, started a family.
Their union produced the humanoid immortal gods and goddesses:
- Hestia (Vesta),
- Demeter (Ceres),
- Hera (Juno),
- Hades,
- Poseidon (Neptune), and
- Zeus (Jupiter).
Cronus the Cannibal
Knowing his fate was supposed to echo his father's, Cronus tried to prevent his own loss of power -- by swallowing his children immediately after birth.
This theme of trying to go against the fates is a popular one in Greek mythology and especially Greek tragedy. Avoiding fate, with one major exception, doesn't have a happy ending.
Rhea Asks Her Parents for Pre-Natal Advice
When her last child was due to be born, a grieving Rhea turned to her own parents. Since Earth had suffered similarly when her husband had tormented her, and since her husband, Sky, had endured an appropriate punishment and lost his prominence, Earth and Sky could advise Rhea effectively.
Rhea Activates The Devious Plot
In accordance with the plan the 3 concocted, Rhea tricked her mate, Cronus. When Cronus asked for the next baby so he could swallow it, Rhea gave him a stone, instead. This stone stood in the place of Rhea and Cronus' last child, Zeus.
Zeus Matures and Outwits His Father
Zeus was then spirited off to safety where he grew to manhood. When grown, Zeus returned to his parents. Then someone, perhaps the Titaness Metis, perhaps Zeus, tricked Cronus with an emetic or otherwise forced him into regurgitating his other children. Zeus and his sisters and brothers were re-united. Some say this made the last-born Zeus the oldest of the children, but he wasn't yet king of the gods.
The Titanomachy
Zeus Frees His Allies
After Zeus freed his father's brothers, the 100-armed, 50-headed Briareus, Cottus, and Gyes, whom grandfather Sky had imprisoned, the battle for top-billing among the gods and immortals began. This series of battles, is known as the Titanomachy (titan + machy 'battle').
The Mountains of the Titanomachy
On Zeus' side, on top of Mount Olympus [see Map section dI], they fought for 10 years (like other legendary battles, including the Trojan War) alongside Zeus and his siblings. Ranged against the gods and their allies, the Titan brothers and sisters of Cronus, fought from their station atop Mount Othrys.
Zeus Imprisons His Enemies
Eventually the Olympians won, the Titans were imprisoned in Tartarus, and Zeus was made king.
[8.8.3] When I began to write my history I was inclined to count these legends as foolishness, but on getting as far as Arcadia I grew to hold a more thoughtful view of them, which is this. In the days of old those Greeks who were considered wise spoke their sayings not straight out but in riddles, and so the legends about Cronus I conjectured to be one sort of Greek wisdom. In matters of divinity, therefore, I shall adopt the received tradition.
-- From a public domain translation of Description of Greece 8.8.3, by Pausanias; translated by W. H. S. Jones and H. A. Ormerod.
The Vengeance Cycle
The Role of the Furies
Revenge is serious business. In The House of Atreus, the cycle of revenge ended in a father (Agamemnon) killing his daughter Iphigenia and in turn being killed by his wife, Clytemnestra, or her lover, Aegisthus (Agamemnon's cousin). The son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, Orestes, had no choice but to revenge his father by killing his mother. The Furies had to pursue the matricide. Similarly, when Cronus mutilated his father Uranus, he knew he deserved payback at the hands of his son Zeus. It's hard to understand why this tradition didn't carry through into the next generation -- why no one unseated the king of the Olympian gods. It was supposed to happen....
Zeus Ends the Cycle With a New World Order
Knowing that "Metis [wisdom or cunning] was destined to produce ... an unruly son, the future king of gods and men," Zeus took more thorough precautions than his father had. Instead of just consuming the offspring, he swallowed the pregnant Metis. Stuck inside Zeus' belly, she continued to provide him with knowledge of good and evil. And that was the end of it.
Why didn't Zeus get his comeuppance? Was it because the Greeks didn't view Zeus' acts as reprehensible? No, says Norman O. Brown in his introduction to Hesiod's Theogony, it's because Zeus established a new world order based on law. Since Zeus represented the state, he was himself above its laws.
A nice tidy explanation, but is it sufficient?
Sources:
• www.lib.msu.edu/pubs/subject/su36.htm -
Sources in Classical Mythology Bibliography
• www.ucd.ie/~classics/97/Luce97.html -
J. V. Luce's "Homeric Poetry & Its Significance for the Modern World"
Tough Quiz on the Genealogy of the First Gods | Other Quizzes
Related Resources
- Genealogy of the First Gods
- What Is Myth? (FAQ)
- Myths vs. Legends
- Gods in the Heroic Age
- Creation Myths
- Five Ages of Man
- Prometheus
- Trojan War
- Golden Fleece and the Tanglewood Tales, by Nathaniel Hawthorne
- Genealogy of the First Gods
The Olympians | ||
| Zeus | Poseidon | Hades |
| Hestia | Hera | Ares (parents: Zeus and Hera) |
| Athena (born from the head of Zeus although real mother was Metis) | Apollo (parents: Leto and Zeus) | Aphrodite |
| Hermes (parents: Zeus and Maia - Atlas' daughter) | Artemis (parents: Leto and Zeus) | Hephaestus (parent: Hera) |
| Demeter | Dionysus (parents: Zeus and Semele) | |
| 12, Hestia or Dionysus, Demeter, and Hades are sometimes eliminated) | ||
The Titans | ||
| ** The other Titans, Ocean, Tethys, Hyperion, Thea, and Crius, produced, not humanoid offspring, but natural bodies, like rivers and wind. | ||