Greek Mythology
Aphrodite: Gr. Equivalent of Roman Goddess Venus.
Apollo: One of the great Gods of Mt. Olympus. He was the son of Jupiter & Latona. He was the God of archery, music,
prophecy and healing. He was given a lyre by Mercury. His son was the musician Orpheus. As the God of healing, his name was
Paeon. He became the father of Aesculapius. He was the successor of Hyperion, the sun God. Apollo’s exploits in myth
and poetry are numerous. He killed the serpent Python among other things. He was the Gr. Ideal of youthful manhood incarnate.
There is a statue of Apollo in the belvedere apartment of the Vatican.
Aphrodite: The Greek equivalent of Roman Goddess Venus. She was the Goddess of love & beauty. She
was the daughter of Jupiter & Dione.
Ares: The equivalent of the Roman God Mars. The God of war and one of the great deities of Mt. Olympus.
Artemis: the equivalent of the Roman Goddess Diana. She was the daughter of Leto and Zeus. She was the Goddess of the moon, hunting and the protectress of women and in earlier times the great mother
Goddess of nature.
Atlas: One of the Titans warring against the Gods, he was condemned to uphold the heavens on his shoulders.
He was a brother of Prometheus and the son of Iapetus. He fathered the Pleiades. A king had the garden of the hesperides in
his realm and was named Atlas and was either their uncle or father.
Athene: Also known as Athena. The Goddess of wisdom and of the arts and science. The equivalent of Minerva, she sprang
fully armed from the head of Zeus. Athens was named after her as a prize when she bestowed the most useful boon in a contest. Athene’s
was the olive tree; Neptune’s was the horse.
Caicus: An ancient Greek river that like many others dried up when Phaeton drove the chariot of the sun.
Cassiopeia: The wife of Cepheus, king of Ethiopia, and the mother of Andromeda. As a result of her boasting about the
beauty of her daughter, she was sent to the heavens as the constellation Cassiopeia.
Cephisus: A river in Greece.
Chaos: Original Confusion, in which air, sea and earth were mixed together. The ancient Greeks personified
it as the most ancient of the Gods. The egg of Nyx, was floating on Chaos and from it rose the world.
Chiron: The son of Cronos and Philyra and the wisest of Centaurs. He was instructed by Diana and Apollo
and in turn became the teacher of Aesculapius and many other Grecian heroes. He assisted Peleus in winning the hand of the
Goddess Thetis. Jupiter placed him among the stars on his death where he appears as the constellation Sagittarius.
Cronos: The son of Ge and Uranus and the father of hestia, Demeter, hera, Hades, Poseidon, and Zeus by
Rhea. He dethroned his father as ruler of the world and was dethroned by his son, Zeus or Jupiter. He is the equivalent of
the Roman God Saturn.
Cybele: The wife of Cronos and the mother of the Gods of Mt. Olympus.
Demeter: The same as the Roman Ceres. The name of Mother earth, the protectress of agriculture
and all the fruits of the earth. She was also the proitectress of marriage and the mother of Persephone.
Deucalion: The son of Prometheus and Clymene and a king of Phthia. He survived the deluge sent by Zeus with his wife
Pyrrha by withdrawing to a chest, which landed on Mt. Parnassus. He was the Greek Noah.
Dionysus: The God of wine. The equivalent of the Roman God Bacchus. He was the son of Jupiter & Semele.
He is also known as Libus. According to some accounts, he married Ariadne after Theseus deserted her.
Dodona: A village in Epirus, and the site of the most ancient oracle of Greece, which was dedicated to Jupiter or Zeus.
Eros: The God of love. The youngest of all the Gods. The equivalent of the Roman God Cupid.
Eumenides: It means the gracious ones. It was a euphemistic term used by the Greeks to refer to the Furies
or Erinyes to propitiate them.
Hades: Also known as Pluto. See: Pluto.
Helios: The God of light and warmth. The sun God. The solar deity.
Hermaphroditus: the son of Hermes & Aphrodite. He was united in a single body with a nymph.
Hermes: Gr. Equivalent of Roman God Mercury.
He was the son of Maia & Jupiter. He acted as their messenger. He was the God of science and commerce and the patron of
travelers, rogues, vagabonds & thieves.
Helicon, Mt.: The residence of Apollo and the Muses, with the fountains of poetic inspiration, Hippocrene and Aganippe.
Hellas: Another name for Greece.
Hephaestus: The Greek equivalent of Roman God Vulcan and also known as Mulciber, i.e., the softener.
He was a son of Jupiter & Juno & the husband of Venus. He was the God of fire and metalsmithery.
His workshop was on Mt.
Etna. The Cyclops helped him forge thunderbolts
for Jove.
Hera: The equivalent of the Gr. Goddess Juno. The daughter of Rhea and Cronus, and the wife and sister
of Zeus. Her name means “chosen one.”
Hestia: The Roman equivalent of Vesta. The Goddess of the hearth.
Hymen: A marriage song of the Greeks. He was later personified as the God of marriage and represented
as a youth carrying a torch and veil. A more mature Cupid or Eros.
Hyperion: The son of Uranus and Ge, and the father of Helios, Selene, and Eos. He was a Titan and the precursor of
the sun God Apollo. He owned the island of Thrinakia where Lampetia and Phathusa tended his cattle.
Hyrieus: A king whose treasure was stolen by Agamedes and Trophonius, the architects of his treasury.
Iapetus: A son of Ge and Uranus, the father of Atlas, Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Menoetius and a Titan. He was thrown
into tartarus by Jupiter. Milton modified his name to Japhet.
Lebadeia or Lebadea: Known in modern times as Livadia, a modern town in Boeotia, Greece. In ancient times it was noted for its oracle of Trophonius.
Libethra: The place in Greece where the Muses buried the fragments of Orpheus’ body and where the nightingales
sing most sweetly.
Libya: The Greek name for Africa.
Megaera: One of the Furies.
Minos: A legendary king & lawgiver of Crete. He was the son of Jupiter & Europa. After his death, he too became one of the judges of the under world.
Moirae: The name of the Fates in Greek.
Morpheus: The son of Sleep, and God of dreams; so called by Ovid. He gives airy nothings their form and
fashion.
Mnemosyne: Goddess of memory and the mother of the nine Muses by Zeus. She was the daughter of Heaven
and Earth (Uranus & Ge.)
The Muses: Daughters of Jupiter & Mnemosyne. They number nine. They were the goddesses of the arts and sciences
& memory. They lived on Mt.
Helicon. They were put in charge of Pegasus by Minerva.
Their guardian was Apollo and so he became known as Musagetes. The Muses were:
Calliope: Goddess of epic poetry
Clio: Goddess of history
Erato: Goddess of love poetry
Euterpe: Goddess of lyric poetry
Melpomene: Goddess of the tragedy
Polymnia: Goddess of sacred poetry
Terpsichore: Goddess of choral dance
Thalia: Goddess of the comedy
Urania: Goddess of astronomy
Mycenae: The capital of Agamemnon’s kingdom. An ancient Greek city.
Nymph: any one of a group of minor nature goddesses who lived in trees, rivers, etc.
Oceanus: A Titan ruling the watery element.
Olympians: The twelve Gods who rebelled and warred with the Titans (the elder Gods). Each had a distinct
and vivid personality.
Olympus, Mt.: A mountain peak. The home of the twelve Gods who succeeded the Titans. It is not heaven. Olympus is common to the sea, which is ruled by Poseidon, the dead,
which are ruled by Hades, and the heavens, which are ruled by Zeus.
Palamedes: A warrior against Troy, who served as a messenger calling Ulysses to the fight. The machinations of Ulysses finally got him killed.
Pallas Athene: See Minerva.
PanathenaeĒa: A festival honoring Pallas Athene.
Pan: Gr. Equivalent of Roman God Faunus & Celtic God Cernunnos. The Gr. God of the universe &
nature. God of fields, flocks, forests & shepherds. He was demonized by the Catholic Church and is the equivalent of Satan.
Pandean Pipes: A musical instrument of reeds, made by Pan in memory of Syrinx.
Definition:
Demonize: 1. to deprive of current value 2. turned into a demon 3. called a demon 4. Is known as a demon
by the ignorant 5. Is known as a demon to the unsophisticated. 6. Is known as a demon to the rustics. 7. to call a God a demon
Parnassian laurel: A wreath of Parnassian laurel, awarded to the winner of the poetic contests.
Parnassus: A mountain near Delphi, Greece, with two summits, one was consecrated to
Apollo and the Muses and the other to Bacchus.
Parthenon: The great temple at Athens on the Acropolis dedicated to Athene Parthenos (i.e. the Virgin). The temple was begun by the
architect Ictinus about 450 B.C. and was embellished mainly by Phidias. Many of the friezes and pediments are now in the British Museum among the Elgin Marbles. The chief treasure was a colossal chyrselephantine
statue of Athene by Phidias.
Periander: A king of Corinth. He is usually considered among the seven wise men of Greece. The host of Arion.
Pluto: Also known as Hades. The God of the dead.
Poseidon: The God of the Sea. The son of Rhea and Cronus, brother of Pluto and Zeus, husband of Amphitrite.
Priam: A king of Troy
when that city was sacked by the Greeks. He was the husband of Hecubam, and the father of fifty sons and many daughters, and
among them were Hector, Helenus, Paris, Agenor, Deiphobus, Polyxena, Cassandra, Troilus, and Polydorus. The old king went
to the tent of Achilles and made a successful plea for the body of hector after Hector was slain. After the Greeks concealed
in the Trojan horse had thrown open the gates, Pyrrhus the son of Achilles slew the aged Priam.
Prometheus: “Forethought,” literally. A Titan, The son of Clymene and Iapetus. Jupiter entrusted him with
making men out of water and mud. Pitying their state, he stole fire from heaven and gave it to them, and was punished by being
chained to Mt.
Caucasus, where an eagle preyed on his liver. Hercules
finally released him.
Protesilaus: The first Greek to fall in the Trojan War. He was slain by Hector, and the Gods allowed
him to return for three hours to converse with his widow Laodamia.
Proteus: Neptune’s herdsman. An old man and prophet,
renowned for his power of assuming different shapes at will.
Prudence: See Metis.
Salamis: An ancient Greek island. One of the cities contending for the honor of having
been the birth place of Homer.
Sappho: Greek poetess who leapt into the sea from the promontory of leucadia in disappointed love for
Phaon.
Tacnarus: The entrance to the lower regions.
Tauris: A Greek city, site of a temple of Diana.
Tethys: A sea Goddess, wife of Oceanus, mother of the river Gods, and daughter of Heaven and Earth.
Thebes: Founded by Cadmus, the Tyrian. The chief city of Boeotia, Greece.
Themis: A female Titan, daughter of Uranus, and Goddess of law and justice.
Zeus: the Gr. Equivalent of Jupiter. He and his brothers drew lots for their share of the universe. Poseidon
got the sea, Hades got the underworld, and
