They are also known as the Elder Gods and their dwelling place was at Mount Othrys. In Greek culture they were interpreted as personifications of the earth Gaea and the sky or heavens Uranus.
The first generation of Titans were descendants of Gaea and Uranus who originally gave birth to Twelve Titans , six males and six females. They arose to power when Cronus, in a plot with his mother and his brothers, castrated his father Uranus and took the rulership of Cosmos from him. The Age of Silver. The Olympian gods made a second race of silver, far less favored than the one of gold. Their childhood lasted a hundred years and when they grew up their lives were short and distressful.
For they were arrogant against one another and refused to worship the gods or offer them sacrifice. Zeus in his anger at their senselessness hid them under the earth where they still dwell. The Age of Bronze. Zeus made a third race of mortals, a terrible and mighty one of bronze. Their implements and weapons were of bronze, and they relentlessly pursued the painful and violent deeds of war.
They destroyed themselves by their own hands and went down to the realm of Hades without leaving a name. The Age of Heroes. Zeus made still another race, also valiant in war but more just and more civilized.
This was the race of the heroes, also called demigods, who were involved in the legendary events of Greek saga. They fought, for example, at Thebes and in the Trojan War. When they died, Zeus sent some of these heroes to inhabit the Islands of the Blessed, a paradise at the far ends of the earth, ruled over by Cronus Saturn , who had been deposed and freed by Zeus.
The Age of Iron. Zeus made still another race, that of iron, troubled by toil and misery, although good is intermingled with their evils. More and more will this become an age of wickedness, strife, and disrespect for the gods, until Shame itself and righteous Retribution will abandon mortals to their evil folly and doom. Dominant in the tradition about creation is the myth that Prometheus not Zeus was the creator of human beings from clay and Athena breathed into them the divine spirit.
In the version of Hesiod, although his account is far from logical and clear, it seems that Prometheus fashioned only mankind. Womankind was created later, through the agency of Zeus, in the person of Pandora. Although Prometheus had fought on the side of Zeus in his war against Cronus, the two mighty gods soon came into conflict once Zeus had assumed supreme power. The Nature of Sacrifice. Their antagonism began when Prometheus dared to match wits with Zeus.
There was a quarrel between mortals and the gods, apparently about how the parts of the sacrificial animals should be apportioned. For the gods, however, he deviously and artfully wrapped up the bones of the ox in its enticing, rich, white fat. Thus it was that when the Greeks made sacrifice to the gods, they enjoyed feasting upon the best edible portions of the animals, while only the white bones that remained were burned for the gods.
The Theft of Fire. He took away from them fire, essential to their livelihood and progress. Prometheus, defiantly our champion, once again tricked Zeus who this time was presumably at first unaware? The Punishment of Prometheus. A further defiance of Prometheus was his refusal to reveal to Zeus a crucial secret that he knew and Zeus did not.
If Zeus mated with the sea-goddess Thetis, she would bear a son who would overthrow his father. Thus Zeus faced the terrible risk of losing his power as supreme god, like Cronus and Uranus before him. Zeus had the wily and devious Prometheus bound in inescapable bonds to a crag of the remote Caucasus Mountains in Scythia, with a shaft driven through his middle.
And he sent an eagle to eat his immortal liver each day, and what the eagle ate would be restored again each night. Generations later, however, Zeus worked out a reconciliation with Prometheus and sent his son Heracles to kill the eagle with an arrow and release Prometheus. The plan worked, and when Uranus was castrated his blood fell to earth and into the sea. From this blood, several sets of children were born.
But Uranus made a prediction that Cronus would be overthrown by his sons. Because Cronus was afraid of losing the kingdom, he made the same mistakes his father did and turned into a terrible, angry king and did lots of horrible things to stay in power. He put his brothers back into prison and ate his children, just to keep them from overthrowing him. But Rhea, his wife, managed to fool Cronus and keep one of his children safe. This child was named Zeus. Rhea hid him away in a cave on the island of Crete so he would be safe.
On the island, Zeus was raised by a goat, named Amalthea. His father did not know that Zeus was his son. A Titan goddess named Metis helped Zeus fool his father into drinking a mixture of mustard in his wine.
This caused Cronus to feel sick, and he threw up all of his children that he had eaten, one by one. Zeus and his brothers and sisters rebelled against his father, Cronus. Zeus set the Cyclopes and the Hecatonchires free from their underground prison and convinced them to join the rebellion against Cronus too.
Remember, Cronus had been the one who locked up his siblings, so they agreed to join Zeus. The only Titians the older generation to fight with Zeus were Themis and Prometheus. This war lasted ten years. Atlas was a major leader on the side of the Titans and Cronus.
After the war was over, Zeus imprisoned all of the Titans, except for Themis and Prometheus who fought for him. These Titans were imprisoned in the earth the same way that Cronus, Hecatonchires and the Cyclopes once were. Hecatonchires guarded the Titans in their prison. Because Atlas was such an important fighter for the opposition, Zeus gave him the special punishment of holding up the world.
They drew straws to see who would rule over which part. He imprisoned them all in Tartarus, deep within Gaia. The imprisonment of her children caused Gaia great pain emotionally and physically. In order to reap vengeance on her consort Uranus for what he had done to her and her children, Gaia fashioned a sickle made of flint and approached her Titan children for help. The plan was to castrate Uranus.
None of the Titans were willing to risk a confrontation with Uranus with the exception of the youngest and the most ambitious Titan. His name was Cronus. Cronus took the sickle and laid in wait for his father to arrive.
When Uranus came, Cronus ambushed him and succeeded in castrating him. Cronus cast the severed genitals into the sea, the blood of which would create the giants, the meliae and the erinyes.
When the genitals washed up to shore, Aphrodite was created. Some claimed that the sickle was buried in Sicily. Others would claim that the sickle had been cast into the sea.
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