[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. 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. In some versions of the story, Athena has no mother and is born from Zeus' forehead by parthenogenesis. Symbology. 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". She was known as Athena Parthenos "Athena the Virgin," but in one archaic Attic myth, the god Hephaestus tried and failed to rape her, resulting in Gaia giving birth to Erichthonius, an important Athenian founding hero. [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. For other uses, see. [6] For example, in Mycenae there was a goddess called Mykene, whose sisterhood was known as Mykenai,[6] whereas at Thebes an analogous deity was called Thebe, and the city was known under the plural form Thebai (or Thebes, in English, where the 's' is the plural formation). [135] She warned the three sisters not to open the chest,[135] but did not explain to them why or what was in it. [204] Then, Hector throws his spear at Achilles and misses, expecting Deiphobus to hand him another,[205] but Athena disappears instead, leaving Hector to face Achilles alone without his spear. Athena, in Greek mythology, is widely known as the goddess of wisdom and warfare. . Perhaps, however, the name Theonoe may mean "she who knows divine things" [ , ta theia noousa] better than others. Her Roman name was Minerva. Herse, Aglaulus, and Pandrosus go to the temple to offer sacrifices to Athena. [169][170][166] Athena also appears to Odysseus's son Telemachus. "Athene's garments and aegis were borrowed by the Greeks from the Libyan women, who are dressed in exactly the same way, except that their leather garments are fringed with thongs, not serpents."[11]. In the Iliad when Zeus sends Apollo to revive the wounded Hector, Apollo, holding the aegis, charges the Achaeans, pushing them back to their ships drawn up on the shore. "Athena, by the time she appears in art," Jane Ellen Harrison remarks, "has completely shed her animal form, has reduced the shapes she once wore of snake and bird to attributes, but occasionally in black-figure vase-paintings she still appears with wings. In every city and village in ancient Greece Athena, the goddess of war and wisdom, was one of the most venerated beings in the entire pantheon. [67] Other epithets include Ageleia, Itonia and Aethyia, under which she was worshiped in Megara. She was also a warrior goddess, and was believed to lead soldiers into battle as Athena Promachos. [199][134] The other two goddesses were enraged and, as a direct result, sided with the Greeks in the Trojan War. Essentially urban and civilized, Athena was probably a pre-Hellenic goddess later taken over by the Greeks. [209] As Athena Promachos, she is shown brandishing a spear. She fastened the head of the gorgon Medusa to the shield to scare others in battle. Athena was probably a pre-Hellenic goddess and was later taken over by the Greeks. Since the Renaissance, Athena has become an international symbol of wisdom, the arts, and classical learning. Corrections? [119], In one version of the myth, Pallas was the daughter of the sea-god Triton;[83] she and Athena were childhood friends, but Athena accidentally killed her during a friendly sparring match. Athena is One of the Twelve Olympians. [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. When Hermes arrives to seduce Herse, Aglaulus stands in his way instead of helping him as she had agreed. In Greek mythology [ edit] Athena's aegis, with Gorgon, here resembles the skin of the serpent who guards the golden fleece (regurgitating Jason); cup by Douris, early fifth century BC ( Vatican Museums) The aegis of Athena is referred to in several places in the Iliad. [15] Although Athana potnia is often translated as "Mistress Athena", it could also mean "the Potnia of Athana", or the Lady of Athens. Athena is associated with courage and braveness. In his dialogue Cratylus, the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (428347 BC) gives some rather imaginative etymologies of Athena's name, based on the theories of the ancient Athenians and his etymological speculations: That is a graver matter, and there, my friend, the modern interpreters of Homer may, I think, assist in explaining the view of the ancients. [19] This could be connected with the Linear B Mycenaean expressions a-ta-na po-ti-ni-ja and di-u-ja or di-wi-ja (Diwia, "of Zeus" or, possibly, related to a homonymous goddess),[15] resulting in a translation "Athena of Zeus" or "divine Athena". "[233] In contemporary Wicca, Athena is venerated as an aspect of the Goddess[234] and some Wiccans believe that she may bestow the "Owl Gift" ("the ability to write and communicate clearly") upon her worshippers. It established their descent from earlier deities considered to remain powerful. 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. Athena, also spelled Athene, in Greek religion, the city protectress, goddess of war, handicraft, and practical reason, identified by the Romans with Minerva. Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Dewing Greek Numismatic Foundation [44], As Athena Promachos, she was believed to lead soldiers into battle. [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. [136] In Pausanias's story, the two sisters were driven mad by the sight of the chest's contents and hurled themselves off the Acropolis, dying instantly,[137] but an Attic vase painting shows them being chased by the serpent off the edge of the cliff instead. [236], Athena is a natural patron of universities: At Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania, a statue of Athena (a replica of the original bronze one in the arts and archaeology library) resides in the Great Hall. [5] The Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens is dedicated to her. [197][134], The goddesses chose to place the matter before Zeus, who, not wanting to favor one of the goddesses, put the choice into the hands of Paris, a Trojan prince. A virgin deity, she was also - somewhat paradoxically - associated with peace and handicrafts, especially spinning and weaving. [127] Athena offered the first domesticated olive tree. [117] Although Agamemnon attempted to placate her anger with sacrifices, Athena sent a storm at Cape Kaphereos to destroy almost the entire Greek fleet and scatter all of the surviving ships across the Aegean. Being the favourite child of Zeus, she had great power. Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom and war, was known by a number of attributes and symbols. [177], In his Twelfth Pythian Ode, Pindar recounts the story of how Athena invented the aulos, a kind of flute, in imitation of the lamentations of Medusa's sisters, the Gorgons, after she was beheaded by the hero Perseus. [133] Zeus agreed to this and Hephaestus and Athena were married,[133] but, when Hephaestus was about to consummate the union, Athena vanished from the bridal bed, causing him to ejaculate on the floor, thus impregnating Gaia with Erichthonius. Two Athenians, the sculptor Phidias and the playwright Aeschylus, contributed significantly to the cultural dissemination of Athenas image. She was widely worshipped, but in modern times she is associated primarily with Athens, to which she gave her name and protection. During this period, the priestesses of Athena, or plyntrdes, performed a cleansing ritual within the Erechtheion, a sanctuary devoted to Athena and Poseidon. [6][tone] "Aegis-bearing Zeus", as he is in the Iliad, sometimes lends the fearsome aegis to Athena. As the guardian of the welfare of kings, Athena became the goddess of good counsel, prudent restraint and practical insight, and war. [211] The Roman goddess Minerva adopted most of Athena's Greek iconographical associations,[213] but was also integrated into the Capitoline Triad. She was the daughter of Zeus, produced without a mother, so that she emerged full-grown from his forehead. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Athena appears in Homers Odyssey as the tutelary deity of Odysseus, and myths from later sources portray her similarly as helper of Perseus and Heracles (Hercules). [144][145] Pseudo-Apollodorus also records that Athena guided the hero Perseus in his quest to behead Medusa. [72][73], The Greek biographer Plutarch (AD 46120) refers to an instance during the construction of the Propylaia of her being called Athena Hygieia (, i.e. personified "Health") after inspiring a physician to a successful course of treatment. [192] It represented the unjust and discrediting behavior of the gods towards mortals. Also known as Pallas Athena, she wore a breastplate made out of goatskin called the Aegis, which was given to her by her father, Zeus. She was essentially urban and civilized, the antithesis in many respects of Artemis, goddess of the outdoors. [191][190], Athena wove the scene of her victory over Poseidon in the contest for the patronage of Athens. (lines 789). [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. [176] Upon discovering the desecration of her temple, Athena transformed Medusa into a hideous monster with serpents for hair whose gaze would turn any mortal to stone. [139] The serpent in the story may be the same one depicted coiled at Athena's feet in Pheidias's famous statue of the Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon. The Twelve Olympians in Greek mythology are the most respected major deities of the Greek pantheon. In Greek mythology, Athena was the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and justice, strategic warfare, mathematics, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, and skill. Symbols associated with Athena are many, and among them are the owl, the Aegis (her shield), the spear, and snakes. [205] In Sophocles's tragedy Ajax, she punishes Odysseus's rival Ajax the Great, driving him insane and causing him to massacre the Achaeans' cattle, thinking that he is slaughtering the Achaeans themselves. [53][129] Robert Graves was of the opinion that "Poseidon's attempts to take possession of certain cities are political myths",[128] which reflect the conflict between matriarchal and patriarchal religions. [66], Athena was sometimes given the epithet Hippia ( "of the horses", "equestrian"),[40][67] referring to her invention of the bit, bridle, chariot, and wagon. [197] Aphrodite, Hera, and Athena all claimed to be the fairest, and thus the rightful owner of the apple. However, Zeus is normally portrayed in classical sculpture holding a thunderbolt or lightning, bearing neither a shield nor a breastplate. [216] Some even viewed the Virgin Mary as a warrior maiden, much like Athena Parthenos;[216] one anecdote tells that the Virgin Mary once appeared upon the walls of Constantinople when it was under siege by the Avars, clutching a spear and urging the people to fight. [167][166] Impressed by his resolve and shrewdness, she reveals herself and tells him what he needs to know to win back his kingdom. Triton's mother, Amphitrite). She plays an active role in the Iliad, in which she assists the Achaeans and, in the Odyssey, she is the divine counselor to Odysseus. The word aegis is identified with protection by a strong force with its roots in Greek mythology and adopted by the Romans; there are parallels in Norse mythology and in Egyptian mythology as well,[citation needed] where the Greek word aegis is applied by extension. [45][46] Athena represented the disciplined, strategic side of war, in contrast to her brother Ares, the patron of violence, bloodlust, and slaughter"the raw force of war". [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. [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. Robert Graves in The Greek Myths (1955) asserts that the aegis in its Libyan sense had been a shamanic pouch containing various ritual objects, bearing the device of a monstrous serpent-haired visage with tusk-like teeth and a protruding tongue which was meant to frighten away the uninitiated. [210] She is most often represented dressed in armor like a male soldier[209][210][7] and wearing a Corinthian helmet raised high atop her forehead. [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. "[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. Athena, like the other characters in Homer's epic, comes from a rich and vivid cultural tapestry of ancient Greek myth. Athena is associated with the city of Athens. Athenas association with the acropolises of various Greek cities probably stemmed from the location of the kings palaces there. [225] A series of paintings by Peter Paul Rubens depict Athena as Marie de' Medici's patron and mentor;[226] the final painting in the series goes even further and shows Marie de' Medici with Athena's iconography, as the mortal incarnation of the goddess herself. [171] Her actions lead him to travel around to Odysseus's comrades and ask about his father. [134][179] Chariclo's son Tiresias happened to be hunting on the same mountain and came to the spring searching for water. [178], A myth told by the early third-century BC Hellenistic poet Callimachus in his Hymn 5 begins with Athena bathing in a spring on Mount Helicon at midday with one of her favorite companions, the nymph Chariclo. Her birth and her contest with Poseidon, the sea god, for the suzerainty of the city were depicted on the pediments of the Parthenon, and the great festival of the Panathenaea, in July, was a celebration of her birthday.