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Greek mythology
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Scenes from Greek mythology depicted in ancient art. Left-to-right, top-to-bottom:

the birth of Aphrodite, a revel with Dionysus and Silenus, Adonis playing the
kithara for Aphrodite, Heracles slaying the Lernaean Hydra, the Colchian dragon
regurgitating Jason in the presence of Athena, Hermes with his mother Maia, the
Trojan Horse, and Odysseus's ship sailing past the island of the sirens
Greek mythology
Euboean amphora, c. 550 BCE, depicting the fight between Cadmus and a dragon
Deities
PrimordialTitansOlympiansNymphsSea-deitiesEarth-deities
Heroes and heroism
Heracles / Hercules LaborsAchillesHector Trojan WarOdysseus OdysseyJasonArgonauts
Golden FleecePerseus MedusaGorgonOedipus SphinxOrpheus OrphismTheseus
MinotaurBellerophon PegasusChimeraDaedalus LabyrinthAtalantaHippomenes Golden
appleCadmus ThebesAeneas AeneidTriptolemus Eleusinian MysteriesPelops Ancient
Olympic GamesPirithous CentauromachyAmphitryon Teumessian foxNarcissus
NarcissismMeleager Calydonian BoarOtrera Amazons
Related
SatyrsCentaursDragonsDemogorgonReligion in Ancient GreeceMycenaean gods
Parthenon from west.jpg Ancient Greece portal
Draig.svg Myths portal
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Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks and a
genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and the nature of
the world, the lives and activities of deities, heroes, and mythological creatures,
and the origins and significance of the ancient Greeks' own cult and ritual
practices. Modern scholars study the myths in an attempt to shed light on the
religious and political institutions of ancient Greece and its civilization, and to
gain understanding of the nature of myth-making itself.[1]

The Greek myths were initially propagated in an oral-poetic tradition most likely
by Minoan and Mycenaean singers starting in the 18th century BC;[2] eventually the
myths of the heroes of the Trojan War and its aftermath became part of the oral
tradition of Homer's epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Two poems by Homer's
near contemporary Hesiod, the Theogony and the Works and Days, contain accounts of
the genesis of the world, the succession of divine rulers, the succession of human
ages, the origin of human woes, and the origin of sacrificial practices. Myths are
also preserved in the Homeric Hymns, in fragments of epic poems of the Epic Cycle,
in lyric poems, in the works of the tragedians and comedians of the fifth century
BC, in writings of scholars and poets of the Hellenistic Age, and in texts from the
time of the Roman Empire by writers such as Plutarch and Pausanias.

Aside from this narrative deposit in ancient Greek literature, pictorial

representations of gods, heroes, and mythic episodes featured prominently in
ancient vase paintings and the decoration of votive gifts and many other artifacts.
Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan
cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles. In the succeeding Archaic, Classical,
and Hellenistic periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear,
supplementing the existing literary evidence.[3]

Greek mythology has had an extensive influence on the culture, arts, and literature
of Western civilization and remains part of Western heritage and language. Poets
and artists from ancient times to the present have derived inspiration from Greek
mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the
themes.[4]:43

Achilles and Penthesileia by Exekias, c. 540 BC, British Museum, London

Contents
1 Sources
1.1 Literary sources
1.2 Archaeological sources
2 Survey of mythic history
2.1 Origins of the world and the gods
2.1.1 Greek pantheon
2.2 Age of gods and mortals
2.3 Heroic age
2.3.1 Heracles and the Heracleidae
2.3.2 Argonauts
2.3.3 House of Atreus and Theban Cycle
2.3.4 Trojan War and aftermath
3 Greek and Roman conceptions of myth
3.1 Philosophy and myth
3.2 Hellenistic and Roman rationalism
3.3 Syncretizing trends
4 Modern interpretations
4.1 Comparative and psychoanalytic approaches
4.2 Origin theories
5 Motifs in Western art and literature
6 References
6.1 Notes
6.2 Citations
6.3 Primary sources (Greek and Roman)
6.4 Secondary sources
7 Further reading
8 External links
Sources
Greek mythology is known today primarily from Greek literature and representations
on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c. 900 BC to c. 800 BC
onward.[5]:200 In fact, literary and archaeological sources integrate, sometimes
mutually supportive and sometimes in conflict; however, in many cases, the
existence of this corpus of data is a strong indication that many elements of Greek
mythology have strong factual and historical roots.[6]

Literary sources
Mythical narration plays an important role in nearly every genre of Greek
literature. Nevertheless, the only general mythographical handbook to survive from
Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus. This work attempts to
reconcile the contradictory tales of the poets and provides a grand summary of
traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends.[7]:1 Apollodorus of Athens lived
from c. 180 BC to c. 125 BC and wrote on many of these topics. His writings may
have formed the basis for the collection; however the "Library" discusses events
that occurred long after his death, hence the name Pseudo-Apollodorus.
Prometheus (1868 by Gustave Moreau). The myth of Prometheus first was attested by
Hesiod and then constituted the basis for a tragic trilogy of plays, possibly by
Aeschylus, consisting of Prometheus Bound, Prometheus Unbound, and Prometheus
Pyrphoros.
Among the earliest literary sources are Homer's two epic poems, the Iliad and the
Odyssey. Other poets completed the "epic cycle", but these later and lesser poems
now are lost almost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the "Homeric Hymns"
have no direct connection with Homer. The oldest are choral hymns from the earlier
part of the so-called Lyric age.[8]:7 Hesiod, a possible contemporary with Homer,
offers in his Theogony (Origin of the Gods) the fullest account of the earliest
Greek myths, dealing with the creation of the world; the origin of the gods,
Titans, and Giants; as well as elaborate genealogies, folktales, and etiological
myths. Hesiod's Works and Days, a didactic poem about farming life, also includes
the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Five Ages. The poet gives advice on the
best way to succeed in a dangerous world, rendered yet more dangerous by its gods.
[3]

Lyrical poets often took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became
gradually less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar,
Bacchylides and Simonides, and bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion, relate
individual mythological incidents.[9]:xii Additionally, myth was central to
classical Athenian drama. The tragic playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, and
Euripides took most of their plots from myths of the age of heroes and the Trojan
War. Many of the great tragic stories (e.g. Agamemnon and his children, Oedipus,
Jason, Medea, etc.) took on their classic form in these tragedies. The comic
playwright Aristophanes also used myths, in The Birds and The Frogs.[8]:8

Historians Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, and geographers Pausanias and Strabo,
who traveled throughout the Greek world and noted the stories they heard, supplied
numerous local myths and legends, often giving little-known alternative versions.
[9]:xii Herodotus in particular, searched the various traditions presented him and
found the historical or mythological roots in the confrontation between Greece and
the East.[10]:60[11]:22 Herodotus attempted to reconcile origins and the blending
of differing cultural concepts.

The poetry of the Hellenistic and Roman ages was primarily composed as a literary
rather than cultic exercise. Nevertheless, it contains many important details that
would otherwise be lost. This category includes the works of:

The Roman poets Ovid, Statius, Valerius Flaccus, Seneca and Virgil with Servius's
commentary.
The Greek poets of the Late Antique period: Nonnus, Antoninus Liberalis, and
Quintus Smyrnaeus.
The Greek poets of the Hellenistic period: Apollonius of Rhodes, Callimachus,
Pseudo-Eratosthenes, and Parthenius.
Prose writers from the same periods who make reference to myths include Apuleius,
Petronius, Lollianus, and Heliodorus. Two other important non-poetical sources are
the Fabulae and Astronomica of the Roman writer styled as Pseudo-Hyginus, the
Imagines of Philostratus the Elder and Philostratus the Younger, and the
Descriptions of Callistratus.

Finally, a number of Byzantine Greek writers provide important details of myth,

much derived from earlier now lost Greek works. These preservers of myth include
Arnobius, Hesychius, the author of the Suda, John Tzetzes, and Eustathius. They
often treat mythology from a Christian moralizing perspective.[12]

Archaeological sources
The Roman poet Virgil, here depicted in the fifth-century manuscript, the Vergilius
Romanus, preserved details of Greek mythology in many of his writings.
The discovery of the Mycenaean civilization by the German amateur archaeologist
Heinrich Schliemann in the nineteenth century, and the discovery of the Minoan
civilization in Crete by the British archaeologist Arthur Evans in the twentieth
century, helped to explain many existing questions about Homer's epics and provided
archaeological evidence for many of the mythological details about gods and heroes.
Unfortunately, the evidence about myths and rituals at Mycenaean and Minoan sites
is entirely monumental, as the Linear B script (an ancient form of Greek found in
both Crete and mainland Greece) was used mainly to record inventories, although
certain names of gods and heroes have been tentatively identified.[3]

Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan
cycle, as well as the adventures of Heracles.[3] These visual representations of
myths are important for two reasons. Firstly, many Greek myths are attested on
vases earlier than in literary sources: of the twelve labors of Heracles, for
example, only the Cerberus adventure occurs in a contemporary literary text.[13]
Secondly, visual sources sometimes represent myths or mythical scenes that are not
attested in any extant literary source. In some cases, the first known
representation of a myth in geometric art predates its first known representation
in late archaic poetry, by several centuries.[5] In the Archaic (c. 750 – c. 500
BC), Classical (c. 480–323 BC), and Hellenistic (323–146 BC) periods, Homeric and
various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary
evidence.[3]

Survey of mythic history

Phaedra with an attendant, probably her nurse, a fresco from Pompeii, c. 60 – c. 20
BC
Greek mythology has changed over time to accommodate the evolution of their
culture, of which mythology, both overtly and in its unspoken assumptions, is an
index of the changes. In Greek mythology's surviving literary forms, as found
mostly at the end of the progressive changes, it is inherently political, as
Gilbert Cuthbertson (1975) has argued.[i][14]

The earlier inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula were an agricultural people who,
using Animism, assigned a spirit to every aspect of nature. Eventually, these vague
spirits assumed human forms and entered the local mythology as gods.[15]:17 When
tribes from the north of the Balkan Peninsula invaded, they brought with them a new
pantheon of gods, based on conquest, force, prowess in battle, and violent heroism.
Other older gods of the agricultural world fused with those of the more powerful
invaders or else faded into insignificance.[15]:18

After the middle of the Archaic period, myths about relationships between male gods
and male heroes became more and more frequent, indicating the parallel development
of pedagogic pederasty (παιδικὸς ἔρως, eros paidikos), thought to have been
introduced around 630 BC. By the end of the fifth century BC, poets had assigned at
least one eromenos, an adolescent boy who was their sexual companion, to every
important god except Ares and to many legendary figures.[16] Previously existing
myths, such as those of Achilles and Patroclus, also then were cast in a pederastic
light.[17]:54 Alexandrian poets at first, then more generally literary
mythographers in the early Roman Empire, often re-adapted stories of Greek
mythological characters in this fashion.

The achievement of epic poetry was to create story-cycles and, as a result, to

develop a new sense of mythological chronology. Thus Greek mythology unfolds as a
phase in the development of the world and of humans.[18]:11 While self-
contradictions in these stories make an absolute timeline impossible, an
approximate chronology may be discerned. The resulting mythological "history of the
world" may be divided into three or four broader periods:

The myths of origin or age of gods (Theogonies, "births of gods"): myths about the
origins of the world, the gods, and the human race.
The age when gods and mortals mingled freely: stories of the early interactions
between gods, demigods, and mortals.
The age of heroes (heroic age), where divine activity was more limited. The last
and greatest of the heroic legends is the story of the Trojan War and after (which
is regarded by some researchers as a separate, fourth period).[8]:35
While the age of gods often has been of more interest to contemporary students of
myth, the Greek authors of the archaic and classical eras had a clear preference
for the age of heroes, establishing a chronology and record of human
accomplishments after the questions of how the world came into being were
explained. For example, the heroic Iliad and Odyssey dwarfed the divine-focused
Theogony and Homeric Hymns in both size and popularity. Under the influence of
Homer the "hero cult" leads to a restructuring in spiritual life, expressed in the
separation of the realm of the gods from the realm of the dead (heroes), of the
Chthonic from the Olympian.[19]:205 In the Works and Days, Hesiod makes use of a
scheme of Four Ages of Man (or Races): Golden, Silver, Bronze, and Iron. These
races or ages are separate creations of the gods, the Golden Age belonging to the
reign of Cronos, the subsequent races to the creation of Zeus. The presence of evil
was explained by the myth of Pandora, when all of the best of human capabilities,
save hope, had been spilled out of her overturned jar.[20] In Metamorphoses, Ovid
follows Hesiod's concept of the four ages.[21]

Origins of the world and the gods

Further information: Greek primordial gods and Family tree of the Greek gods

Amor Vincit Omnia (Love Conquers All), a depiction of the god of love, Eros. By
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, circa 1601–1602.
"Myths of origin" or "creation myths" represent an attempt to explain the
beginnings of the universe in human language.[9]:10 The most widely accepted
version at the time, although a philosophical account of the beginning of things,
is reported by Hesiod, in his Theogony. He begins with Chaos, a yawning
nothingness. Out of the void emerged Gaia (the Earth) and some other primary divine
beings: Eros (Love), the Abyss (the Tartarus), and the Erebus.[22] Without male
assistance, Gaia gave birth to Uranus (the Sky) who then fertilized her. From that
union were born first the Titans—six males: Coeus, Crius, Cronus, Hyperion,
Iapetus, and Oceanus; and six females: Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Rhea, Theia, Themis, and
Tethys. After Cronus was born, Gaia and Uranus decreed no more Titans were to be
born. They were followed by the one-eyed Cyclopes and the Hecatonchires or Hundred-
Handed Ones, who were both thrown into Tartarus by Uranus. This made Gaia furious.
Cronus ("the wily, youngest and most terrible of Gaia's children"),[22] was
convinced by Gaia to castrate his father. He did this, and became the ruler of the
Titans with his sister-wife Rhea as his consort, and the other Titans became his
court.

A motif of father-against-son conflict was repeated when Cronus was confronted by

his son, Zeus. Because Cronus had betrayed his father, he feared that his offspring
would do the same, and so each time Rhea gave birth, he snatched up the child and
ate it. Rhea hated this and tricked him by hiding Zeus and wrapping a stone in a
baby's blanket, which Cronus ate. When Zeus was full grown, he fed Cronus a drugged
drink which caused him to vomit, throwing up Rhea's other children, including
Poseidon, Hades, Hestia, Demeter, and Hera, and the stone, which had been sitting
in Cronus's stomach all this time. Zeus then challenged Cronus to war for the
kingship of the gods. At last, with the help of the Cyclopes (whom Zeus freed from
Tartarus), Zeus and his siblings were victorious, while Cronus and the Titans were
hurled down to imprisonment in Tartarus.[23]
Attic black-figured amphora depicting Athena being "reborn" from the head of Zeus,
who had swallowed her mother Metis, on the right, Eileithyia, the goddess of
childbirth, assists, circa 550–525 BC (Musée du Louvre, Paris).
Zeus was plagued by the same concern, and after a prophecy that the offspring of
his first wife, Metis, would give birth to a god "greater than he", Zeus swallowed
her.[24]:98 She was already pregnant with Athena, however, and she burst forth from
his head—fully-grown and dressed for war.[24]:108

The earliest Greek thought about poetry considered the theogonies to be the
prototypical poetic genre—the prototypical mythos—and imputed almost magical powers
to it. Orpheus, the archetypal poet, also was the archetypal singer of theogonies,
which he uses to calm seas and storms in Apollonius' Argonautica, and to move the
stony hearts of the underworld gods in his descent to Hades. When Hermes invents
the lyre in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes, the first thing he does is sing about the
birth of the gods.[25] Hesiod's Theogony is not only the fullest surviving account
of the gods, but also the fullest surviving account of the archaic poet's function,
with its long preliminary invocation to the Muses. Theogony also was the subject of
many lost poems, including those attributed to Orpheus, Musaeus, Epimenides,
Abaris, and other legendary seers, which were used in private ritual purifications
and mystery-rites. There are indications that Plato was familiar with some version
of the Orphic theogony.[26]:147 A silence would have been expected about religious
rites and beliefs, however, and that nature of the culture would not have been
reported by members of the society while the beliefs were held. After they ceased
to become religious beliefs, few would have known the rites and rituals. Allusions
often existed, however, to aspects that were quite public.

Images existed on pottery and religious artwork that were interpreted and more
likely, misinterpreted in many diverse myths and tales. A few fragments of these
works survive in quotations by Neoplatonist philosophers and recently unearthed
papyrus scraps. One of these scraps, the Derveni Papyrus now proves that at least
in the fifth century BC a theogonic-cosmogonic poem of Orpheus was in existence.
[19]:236[26]:147

The first philosophical cosmologists reacted against, or sometimes built upon,

popular mythical conceptions that had existed in the Greek world for some time.
Some of these popular conceptions can be gleaned from the poetry of Homer and
Hesiod. In Homer, the Earth was viewed as a flat disk afloat on the river of
Oceanus and overlooked by a hemispherical sky with sun, moon, and stars. The Sun
(Helios) traversed the heavens as a charioteer and sailed around the Earth in a
golden bowl at night. Sun, earth, heaven, rivers, and winds could be addressed in
prayers and called to witness oaths. Natural fissures were popularly regarded as
entrances to the subterranean house of Hades and his predecessors, home of the
dead.[3][27]:45 Influences from other cultures always afforded new themes.

Greek pantheon
Further information: Ancient Greek religion, Twelve Olympians, Family Tree of the
Greek Gods, and List of Mycenaean gods

Zeus, disguised as a swan, seduces Leda, the Queen of Sparta. A sixteenth-century

copy of the lost original by Michelangelo.
According to Classical-era mythology, after the overthrow of the Titans, the new
pantheon of gods and goddesses was confirmed. Among the principal Greek gods were
the Olympians, residing on Mount Olympus under the eye of Zeus. (The limitation of
their number to twelve seems to have been a comparatively modern idea.)[28]:8
Besides the Olympians, the Greeks worshipped various gods of the countryside, the
satyr-god Pan, Nymphs (spirits of rivers), Naiads (who dwelled in springs), Dryads
(who were spirits of the trees), Nereids (who inhabited the sea), river gods,
Satyrs, and others. In addition, there were the dark powers of the underworld, such
as the Erinyes (or Furies), said to pursue those guilty of crimes against blood-
relatives.[29] In order to honor the Ancient Greek pantheon, poets composed the
Homeric Hymns (a group of thirty-three songs).[30] Gregory Nagy (1992) regards "the
larger Homeric Hymns as simple preludes (compared with Theogony), each of which
invokes one god."[31]:54

The gods of Greek mythology are described as having essentially corporeal but ideal
bodies. According to Walter Burkert, the defining characteristic of Greek
anthropomorphism is that "the Greek gods are persons, not abstractions, ideas or
concepts."[19]:182 Regardless of their underlying forms, the Ancient Greek gods
have many fantastic abilities; most significantly, the gods are not affected by
disease, and can be wounded only under highly unusual circumstances. The Greeks
considered immortality as the distinctive characteristic of their gods; this
immortality, as well as unfading youth, was insured by the constant use of nectar
and ambrosia, by which the divine blood was renewed in their veins.[28]:4

Each god descends from his or her own genealogy, pursues differing interests, has a
certain area of expertise, and is governed by a unique personality; however, these
descriptions arise from a multiplicity of archaic local variants, which do not
always agree with one another. When these gods are called upon in poetry, prayer or
cult, they are referred to by a combination of their name and epithets, that
identify them by these distinctions from other manifestations of themselves (e.g.,
Apollo Musagetes is "Apollo, [as] leader of the Muses"). Alternatively the epithet
may identify a particular and localized aspect of the god, sometimes thought to be
already ancient during the classical epoch of Greece.

Most gods were associated with specific aspects of life. For example, Aphrodite was
the goddess of love and beauty, Ares was the god of war, Hades the ruler of the
underworld, and Athena the goddess of wisdom and courage.[28]:20ff Some gods, such
as Apollo and Dionysus, revealed complex personalities and mixtures of functions,
while others, such as Hestia (literally "hearth") and Helios (literally "sun"),
were little more than personifications. The most impressive temples tended to be
dedicated to a limited number of gods, who were the focus of large pan-Hellenic
cults. It was, however, common for individual regions and villages to devote their
own cults to minor gods. Many cities also honored the more well-known gods with
unusual local rites and associated strange myths with them that were unknown
elsewhere. During the heroic age, the cult of heroes (or demigods) supplemented
that of the gods.

Age of gods and mortals

Bridging the age when gods lived alone and the age when divine interference in
human affairs was limited was a transitional age in which gods and mortals moved
together. These were the early days of the world when the groups mingled more
freely than they did later. Most of these tales were later told by Ovid's
Metamorphoses and they are often divided into two thematic groups: tales of love,
and tales of punishment.[8]:38

Dionysus with satyrs. Interior of a cup painted by the Brygos Painter, Cabinet des
Médailles.
Tales of love often involve incest, or the seduction or rape of a mortal woman by a
male god, resulting in heroic offspring. The stories generally suggest that
relationships between gods and mortals are something to avoid; even consenting
relationships rarely have happy endings.[8]:39 In a few cases, a female divinity
mates with a mortal man, as in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, where the goddess
lies with Anchises to produce Aeneas.[32]

The second type (tales of punishment) involves the appropriation or invention of

some important cultural artifact, as when Prometheus steals fire from the gods,
when Tantalus steals nectar and ambrosia from Zeus' table and gives it to his own
subjects—revealing to them the secrets of the gods, when Prometheus or Lycaon
invents sacrifice, when Demeter teaches agriculture and the Mysteries to
Triptolemus, or when Marsyas invents the aulos and enters into a musical contest
with Apollo. Ian Morris considers Prometheus' adventures as "a place between the
history of the gods and that of man."[33]:291 An anonymous papyrus fragment, dated
to the third century, vividly portrays Dionysus' punishment of the king of Thrace,
Lycurgus, whose recognition of the new god came too late, resulting in horrific
penalties that extended into the afterlife.[34]:50 The story of the arrival of
Dionysus to establish his cult in Thrace was also the subject of an Aeschylean
trilogy.[35]:28 In another tragedy, Euripides' The Bacchae, the king of Thebes,
Pentheus, is punished by Dionysus, because he disrespected the god and spied on his
Maenads, the female worshippers of the god.[36]:195

Demeter and Metanira in a detail on an Apulian red-figure hydria, circa 340 BC

(Altes Museum, Berlin).
In another story, based on an old folktale-motif,[37] and echoing a similar theme,
Demeter was searching for her daughter, Persephone, having taken the form of an old
woman called Doso, and received a hospitable welcome from Celeus, the King of
Eleusis in Attica. As a gift to Celeus, because of his hospitality, Demeter planned
to make his son Demophon a god, but she was unable to complete the ritual because
his mother Metanira walked in and saw her son in the fire and screamed in fright,
which angered Demeter, who lamented that foolish mortals do not understand the
concept and ritual.[38]

Heroic age
The age in which the heroes lived is known as the heroic age.[39] The epic and
genealogical poetry created cycles of stories clustered around particular heroes or
events and established the family relationships between the heroes of different
stories; they thus arranged the stories in sequence. According to Ken Dowden
(1992), "there is even a saga effect: We can follow the fates of some families in
successive generations."[18]:11

After the rise of the hero cult, gods and heroes constitute the sacral sphere and
are invoked together in oaths and prayers which are addressed to them.[19]:205
Burkert (2002) notes that "the roster of heroes, again in contrast to the gods, is
never given fixed and final form. Great gods are no longer born, but new heroes can
always be raised up from the army of the dead." Another important difference
between the hero cult and the cult of gods is that the hero becomes the centre of
local group identity.[19]:206

The monumental events of Heracles are regarded as the dawn of the age of heroes. To
the Heroic Age are also ascribed three great events: the Argonautic expedition, the
Theban Cycle, and the Trojan War.[39][40]:340

Heracles and the Heracleidae

Further information: Heracles, Heracleidae, and Hercules

Heracles with his baby Telephus (Louvre Museum, Paris).

Some scholars believe[40]:10 that behind Heracles' complicated mythology there was
probably a real man, perhaps a chieftain-vassal of the kingdom of Argos. Some
scholars suggest the story of Heracles is an allegory for the sun's yearly passage
through the twelve constellations of the zodiac.[41] Others point to earlier myths
from other cultures, showing the story of Heracles as a local adaptation of hero
myths already well established. Traditionally, Heracles was the son of Zeus and
Alcmene, granddaughter of Perseus.[42] His fantastic solitary exploits, with their
many folk-tale themes, provided much material for popular legend. According to
Burkert (2002), "He is portrayed as a sacrificer, mentioned as a founder of altars,
and imagined as a voracious eater himself; it is in this role that he appears in
comedy.[19]

While his tragic end provided much material for tragedy—Heracles is regarded by
Thalia Papadopoulou as "a play of great significance in examination of other
Euripidean dramas."[43][19]:211 In art and literature Heracles was represented as
an enormously strong man of moderate height; his characteristic weapon was the bow
but frequently also the club. Vase paintings demonstrate the unparalleled
popularity of Heracles, his fight with the lion being depicted many hundreds of
times.[19]:211

Heracles also entered Etruscan and Roman mythology and cult, and the exclamation
"mehercule" became as familiar to the Romans as "Herakleis" was to the Greeks.
[19]:211 In Italy he was worshipped as a god of merchants and traders, although
others also prayed to him for his characteristic gifts of good luck or rescue from
danger.[42]

Heracles attained the highest social prestige through his appointment as official
ancestor of the Dorian kings. This probably served as a legitimation for the Dorian
migrations into the Peloponnese. Hyllus, the eponymous hero of one Dorian phyle,
became the son of Heracles and one of the Heracleidae or Heraclids (the numerous
descendants of Heracles, especially the descendants of Hyllus—other Heracleidae
included Macaria, Lamos, Manto, Bianor, Tlepolemus, and Telephus). These Heraclids
conquered the Peloponnesian kingdoms of Mycenae, Sparta and Argos, claiming,
according to legend, a right to rule them through their ancestor. Their rise to
dominance is frequently called the "Dorian invasion". The Lydian and later the
Macedonian kings, as rulers of the same rank, also became Heracleidae.[44][19]:211

Other members of this earliest generation of heroes such as Perseus, Deucalion,

Theseus and Bellerophon, have many traits in common with Heracles. Like him, their
exploits are solitary, fantastic and border on fairy tale, as they slay monsters
such as the Chimera and Medusa. Bellerophon's adventures are commonplace types,
similar to the adventures of Heracles and Theseus. Sending a hero to his presumed
death is also a recurrent theme of this early heroic tradition, used in the cases
of Perseus and Bellerophon.[45]

Argonauts
Further information: Argonauts
The only surviving Hellenistic epic, the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes (epic
poet, scholar, and director of the Library of Alexandria) tells the myth of the
voyage of Jason and the Argonauts to retrieve the Golden Fleece from the mythical
land of Colchis. In the Argonautica, Jason is impelled on his quest by king Pelias,
who receives a prophecy that a man with one sandal would be his nemesis. Jason
loses a sandal in a river, arrives at the court of Pelias, and the epic is set in
motion. Nearly every member of the next generation of heroes, as well as Heracles,
went with Jason in the ship Argo to fetch the Golden Fleece. This generation also
included Theseus, who went to Crete to slay the Minotaur; Atalanta, the female
heroine, and Meleager, who once had an epic cycle of his own to rival the Iliad and
Odyssey. Pindar, Apollonius and the Bibliotheca endeavor to give full lists of the
Argonauts.[46][47][48]

Although Apollonius wrote his poem in the 3rd century BC, the composition of the
story of the Argonauts is earlier than Odyssey, which shows familiarity with the
exploits of Jason (the wandering of Odysseus may have been partly founded on it).
[49][50] In ancient times the expedition was regarded as a historical fact, an
incident in the opening up of the Black Sea to Greek commerce and colonization.[49]
It was also extremely popular, forming a cycle to which a number of local legends
became attached. The story of Medea, in particular, caught the imagination of the
tragic poets.[50]
House of Atreus and Theban Cycle
Further information: Theban Cycle and Seven Against Thebes
In between the Argo and the Trojan War, there was a generation known chiefly for
its horrific crimes. This includes the doings of Atreus and Thyestes at Argos.
Behind the myth of the house of Atreus (one of the two principal heroic dynasties
with the house of Labdacus) lies the problem of the devolution of power and of the
mode of accession to sovereignty. The twins Atreus and Thyestes with their
descendants played the leading role in the tragedy of the devolution of power in
Mycenae.[51]

The Theban Cycle deals with events associated especially with Cadmus, the city's
founder, and later with the doings of Laius and Oedipus at Thebes; a series of
stories that lead to the eventual pillage of that city at the hands of the Seven
Against Thebes and Epigoni.[7]:317 (It is not known whether the Seven Against
Thebes figured in early epic.) As far as Oedipus is concerned, early epic accounts
seem to have him continuing to rule at Thebes after the revelation that Iokaste was
his mother, and subsequently marrying a second wife who becomes the mother of his
children—markedly different from the tale known to us through tragedy (e.g.
Sophocles' Oedipus Rex) and later mythological accounts.[7]:311

Trojan War and aftermath

El Juicio de Paris by Enrique Simonet, 1904. Paris is holding the golden apple on
his right hand while surveying the goddesses in a calculative manner.

In The Rage of Achilles by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1757, Fresco, 300 x 300 cm,
Villa Valmarana, Vicenza) Achilles is outraged that Agamemnon would threaten to
seize his warprize, Briseis, and he draws his sword to kill Agamemnon. The sudden
appearance of the goddess Athena, who, in this fresco, has grabbed Achilles by the
hair, prevents the act of violence.
Further information: Trojan War and Epic Cycle
Greek mythology culminates in the Trojan War, fought between Greece and Troy, and
its aftermath. In Homer's works, such as the Iliad, the chief stories have already
taken shape and substance, and individual themes were elaborated later, especially
in Greek drama. The Trojan War also elicited great interest in the Roman culture
because of the story of Aeneas, a Trojan hero whose journey from Troy led to the
founding of the city that would one day become Rome, as recounted in Virgil's
Aeneid (Book II of Virgil's Aeneid contains the best-known account of the sack of
Troy).[52][53] Finally there are two pseudo-chronicles written in Latin that passed
under the names of Dictys Cretensis and Dares Phrygius.[54]

The Trojan War cycle, a collection of epic poems, starts with the events leading up
to the war: Eris and the golden apple of Kallisti, the Judgement of Paris, the
abduction of Helen, the sacrifice of Iphigenia at Aulis. To recover Helen, the
Greeks launched a great expedition under the overall command of Menelaus's brother,
Agamemnon, king of Argos or Mycenae, but the Trojans refused to return Helen. The
Iliad, which is set in the tenth year of the war, tells of the quarrel between
Agamemnon and Achilles, who was the finest Greek warrior, and the consequent deaths
in battle of Achilles' beloved comrade Patroclus and Priam's eldest son, Hector.
After Hector's death the Trojans were joined by two exotic allies, Penthesilea,
queen of the Amazons, and Memnon, king of the Ethiopians and son of the dawn-
goddess Eos.[53] Achilles killed both of these, but Paris then managed to kill
Achilles with an arrow in the heel. Achilles' heel was the only part of his body
which was not invulnerable to damage by human weaponry. Before they could take
Troy, the Greeks had to steal from the citadel the wooden image of Pallas Athena
(the Palladium). Finally, with Athena's help, they built the Trojan Horse. Despite
the warnings of Priam's daughter Cassandra, the Trojans were persuaded by Sinon, a
Greek who feigned desertion, to take the horse inside the walls of Troy as an
offering to Athena; the priest Laocoon, who tried to have the horse destroyed, was
killed by sea-serpents. At night the Greek fleet returned, and the Greeks from the
horse opened the gates of Troy. In the total sack that followed, Priam and his
remaining sons were slaughtered; the Trojan women passed into slavery in various
cities of Greece. The adventurous homeward voyages of the Greek leaders (including
the wanderings of Odysseus and Aeneas (the Aeneid), and the murder of Agamemnon)
were told in two epics, the Returns (the lost Nostoi) and Homer's Odyssey.[52] The
Trojan cycle also includes the adventures of the children of the Trojan generation
(e.g., Orestes and Telemachus).[53]

The Trojan War provided a variety of themes and became a main source of inspiration
for Ancient Greek artists (e.g. metopes on the Parthenon depicting the sack of
Troy); this artistic preference for themes deriving from the Trojan Cycle indicates
its importance to the Ancient Greek civilization.[52] The same mythological cycle
also inspired a series of posterior European literary writings. For instance,
Trojan Medieval European writers, unacquainted with Homer at first hand, found in
the Troy legend a rich source of heroic and romantic storytelling and a convenient
framework into which to fit their own courtly and chivalric ideals. Twelfth-century
authors, such as Benoît de Sainte-Maure (Roman de Troie [Romance of Troy, 1154–60])
and Joseph of Exeter (De Bello Troiano [On the Trojan War, 1183]) describe the war
while rewriting the standard version they found in Dictys and Dares. They thus
follow Horace's advice and Virgil's example: they rewrite a poem of Troy instead of
telling something completely new.[55]

Some of the more famous heroes noted for their inclusion in the Trojan War were:

On the Trojan side:

Aeneas
Hector
Paris
On the Greek side:

Ajax (there were two Ajaxes)

Achilles
King Agamemnon
Menelaus
Odysseus
Greek and Roman conceptions of myth
Mythology was at the heart of everyday life in Ancient Greece.[15]:15 Greeks
regarded mythology as a part of their history. They used myth to explain natural
phenomena, cultural variations, traditional enmities and friendships. It was a
source of pride to be able to trace the descent of one's leaders from a
mythological hero or a god. Few ever doubted that there was truth behind the
account of the Trojan War in the Iliad and Odyssey. According to Victor Davis
Hanson, a military historian, columnist, political essayist and former classics
professor, and John Heath, a classics professor, the profound knowledge of the
Homeric epos was deemed by the Greeks the basis of their acculturation. Homer was
the "education of Greece" (Ἑλλάδος παίδευσις), and his poetry "the Book".[56]

Philosophy and myth

Raphael's Plato in The School of Athens fresco (probably in the likeness of

Leonardo da Vinci). The philosopher expelled the study of Homer, of the tragedies
and of the related mythological traditions from his utopian Republic.
After the rise of philosophy, history, prose and rationalism in the late 5th
century BC, the fate of myth became uncertain, and mythological genealogies gave
place to a conception of history which tried to exclude the supernatural (such as
the Thucydidean history).[57] While poets and dramatists were reworking the myths,
Greek historians and philosophers were beginning to criticize them.[8]

A few radical philosophers like Xenophanes of Colophon were already beginning to

label the poets' tales as blasphemous lies in the 6th century BC; Xenophanes had
complained that Homer and Hesiod attributed to the gods "all that is shameful and
disgraceful among men; they steal, commit adultery, and deceive one
another."[5]:169-70 This line of thought found its most sweeping expression in
Plato's Republic and Laws. Plato created his own allegorical myths (such as the
vision of Er in the Republic), attacked the traditional tales of the gods' tricks,
thefts and adulteries as immoral, and objected to their central role in literature.
[8] Plato's criticism was the first serious challenge to the Homeric mythological
tradition,[56] referring to the myths as "old wives' chatter."[58] For his part
Aristotle criticized the Pre-socratic quasi-mythical philosophical approach and
underscored that "Hesiod and the theological writers were concerned only with what
seemed plausible to themselves, and had no respect for us ... But it is not worth
taking seriously writers who show off in the mythical style; as for those who do
proceed by proving their assertions, we must cross-examine them."[57]

Nevertheless, even Plato did not manage to wean himself and his society from the
influence of myth; his own characterization for Socrates is based on the
traditional Homeric and tragic patterns, used by the philosopher to praise the
righteous life of his teacher:[59]

But perhaps someone might say: "Are you then not ashamed, Socrates, of having
followed such a pursuit, that you are now in danger of being put to death as a
result?" But I should make to him a just reply: "You do not speak well, Sir, if you
think a man in whom there is even a little merit ought to consider danger of life
or death, and not rather regard this only, when he does things, whether the things
he does are right or wrong and the acts of a good or a bad man. For according to
your argument all the demigods would be bad who died at Troy, including the son of
Thetis, who so despised danger, in comparison with enduring any disgrace, that when
his mother (and she was a goddess) said to him, as he was eager to slay Hector,
something like this, I believe,

My son, if you avenge the death of your friend Patroclus and kill Hector, you
yourself shall die; for straightway, after Hector, is death appointed unto you.
(Hom. Il. 18.96)
he, when he heard this, made light of death and danger, and feared much more to
live as a coward and not to avenge his friends, and said,

Straightway may I die, after doing vengeance upon the wrongdoer, that I may not
stay here, jeered at beside the curved ships, a burden of the earth.
Hanson and Heath estimate that Plato's rejection of the Homeric tradition was not
favorably received by the grassroots Greek civilization.[56] The old myths were
kept alive in local cults; they continued to influence poetry and to form the main
subject of painting and sculpture.[57]

More sportingly, the 5th century BC tragedian Euripides often played with the old
traditions, mocking them, and through the voice of his characters injecting notes
of doubt. Yet the subjects of his plays were taken, without exception, from myth.
Many of these plays were written in answer to a predecessor's version of the same
or similar myth. Euripides mainly impugns the myths about the gods and begins his
critique with an objection similar to the one previously expressed by Xenocrates:
the gods, as traditionally represented, are far too crassly anthropomorphic.
[5]:169-70

Hellenistic and Roman rationalism

Cicero saw himself as the defender of the established order, despite his personal
skepticism with regard to myth and his inclination towards more philosophical
conceptions of divinity.
During the Hellenistic period, mythology took on the prestige of elite knowledge
that marks its possessors as belonging to a certain class. At the same time, the
skeptical turn of the Classical age became even more pronounced.[60]:89 Greek
mythographer Euhemerus established the tradition of seeking an actual historical
basis for mythical beings and events.[61] Although his original work (Sacred
Scriptures) is lost, much is known about it from what is recorded by Diodorus and
Lactantius.[7]:7

Rationalizing hermeneutics of myth became even more popular under the Roman Empire,
thanks to the physicalist theories of Stoic and Epicurean philosophy. Stoics
presented explanations of the gods and heroes as physical phenomena, while the
Euhemerists rationalized them as historical figures. At the same time, the Stoics
and the Neoplatonists promoted the moral significations of the mythological
tradition, often based on Greek etymologies.[62] Through his Epicurean message,
Lucretius had sought to expel superstitious fears from the minds of his fellow-
citizens.[63]:xxvi Livy, too, is skeptical about the mythological tradition and
claims that he does not intend to pass judgement on such legends (fabulae).[60]:88
The challenge for Romans with a strong and apologetic sense of religious tradition
was to defend that tradition while conceding that it was often a breeding-ground
for superstition. The antiquarian Varro, who regarded religion as a human
institution with great importance for the preservation of good in society, devoted
rigorous study to the origins of religious cults. In his Antiquitates Rerum
Divinarum (which has not survived, but Augustine's City of God indicates its
general approach) Varro argues that whereas the superstitious man fears the gods,
the truly religious person venerates them as parents.[63]:xxvi According to Varro,
there have been three accounts of deities in the Roman society: the mythical
account created by poets for theatre and entertainment, the civil account used by
people for veneration as well as by the city, and the natural account created by
the philosophers.[64] The best state is, adds Varro, where the civil theology
combines the poetic mythical account with the philosopher's.[64]

Roman Academic Cotta ridicules both literal and allegorical acceptance of myth,
declaring roundly that myths have no place in philosophy.[60]:87 Cicero is also
generally disdainful of myth, but, like Varro, he is emphatic in his support for
the state religion and its institutions. It is difficult to know how far down the
social scale this rationalism extended.[60]:88 Cicero asserts that no one (not even
old women and boys) is so foolish as to believe in the terrors of Hades or the
existence of Scyllas, centaurs or other composite creatures,[65] but, on the other
hand, the orator elsewhere complains of the superstitious and credulous character
of the people.[66] De Natura Deorum is the most comprehensive summary of Cicero's
line of thought.[63]:xxvii

Syncretizing trends

Apollo (early Imperial Roman copy of a fourth-century Greek original, Louvre

Museum).
See also: Roman mythology
In Ancient Roman times, a new Roman mythology was born through syncretization of
numerous Greek and other foreign gods. This occurred because the Romans had little
mythology of their own, and inheritance of the Greek mythological tradition caused
the major Roman gods to adopt characteristics of their Greek equivalents.[60]:88
The gods Zeus and Jupiter are an example of this mythological overlap. In addition
to the combination of the two mythological traditions, the association of the
Romans with eastern religions led to further syncretizations.[67] For instance, the
cult of Sun was introduced in Rome after Aurelian's successful campaigns in Syria.
The Asiatic divinities Mithras (that is to say, the Sun) and Ba'al were combined
with Apollo and Helios into one Sol Invictus, with conglomerated rites and compound
attributes.[68] Apollo might be increasingly identified in religion with Helios or
even Dionysus, but texts retelling his myths seldom reflected such developments.
The traditional literary mythology was increasingly dissociated from actual
religious practice. The worship of Sol as special protector of the emperors and of
the empire remained the chief imperial religion until it was replaced by
Christianity.

The surviving 2nd-century collection of Orphic Hymns (second century AD) and the
Saturnalia of Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius (fifth century) are influenced by the
theories of rationalism and the syncretizing trends as well. The Orphic Hymns are a
set of pre-classical poetic compositions, attributed to Orpheus, himself the
subject of a renowned myth. In reality, these poems were probably composed by
several different poets, and contain a rich set of clues about prehistoric European
mythology.[69] The stated purpose of the Saturnalia is to transmit the Hellenic
culture Macrobius has derived from his reading, even though much of his treatment
of gods is colored by Egyptian and North African mythology and theology (which also
affect the interpretation of Virgil). In Saturnalia reappear mythographical
comments influenced by the Euhemerists, the Stoics and the Neoplatonists.[62]

Modern interpretations
Further information: Modern understanding of Greek mythology
The genesis of modern understanding of Greek mythology is regarded by some scholars
as a double reaction at the end of the eighteenth century against "the traditional
attitude of Christian animosity", in which the Christian reinterpretation of myth
as a "lie" or fable had been retained.[70] In Germany, by about 1795, there was a
growing interest in Homer and Greek mythology. In Göttingen, Johann Matthias Gesner
began to revive Greek studies, while his successor, Christian Gottlob Heyne, worked
with Johann Joachim Winckelmann, and laid the foundations for mythological research
both in Germany and elsewhere.[5]:9

Comparative and psychoanalytic approaches

Max Müller is regarded as one of the founders of comparative mythology. In his

Comparative Mythology (1867) Müller analysed the "disturbing" similarity between
the mythologies of "savage races" with those of the early Europeans.
See also: Comparative mythology
The development of comparative philology in the 19th century, together with
ethnological discoveries in the 20th century, established the science of myth.
Since the Romantics, all study of myth has been comparative. Wilhelm Mannhardt,
James Frazer, and Stith Thompson employed the comparative approach to collect and
classify the themes of folklore and mythology.[71] In 1871 Edward Burnett Tylor
published his Primitive Culture, in which he applied the comparative method and
tried to explain the origin and evolution of religion.[72][73]:9 Tylor's procedure
of drawing together material culture, ritual and myth of widely separated cultures
influenced both Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell. Max Müller applied the new science
of comparative mythology to the study of myth, in which he detected the distorted
remains of Aryan nature worship. Bronisław Malinowski emphasized the ways myth
fulfills common social functions. Claude Lévi-Strauss and other structuralists have
compared the formal relations and patterns in myths throughout the world.[71]