Treasury of Greek Mythology: Classic Stories of Gods, Goddesses, Heroes & Monsters

Published by the National Geographic Society

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Text copyright © 2011 Donna Jo Napoli

Illustrations copyright © 2011 Christina Balit

Compilation copyright © 2011 National Geographic Society

National Geographic Society would like to thank Rosaria Munson, professor of classics at Swarthmore College, for her thoughtful review throughout the process of creating this book. In addition, the Society would like to thank Deborah Roberts, professor of classics and comparative literature at Haverford College, for her generous assistance with resources for this title. The publisher gratefully acknowledges Frances Lincoln, Ltd., for their kindness in licensing several previously published pieces of artwork by Christina Balit.

eBook ISBN: 978-1-4263-1191-8

Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4263-0844-4

Hardcover Library Binding ISBN: 978-1-4263-0845-1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Napoli, Donna Jo, 1948-

Treasury of Greek mythology : classic stories of gods, goddesses, heroes & monsters / by Donna Jo Napoli; illustrated by Christina Balit.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4263-0844-4 (hardcover : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-1-4263-0845-1 (library binding : alk. paper)

1. Mythology, Greek–Juvenile literature. I. Balit, Christina. II. Title.

BL783.N365 2011

398.20938–dc23

2011024327

Photo Credits

All artwork by Christina Balit unless otherwise noted below:

1, keren-seg/ Shutterstock; 2, Byron W.Moore/ Shutterstock; 3, jaimaa/ Shutterstock; 4, stoyanh/ Shutterstock; 5, Christina Balit; 6, Araldo de Luca/ Corbis; 7, Murat Taner/ Getty Images; 8, Photolibrary.com; 9, Erich Lessing/ Art Resource, NY; 10, Hunor Focze/ Shutterstock; 11, Arte & Immagini srl/ Corbis; 12, Stapleton Collection/ Corbis; 13, Jose AS Reyes/ Shutterstock; 14, The Bridgeman Art Library/ Getty Images; 15, Kevin Carden/ Shutterstock; 16, PoodlesRock/ Corbis; 17, Sandro Vannini/ Corbis; 18, Igor Kovalchuk/ Shutterstock; 19, NASA 20, Christopher Boswell/ Shutterstock; 21, Bettmann/ Corbis; 22, David Aguilar; 23, Danilo Ascione/ Shutterstock; 24, Erich Lessing/ Art Resource, NY; 25, Bettmann/ Corbis; 26, Mimmo Jodice/ Corbis

v3.1

Version: 2017-07-10

To the spirit of Margaret Reynolds and all classics teachers everywhere—DJN

For the newest member of the gang—Ethan Croucher—CB

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

GAIA Mother Earth

URANUS Father Heaven

CRONUS Titan King

ZEUS King of the Gods

HESTIA Goddess of the Hearth

POSEIDON God of the Seas

ATHENA Goddess of Wisdom

HADES God of the Underworld

DEMETER Goddess of the Harvest

APOLLO God of Music

ARTEMIS Goddess of the Hunt

HERA Goddess of Marriage

HEPHAESTUS God of Metalworking

APHRODITE Goddess of Love & Beauty

HERMES Messenger of the Gods

ARES God of War

HELIOS Sun God

SELENE Goddess of the Moon

DIONYSUS God of Wine

PERSEUS The Ill-Fated Hero

ORION The Hunter

HERACLES The Hero Who Became Immortal

JASON Wanderer of the Seas

THESEUS The King of Athens

HELEN The Lethal Beauty

Map of Greece

Time Line

Cast of Characters

Bibliographic Note

Find Out More

Index

Some things about daily life can be counted on. The sun rises, crosses the sky, sets. Stars come out at night. Rivers flow toward the sea. The air and land and waters burst with life. These life-forms feed one another: Plants are eaten by animals, which are eaten by other animals. But there are also interruptions: volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, storms. Life on Earth is complex.

From our earliest records of human activity, we can conclude that people recognized this complexity and wanted to explain it. So far as we know, humans are the only creatures who entertain a wide variety of questions about the nature of existence. The questions that people from different societies raise are often quite similar, but the answers they give and the relative importance they assign to these answers can be significantly different. And those answers define the human values of our societies. They are at once based on intellect, experience, and emotion. And from them, we draw our ethics, our rituals, and our storytelling.

In this book we find answers offered by the ancient Greeks to many of the questions humans long to understand. But we also find gods, goddesses, heroes, and monsters who love and hate and grow jealous and get duped; they are blessed and cursed with all the emotions that enrich and plague ordinary humans. In reading the myths, we begin to understand that the ancient Greeks must have wanted more than just the big answers from their gods. They must have also wanted their gods to be a reflection that could help them understand themselves.

A note to ebook readers: We hope you find the art in this book as enchanting as we do. To experience it in more detail, you may be able to enlarge it. In most reading systems, you can double tap on the image to bring up a full-screen viewer with zoom and pan functionality.

From the earliest nothingness came air and water and earth, all churning and whirling until they were inextricably bound and life became inevitable: A tree sprouted and grew strong and unruly, fruited with gods and goddesses whose powers thrived under the sun and moon and stars, stretching into every corner of the universe. That tree would nourish and confound the lives of the simple mortals yet to come.

How do you get something from nothing? Not easily, it would seem.

From empty Chaos, somehow sea and earth and air appeared. They drifted around, pieces of each getting lost in the other. No water was swimmable, no land was walkable, no gas was breathable. Anything hot could quickly turn cold. Anything cold could burst into flames. Shapes shifted, textures shifted. Objects merged one into the other effortlessly, then suddenly—slam! One or both turned inexplicably hard. What was heavy became weightless. What was weightless crashed through earth and sea and air, shattering and splattering and scattering bits of everything and nothing.

Rules of nature? They didn’t operate. Indeed, there was no nature. There was nothing reliable in this turmoil except lack of order. And lack is the essence of need.

Out of that original need came the mother force, Gaia. All on her own. Need can do that.

Gaia sucked up heat and stored it in her heart. She wrapped herself round and round with anything solid she could reach, growing firmer with each layering. She pulled together her glassy sands, lifting them, grain by grain—free of air, to form deserts; free of water, to form beaches. She pushed together gigantic plates of rock until her mountains rose high, so far from her scalding heart that snow settled on their peaks.

As Gaia disentangled herself from the waters and the gases, the seas fell together in giant puddles, the heavens arched over it all. In this way the emergence of Gaia led to both the wholeness of the seas, called Pontus, and the wholeness of the heavens, called Uranus.

Gaia is the flowing circle of heat, whose energy allowed land and sea and air to gather and welcome life. She’s known as Mother Earth.

But Gaia was generous, as a mother should be. She opened her veins so water could rush through rivers and creeks, and pool together in large low lakes and small hidden ponds. She yielded here and there to the gases, allowing crevices to cradle them. One in particular was huge and gaping: the waiting hole for the dead. But at this point she didn’t know that. She knew things only as they happened, like a child encountering everything for the first time. She created the hole almost as though she understood instinctually all the gain and loss that would follow from her generosity.

The seas learned from Gaia and welcomed islands. The skies learned from Gaia and welcomed stars. And then the seas and skies went further and worked together to cycle water from the salty seas to the skies, then fresh and sweet to the lands, who returned it once more to the seas.

But Gaia was not the only child of the enormous original need; there were two others. One was Tartarus, the Underworld. The other was Eros, the god of love. Then Chaos gave a giant yawn and out flowed the total darkness of Night as well as Erebus. Erebus, like Gaia, was a place as well as a force, seeking to fill crannies. Erebus settled into the hole for the dead and became the upper part of the Underworld.

Eros was beautiful, but not ordinary beautiful. Eros’ beauty made the others quiver. It made them dream of being enveloped in warm caresses. Of getting drunk on thick creamy honey. Of swooning from ambrosia. Of whirling to tinkling music. Of being dazzled by sparkles in this lightless world.

So Night and Erebus fell in love, and Night gave birth to Day. And with light, in the lushness of fresh and salty water and in the expansiveness of air, life on Earth began. Grasses and vines wound their way around the globe. Bushes gently bloomed.

Gaia watched Night and Erebus with envy. She felt so alone. She was the cause of all this wonder, yet none of it satisfied her. She was hungry, longing, needy. And so she turned to the heavens and the seas—Uranus and Pontus. She loved them both, of course. But Uranus seemed soothing, while Pontus seemed raging. So she chose Uranus as her husband.

Let There Be LIGHT

Around the world, stories of the creation of life appear. Usually the sun plays an important role in these stories, which is no surprise, given how important the sun is to life on Earth. Greek mythology is different in a strange way, though: Daylight appears early in the creation story, but daylight is not connected to the sun, at least not initially. Interestingly, in the Book of Genesis the appearance of light also precedes the appearance of the sun.

A light-burst shines bright in space.

Uranus was the god of heaven. He was the brother of the sea god Pontus. And the earth goddess Gaia chose him for her husband.

Uranus spread himself over Gaia, enveloping her in that comforting way that the sky has on warm spring and summer nights. He dazzled her with stars, fulfilling the dreams that Eros had given her. He swirled through her trees, setting leaves atremble. He wafted across her meadows, freeing milkweed seeds to float everywhere, everywhere. He was tender. That’s what she loved the most. That’s what made earth and sky harmonious.

They inspired each other, and then Pontus, as well. The three were partners. Soon the lands ran with all manner of wild beasts, the skies hovered with hummingbirds and swooped with falcons, the seas teemed with gleaming fish. Under the beneficent smiles of Gaia and Uranus and Pontus, life in the universe pulsed and whispered and sang.

In those songs, Gaia bore Uranus children, so many children. A flood of sons and daughters—12 in all.

Uranus was overwhelmed. These children were strong and large. And he feared they’d take over the far reaches of the universe. One wanted to play in the deepest swirls of the water. One wanted to shine from on high even brighter than Uranus himself. One wanted to play in the darkest corners of the Underworld.

Distant Planet

The planet Uranus moves slowly and is dim. It consists of icy water, ammonia, and methane gas, surrounded by clouds of mostly hydrogen with a thin outer layer of methane. The outer layer makes Uranus appear blue-green. Winds race across its liquid surface at dizzying speeds. This cold planet is tilted so that its axis of rotation nearly faces the sun. When we look at it through a telescope, its many moons resemble circles around the bull’s-eye of a target.

An artist’s depiction of the planet Uranus

On top of that, they were unruly. One asked questions incessantly. One acted all high-and-mighty and righteous. One behaved as though she were more motherly than even her bounteous mother Gaia—what presumption! These children were driving Uranus half crazy.

They were too strong. They were too many.

He called them the Titans, which meant “stretchers,” because they wanted to stretch themselves in every direction. They wanted power. That was it! That was exactly it. And if they should decide to conspire against him …

Uranus shuddered in fear. They were his own children, but his heart turned cold at the very thought of them.

And so he trapped them inside their mother, deep within the recesses of the Earth.

Yet Gaia loved Uranus. She bore him more children, but Uranus’ fear poisoned them. They were three sons—strong, yes strapping in fact. But each had only one eye, set in the very middle of his forehead. Uranus called them the Cyclopes, which meant “wheel eyes,” and the very sight of them made his mouth go sour. Still Gaia loved Uranus. She bore him more children. By this point Uranus’ fear had turned to hatred. The children of such a father couldn’t help but be misshapen in hideous ways. They were three more sons, of exceptional power, but each had fifty heads and one hundred arms shooting from his shoulders. Uranus turned his head away, his stomach roiling.

And so Uranus kept them all—all his progeny with Gaia—imprisoned within the crevasses and caverns of the Earth.

Uranus’ fear of his Titan children poisoned him so much that his later children were all monstrous, from having only one eye to having a hundred arms and fifty heads.

Gaia moaned in pain. Her children were thwarted when they should have been thriving. What had happened to tenderness? Where had mercy gone? Her husband had become monstrous.

And so Gaia swallowed her sobs and picked up a great curved blade—the sharpest sickle. She spoke to the children within her. “Your father is evil. Listen to me. Do as I say. Then you can lead free lives.”

The children, large as they were, strong as they were, many as they were, huddled together, uncertain. How could their mother say such things? Uranus was their father.

But the youngest Titan, Cronus, didn’t huddle. “Mother, I will do the deed.” He took the sickle.

Cronus, the Titan son of Gaia, Mother Earth, and Uranus, Father Heaven, lived deep in the Earth, where his father had locked him and his brothers and sisters. While the others quaked in fear at their father and hid in the shadows of their mother, Cronus just watched and listened.

Gaia suffered. The cruelty of this father toward his children was unbearable. She tore her hair, she gnashed her teeth. And in the end, she offered her children an adamantine sickle—lustrous and unbreakable—to confront their father with. Horrified, the children retreated. All but Cronus. Where his courage came from, he didn’t know, but he never hesitated. He waited until nightfall, when his father was asleep. Then silently, stealthily, he struck. Wicked Uranus—his fear became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Cruelty is the snake that bites its own tail.

The blow was powerful. Not lethal—no, the old man lived on. But withering—he became a shadow of himself, his strength a memory. An immortal god humiliated for all time.

The blood of Uranus splattered across Gaia. Gaia spun and spun. Yes, she had wanted freedom for her children, yes and yes. But, oh, the cost was so dear. She could do nothing but spin through the whole year. And as she spun the blood drops seeped deep within her. From them sprang three more groups of children.

The furious Erinyes immediately took to the air and flew above Gaia, screaming for vengeance. They were their father’s daughters. They wept blood as their serpent hair snapped at the winds.

The giants lumbered forth heavily armed, with breastplates and spears at the ready. They looked around, dazed by their sudden existence, knowing nothing about who was at fault—mother or father, who could know? But one thing was for sure: They had to find a way to wage battle.

The numerous nymphs didn’t hesitate; they were their mother’s daughters. They ran over the boundless earth, hiding in streams and woodland glades and cool grottoes. They laughed and played, confident already that they would bring delight to a world that so clearly pined for them.

Parts of Uranus splattered across the seas, as well, and thus sprang up the very last child that he would ever father, riding on the sea foam: Aphrodite, who even as a child caused those who viewed her to fall to their knees in wonderment at her beauty.

THE RULE of the Titans

Gaia and Uranus had 12 Titan children. Cronus was leader, with Rhea as wife. Oceanus encircled the world in water, while Tethys was mother to land rivers. Hyperion was lord of light, with Theia shining beside him. The other Titans were important mostly because their descendants were remarkable. Titans ruled in the Golden Age but were overthrown by younger gods—the Olympians. One Titan, though—Themis—had lasting importance throughout Greek mythology. She was goddess of right and wrong, embodiment of justice.

The sun rising over the horizon

Not every little thing was right with the universe, but all was far better than it had been for Cronus and his brothers and sisters; they were free. Cronus crowed at his victory. Both his mother and father looked at him with fear. Each parent, separate and hushed, prophesied to him that he would be stripped of his power by his own son.