[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. Full of contradictions, Athena was a female deity overseeing traditionally male domains. She instructs Laertes to throw his spear and to kill Eupeithes, the father of Antinous. [220][221] Andrea Mantegna's 1502 painting Minerva Expelling the Vices from the Garden of Virtue uses Athena as the personification of Graeco-Roman learning chasing the vices of medievalism from the garden of modern scholarship. Along with Aphrodite and Hera, Athena was one of the three goddesses whose feud resulted in the beginning of the Trojan War . [163] She appears in Nausicaa's dreams to ensure that the princess rescues Odysseus and plays a role in his eventual escort to Ithaca. Athena is associated with courage and braveness. [15] Although Athana potnia is often translated as "Mistress Athena", it could also mean "the Potnia of Athana", or the Lady of Athens. 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. [g] The geographer Pausanias was informed that the temenos had been founded by Aleus. [62] Bells made of terracotta and bronze were used in Sparta as part of Athena's cult. Athena is a goddess born directly from Zeus. Representing the intellectual and civilized side of war, she is the divine form of the heroic, martial ideal and personifies excellence in close combat, victory, and glory. [207] Ajax later commits suicide as a result of his humiliation. In art, she is generally depicted wearing a helmet and holding a spear. No, Athena did not have any known romantic partners or consorts. The aegis is a shield carried primarily by Zeus in Greek mythology, which he sometimes lent to Athena. [118] On this topic, Walter Burkert says "she is the Pallas of Athens, Pallas Athenaie, just as Hera of Argos is Here Argeie. [139] They would leave the objects they had been given at the bottom of the passage and take another set of hidden objects,[139] which they would carry on their heads back up to the temple. 449 - 420 B.C. Athena was the patron goddess of heroic endeavor; she was believed to have aided the heroes Perseus, Heracles, Bellerophon, and Jason. [68][69] The word athyia () signifies a "diver", also some diving bird species (possibly the shearwater) and figuratively, a "ship", so the name must reference Athena teaching the art of shipbuilding or navigation. Someone requested that I make an article on this goddess so I hope you like it! [130] On the eve of the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC, the serpent did not eat the honey cake[130] and the Athenians interpreted it as a sign that Athena herself had abandoned them. Athena, enraged at the desecration of her temple, turned her into a mortal Gorgon. But as he swung his axe, he missed his aim and it fell in himself, killing him. [169][170][166] Athena also appears to Odysseus's son Telemachus. [199][134], In Books VVI of the Iliad, Athena aids the hero Diomedes, who, in the absence of Achilles, proves himself to be the most effective Greek warrior. Proto-Indo-European transfunctional goddess, Minerva Expelling the Vices from the Garden of Virtue, "Detail of a cup in the Faina collection", "Marinus of Samaria, The Life of Proclus or Concerning Happiness", "Pausanias, Description of Greece, 2.34.8", "Pausanias, Description of Greece, 2.34.9", "Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, BOOK IX, Chapter 7. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. A virgin, she had no children of her own but occasionally befriended or adopted others. Nor shall we be far wrong in supposing that the author of it wished to identify this Goddess with moral intelligence [ , en thei nesin], and therefore gave her the name Etheonoe; which, however, either he or his successors have altered into what they thought a nicer form, and called her Athena. [184], The fable of Arachne appears in Ovid's Metamorphoses (8 AD) (vi.554 and 129145),[185][186][187] which is nearly the only extant source for the legend. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. 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. Athena, also spelled Athene, in Greek religion, the city protectress, goddess of war, handicraft, and practical reason, identified by the Romans with Minerva. There was an alternate story that Zeus swallowed Metis, the goddess of counsel, while she was pregnant with Athena and when she was fully grown she emerged from Zeus' forehead. [99][102][98][101] A later account of the story from the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, written in the second century AD, makes Metis Zeus's unwilling sexual partner, rather than his wife. [42] Here Athena's statue was undressed, her clothes washed, and body purified. "to quickly move, to shoot, dart, to put in motion": Part I, section I (Warner Books' United States Paperback Edition), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Aegis&oldid=1138900742, Articles containing Ancient Greek (to 1453)-language text, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference, Wikipedia articles incorporating text from the 1911 Encyclopdia Britannica, Articles with unsourced statements from December 2016, Wikipedia articles with style issues from January 2022, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0. Athena is associated with birds, particularly the owl, which became famous as the symbol of the city of Athens. [citation needed] He curses her and strikes with all his strength. 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. Her superiority also derived in part from the vastly greater variety and importance of her functions and the patriotism of Homer's predecessors, Ares being of foreign origin. 460-357 B.C. [124], The palladium was a statue of Athena that was said to have stood in her temple on the Trojan Acropolis. [56] This role is expressed in several stories about Athena. 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. One of Athena's epithets is related to the Greek glaux, "little owl," and the bird was prominently featured on Athenian coins. [208] In classical depictions, Athena is usually portrayed standing upright, wearing a full-length chiton. [185][190] Arachne scoffed and wished for a weaving contest, so she could prove her skill. [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. [191][190][192] Arachne hanged herself in despair,[191][190][192] but Athena took pity on her and brought her back from the dead in the form of a spider. 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. [133][134] The Roman mythographer Hyginus[113] records a similar story in which Hephaestus demanded Zeus to let him marry Athena since he was the one who had smashed open Zeus's skull, allowing Athena to be born. [87] Michael Janda has connected the myth of Trita to the scene in the Iliad in which the "three brothers" Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades divide the world between them, receiving the "broad sky", the sea, and the underworld respectively. (, "This sanctuary had been respected from early days by all the. Her guiding actions reinforce her role as the "protectress of heroes," or, as mythologian Walter Friedrich Otto dubbed her, the "goddess of nearness," due to her mentoring and motherly probing. The second-century AD Christian apologist Justin Martyr takes issue with those pagans who erect at springs images of Kore, whom he interprets as Athena: "They said that Athena was the daughter of Zeus not from intercourse, but when the god had in mind the making of a world through a word (logos) his first thought was Athena. [51][138] Pausanias records that, during the Arrhephoria, two young girls known as the Arrhephoroi, who lived near the temple of Athena Polias, would be given hidden objects by the priestess of Athena,[139] which they would carry on their heads down a natural underground passage. [18] A sign series a-ta-no-dju-wa-ja appears in the still undeciphered corpus of Linear A tablets, written in the unclassified Minoan language. Athena, or Athene, In ancient Greek religion, the goddess of war, handicraft, and wisdom and the patroness of Athens.Her Roman counterpart was Minerva. from the Gigantomachy Frieze on the Pergamon Altar (early second century BC), Classical mosaic from a villa at Tusculum, 3rd century AD, now at Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican, Athena portrait by Eukleidas on a tetradrachm from Syracuse, Sicily c. 400 BC, Mythological scene with Athena (left) and Herakles (right), on a stone palette of the Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara, India, Atena farnese, Roman copy of a Greek original from Phidias' circle, c. 430 AD, Museo Archeologico, Naples, Athena (2nd century BC) in the art of Gandhara, displayed at the Lahore Museum, Pakistan, Early Christian writers, such as Clement of Alexandria and Firmicus, denigrated Athena as representative of all the things that were detestable about paganism;[215] they condemned her as "immodest and immoral". [195] Only Eris, goddess of discord, was not invited. [58], Athena was not only the patron goddess of Athens, but also other cities, including Argos, Sparta, Gortyn, Lindos, and Larisa. [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. Athena was the goddess of battle strategy, and wisdom. Athena is customarily portrayed wearing an aegis, body armor, and a helmet and carrying a shield and a lance. [47][48] Athena was especially worshipped in this role during the festivals of the Panathenaea and Pamboeotia,[49] both of which prominently featured displays of athletic and military prowess. with 5 letters was last seen on the January 22, 2023. [218], During the Renaissance, Athena donned the mantle of patron of the arts and human endeavor;[219] allegorical paintings involving Athena were a favorite of the Italian Renaissance painters. The qualities that lead to victory are found on the aegis, or breastplate, that Athena wears when she goes to war: fear, strife, defense, and assault. In Ancient Greece, the Gorgoneion (Greek: ) was a special apotropaic amulet showing the Gorgon head, used by the Olympian deities Athena and Zeus: both are said to have worn the gorgoneion as a protective pendant, and often are depicted wearing it. [citation needed] Athena taunted the gods who supported Troy, saying that they will too eventually end up like Ares and Aphrodite, which scared them, therefore proving her power and reputation among the other gods. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. [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. [148][150] Hermes gave him an adamantine scythe to cut off Medusa's head. Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Dewing Greek Numismatic Foundation 13).[2]. [114] Fragments attributed by the Christian Eusebius of Caesarea to the semi-legendary Phoenician historian Sanchuniathon, which Eusebius thought had been written before the Trojan war, make Athena instead the daughter of Cronus, a king of Byblos who visited "the inhabitable world" and bequeathed Attica to Athena. . [6] In ancient times, scholars argued whether Athena was named after Athens or Athens after Athena. The crossword clue Protection, or Athena's shield. Crossword Clue. [32] Neith was the ancient Egyptian goddess of war and hunting, who was also associated with weaving; her worship began during the Egyptian Pre-Dynastic period. Born from Zeus's head, she was his favorite daughter and possessed great wisdom, bravery, and resourcefulness. [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. [191][192][190] Athena's tapestry also depicted the 12 Olympian gods and defeat of mythological figures who challenged their authority. [f] Based on these similarities, the Sinologist Martin Bernal created the "Black Athena" hypothesis, which claimed that Neith was brought to Greece from Egypt, along with "an enormous number of features of civilization and culture in the third and second millennia". [200] Numerous passages in the Iliad also mention Athena having previously served as the patron of Diomedes's father Tydeus. [209] As Athena Promachos, she is shown brandishing a spear. [83] Kernyi suggests that "Tritogeneia did not mean that she came into the world on any particular river or lake, but that she was born of the water itself; for the name Triton seems to be associated with water generally. Poseidon in fury accused Ares of murder, and the matter was eventually settled on the Areopagus ("hill of Ares") in favour of Ares, which was thereafter named after the event. [131][132], Pseudo-Apollodorus[113] records an archaic legend, which claims that Hephaestus once attempted to rape Athena, but she pushed him away, causing him to ejaculate on her thigh. Athena's name probably comes from the name of the city of Athens. The aegis (/ids/ EE-jis;[1] Ancient Greek: aigs), as stated in the Iliad, is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a shield and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. Perhaps, however, the name Theonoe may mean "she who knows divine things" [ , ta theia noousa] better than others. [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. [197] Hera tried to bribe Paris with power over all Asia and Europe,[197][134] and Athena offered fame and glory in battle,[197][134] but Aphrodite promised Paris that, if he were to choose her as the fairest, she would let him marry the most beautiful woman on earth. [106][98][93][108] The "First Homeric Hymn to Athena" states in lines 916 that the gods were awestruck by Athena's appearance[109] and even Helios, the god of the sun, stopped his chariot in the sky. [193] Arachne's tapestry featured twenty-one episodes of the deities' infidelity,[191][192][190] including Zeus being unfaithful with Leda, with Europa, and with Dana. Below are all possible answers to this clue ordered by its rank. Perseus, the mortal son of Zeus and the Argive princess Danae, was a Greek hero, king, and slayer of monsters. Medusa wherever you're right now. In the Iliad she fought alongside the Greek heroes, and she represented the virtues of justice and skill in warfare as opposed to the blood lust of Ares. [citation needed] Athena picked up a massive boulder and threw it at Ares, who immediately crumpled to the ground. [78], The word glax (,[79] "little owl")[80] is from the same root, presumably according to some, because of the bird's own distinctive eyes. [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. In the Iliad, Athena was the divine form of the heroic, martial ideal: she personified excellence in close combat, victory, and glory. [120] Distraught over what she had done, Athena took the name Pallas for herself as a sign of her grief. The Douris cup shows that the aegis was represented exactly as the skin of the great serpent, with its scales clearly delineated. She is not considered a goddess or Olympian, but some variations on her legend say she consorted with one. [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. [67] Other epithets include Ageleia, Itonia and Aethyia, under which she was worshiped in Megara. [62] An Ionic-style temple to Athena Polias was built at Priene in the fourth century BC. [99][100][98][101] In order to prevent this, Zeus tricked Metis into letting him swallow her, but it was too late because Metis had already conceived.