MYTHOSATLAS

Explore the pantheons

11 figures

A

Atlas

Greek · titan · endurance, the burden of the sky

The Titan condemned after the Titanomachy to hold up the sky at the world's western edge. Heracles briefly shouldered the burden for him, and tricked him into taking it back.

C

Cronus

Greek · titan · time's harvest, the old order

Youngest Titan, who unmanned his father and swallowed his own children to dodge the same prophecy. Tricked into swallowing a stone in place of Zeus, he was overthrown in turn, in some tellings, to reign again over the blessed dead.

E

Eos

Greek · titan · the dawn

Rosy-fingered dawn, sister of sun and moon, cursed with insatiable love for mortal men. She asked Zeus for immortality for her lover Tithonus, but forgot to ask for eternal youth, and he withered forever.

E

Epimetheus

Greek · titan · afterthought

Brother of Prometheus, Afterthought to his Forethought, who ignored the warning to accept no gift from Zeus and welcomed Pandora, jar and all, into the world of men.

H

Helios

Greek · titan · the sun, all-seeing witness

The sun as a god, driving his four-horse chariot across the sky each day and seeing everything below, it is Helios who reports Persephone's abduction and the affair of Ares and Aphrodite. His cattle, eaten by Odysseus's crew, cost them their homecoming.

L

Leto

Greek · titan · motherhood, dignity in persecution

The Titaness whom jealous Hera barred from every land when she was pregnant by Zeus, until the floating island of Delos gave her refuge to bear the twins Apollo and Artemis, whose first acts were to defend her.

M

Metis

Greek · titan · cunning wisdom

The Titaness whose name means cunning itself, who mixed the potion that made Cronus vomit up his children. Zeus swallowed her while she was pregnant to forestall a prophesied usurper, and Athena was born from his head.

P

Prometheus

Greek · titan · fire, foresight, craft

The Titan who sided with Zeus in the Titanomachy, then defied him by stealing fire for humankind. Punished by being chained to a mountain where an eagle devoured his ever-regenerating liver.

R

Rhea

Greek · titan · motherhood, protection

Sister-wife of Cronus who, tired of watching her children swallowed, hid the infant Zeus in a Cretan cave and handed her husband a swaddled stone instead.

S

Selene

Greek · titan · the moon

The moon as a goddess, sister of Helios, crossing the night sky in her silver chariot. Best known for her love of the shepherd Endymion, sealed in eternal sleep so she might visit him forever.

T

Themis

Greek · titan · divine law, right order, oracles

Titaness of divine law and custom, second holder of the Delphic oracle and counselor at Zeus's side. Mother of the Seasons and, in most accounts, of the Fates, law older than the gods who enforce it.