Athena or Athena (in Attic Ἀθηνᾶ / Athênã or in Ionian Ἀθήνη / Athếnê[1]) is a goddess of Greek mythology, identified with Minerva among the Romans. She is also called "Pallas Athena".
Birth
Athena is the daughter of Zeus and Metis (an Oceanid), his first wife, goddess of ingenuity (μῆτις / mễtis, “the advice”). Ouranos, the Starry Sky, warns Zeus that a son born to Metis would take his throne. Therefore, as soon as he learns that Metis is pregnant, Zeus decides to swallow her[2]. But a few months later, he feels terrible headaches on the shores of Lake Triton[3] (for some authors, it is a source or a river). He then asks Hephaestus, the blacksmith god, to open his skull with an ax blow, to free him from this evil:this is how Athena springs, fully armed, from the head of Zeus, pushing a mighty battle cry. Thereafter, Athena is considered the daughter of Zeus alone. Thus, in Aeschylus, she declares:“I had no mother to give me life[4]. »
Very quickly, she joined the gods of Olympus, where she took an important place. The Iliad, the Odyssey and the Homeric Hymns represent her as the favorite of Zeus, the one to whom he can refuse nothing. Much like Zeus, she holds the aegis and can cast lightning and thunder. His name is invoked alongside those of Zeus and Apollo in solemn oaths. She is the goddess of the City, but it is as the goddess of wisdom, represented by the owl, that she imposes herself and comes to symbolize Greek civilization over the centuries, up to the present day.
Like Hestia and Artemis, Athena is a virgin goddess, with whom no adventures are known.
Roles
Protector of Athens
Athena Varvakeion, copy of the Chryselephantine Athena of Phidias
Athena Varvakeion, copy of the Chryselephantine Athena of Phidias
According to the legend of Cecrops, Athena and Poseidon disputed the possession of Attica. They choose as arbiter Cecrops, the first king of the territory. Poseidon strikes the Acropolis with his trident and causes a spring of salt water to spring from it. Athena offers an olive tree. Cecrops considers the present of the goddess much more useful for his people, and it is she who becomes protector of Athens.
According to Varro[5], Cecrops asks the inhabitants of Athens (including women) to choose their protector themselves. Men prefer the horse, which can bring them victory in battle. As for women, they prefer the olive tree. The women, more numerous by one vote, tip the scales in favor of Athena. Furious, Poseidon submerges Attica under the waves. To appease her anger, the Athenians must impose three punishments on women:women will no longer have the right to vote; no child will bear his mother's name; women will no longer be called Athenians.
Subsequently, Athena raises another mythical king, Erichthonios. He erected the Erechtheion for him, the oldest sanctuary of the Acropolis, whose first priestesses were none other than the daughters of Cecrops, Aglaure, Pandrose and Hersé, that is to say respectively the good weather, the dew and the rain, all three gifts of Athena. He also creates in his honor the Panathenaic, intended to celebrate the birthday of the goddess, the biggest religious festival of Athens. As a civilizing deity, the Athenians also venerate her for having taught her how to use the plough, and the harnessing of oxen. All in all, Athena is the poliad deity (Πολιάς, “protector of the city”) of Athens.
Counselor of Heroes
Heracles entering Olympus accompanied by Athena, Attic black-figure olpè, 550-530 BC. AD, Louvre
Heracles entering Olympus accompanied by Athena, Attic black-figure olpè, 550-530 BC. AD, Louvre Museum
Like Hermes, her half-brother, she is often in charge of protecting the heroes. This is the case in the Trojan War, where after being refused by Paris in the judgment of Mount Ida, she sided with the Greeks. She especially protects Diomede. After the war, she protects Ulysses and especially Telemachus, in the guise of Mentor. She appeases the anger of the Erinyes and has Orestes acquitted by the Areopagus.
She also helps Heracles complete his Twelve Labors, and Perseus slay Medusa, whose severed head then adorns her aegis. It is she who advises Cadmus, the founder of Thebes, enjoining him to kill the dragon and then sow its teeth to raise an army out of the ground. She tells Bellerophon how to tame Pegasus.
Goddess of Fight
It may seem strange that the goddess of wisdom is born in arms and is also the goddess of combat. However, her epicleses show it:she is Athéna Πρόμαχος / Prómakhos, the one who fights in the front row, or even Athéna Νίκη / Níkê, goddess of victory - many representations show her holding Nikê, the personification of victory, in hand, just like Zeus. It is her advice that guides the gods during the gigantomachy, and according to some traditions, she kills the Giant Pallas herself, which would have earned her the name "Pallas Athena".
Unlike Ares, brutal god, god of war, nicknamed the "blood drinker", Athena embodies the more orderly aspect of war, the war that obeys rules, that which takes place in certain places, at certain times. , and between citizens:the fight.
Finally, Athena is a civilizing goddess, as we saw in Athens, who venerates her among other things for the gift of agricultural techniques. She is always the one who shows Erichthonios how to make a chariot[6], and Danaos, in Rhodes, how to design a ship with fifty oars - her role is similar in the legend of the Argonauts, she is the one who shows how to build largo. She is the protector of craftsmen and workers under her epithet Erganê, "the worker".
Everything that is spun or sewn is her domain, as the fable of Arachne shows, transformed into a spider for having dared to claim that she spun better than the goddess. Many representations show her holding a spindle or a spinning wheel[7].
Finally, she is also Hygeia, the protector of family health.
Epithets, Attributes &Shrine[edit]
* Homeric epithets:
o with private eyes
o of good advice
o daughter of Zeus carrying aegis
* His attributes:the aegis, the olive tree, the spear, the helmet, the gorgoneion;
* His favorite animals:the owl;
* Sanctuary:Sanctuary of Athena Khalkiokos (“at the Bronze House”) in Sparta; Erechtheion of Athens, which houses the Palladium.