Greek myth anecdotes Flashcards
Who are the three judges of the souls of the dead
Minos and Rhadamanthys of Crete (sons of Europa by Zeus)
and Aegina
What are the four children of Hera and Zeus
Hebe
Eileithyia
Ares
Hephaestus
Who renews her virginity each year by bathing in the spring at Nauplia
Hera
What happened when Zeus bought Heracles to Hera to suckle as a baby
He bit her nipple, and in shock she pushed him away
Her divine spraying from her breasts formed the Milky Way, and that which dropped to earth sprouted white lilles
Which king with lands of Thessaly thought he could make love with Hera
what happened to him
Ixion
Zeus tricked him, and he lay with the cloud Nephele instead
He was punished by being lashed to a fiery wheel which revolves throught he universe for eternity
What was the offspring of Nephele (with King Ixion) - remember the Hera story
Centaurus
- not a great guy, he coupled with mares thereby fathering a race of Centaurs, half man and half horse with appetite for carnal pleasure and destruction
What was the daughter of Zeus and Demeter
Persophone
What did Demeter do when Hades abducted (with Zeus’s permission) Persophone
She allowed crops to spoil, then cattle and people starved to death - then the gods couldn’t get their sacrifices
So Zeus sent Hermes down to Hades to retrieve her
However, Hades gave Persophone pommegrannite to eat, which meant she could never leave the underworld for good
Hence Demeter made the soil barren for those times when Persophone was down in the underworld
Who is the handmaid of Persophone
The witch Hecate
Who did Demeter punish with unquenchable hunger for cutting down trees from her beloved grove
Erysichthon, a grandson of Poseidon
Who made a statue of ivory that was so lifelike and beautiful he fell in love with it.
Pygmalion
Aphrodite heard the wishes in his head that the statue was alive and made it so
Who did Aphrodite inflame with a passion for her father Cinyras
What happened to her
The great granddaughter of Pygmalion - Myrrha
Eventually she tricked her way into sleeping with her dad
He found out and was not best pleased
She fled and prayed for help
They responded by turning her into a myrrh tree, forever shedding bitter tears
But she was pregnant and had a boy from within the tree
The boy was tended by tree nymphs and called Adonis
Which good looking youngster was fought over by Aphrodite and Persophone
what happened to him
Adonis
Zeus decided that Adonis would spent one third of a year with Aphrodite, one third with Persophone and the other where he wanted to…he tended to chose being with Aphrodite
in the end, jealous Ares had him savaged by a wild boar whilst hunting
With a prayer to Persephone, Aphrodite sprinkled nectar on his spilled blood and a delicate flower (an anemone) sprung up - for a brief but beautiful life
With whom did Aphrodite have a son Aeneas
Anchises
he boasted of his fun with Aphrodite and was crippled for his troubles
Which famous huntress used to raise people for a wedding - the loser of cause being killed (she was foretold getting married would not end well for her)
-and what happened to her
Atalanta, the daughter of Schoeneus of Boeotia
But a guy called Hippomenes was determined to wed her and Aphrodite decided to help him by giving him three magic apples
During the key race, Atalanta stopped to pick up the apples and lost the race
Hippomenes forgot to thank Aphrodite so she tricked them into having an indiscretion in the shrine of Hera, who turned them into sexless lions as a punishment
Who was son of Hermes and Aphrodite
Hermaphroditus
What happened to the luckless Hermaphrodite
He went for a swim in a pool which was home to the water nymph Salmacis
He couldn’t fend off her lustrous advances, and once she got her arms around him emplored the gods for them never to be separated
…the gods then made them become as one with both male and female attributes
Who was Priapus
The child of Dionysus and Aphrodite
He is the lecherous god of gardens. Gnome like with a big dick he scares evil from gardens
He taught Ares frst dance and then to make war
Who did Hephaestus catch in bed with his wife Aphrodite
Ares
He caught them in an impregnable (but invisible) net
All the male gods came to laugh at Aphrodite and Ares captures in flegrante
Why was Hephaestus lame
He was born hunched from birth, so Hera found him disgusting and flung him off Olympus, laiming him by twisting his ankle.
Who reared Hephaestus
Thetis
Who did Hephaestus get his revenge on his mother
He built her a magic ornate thrown - as soon as she sat in it, it held her fast and rose into the air .
It took Dionysus getting him drunk to agree to free her
As recompense Hephaestus demanded from Zeus a bed-partner. He wanted Athena, but she had sworn to chastity. He tried anyway and failed. So, in the end Zeus agreed he could have Aphrodite
Who is Athena’s mother, and how was it a difficult birth
Metis
There was a prophesy that if Metis had a son by Zeus it would be more powerful than he, so he decided to swallow her when she was pregnant
But Athena wanted to be born, and with the help of Hephaestus was born out Zeus’s forehead fully armoured.
Who was Arachne
A famed weaver of humble birth
She got into a weaving competition with Athena, and well won, which Gods dont like
Athena forced her to commit suicide, but as Arachne was gasping her last Athena let her live, but as a spider
To which God is the Oracle of Delphi sacred - i.e. which god communicates throught the Oracle
Apollo
What happened to Marsyas the Satyr
He was flayed alive for challenging Apollo to a music contest
Why is the laurel tree sacred to Apollo
Apollo had belittled Eros, so in reply Eros made him fall sickeningly in love with the chaste Daphne
Daphne tried to get away from Apollo, and her prayer was answered when the gods turned her into a laurel tree
Who rejected Apollo after he’d given her the gift of prophesy (ironically stupidly)
Cassandra
He spat a curse in her mouth that she was doomed to prophesy in vain, in that one would believe a word she said and took her for a madwomen
Why is the raven black
Apollo shot the messanger.
Apollo’s bird the raven was originally white but it reported on some infideility of his lover Coronis
Obviously Apollo killed Coronis, but saved the unborn son Asclepius who became a supreme healer
Who was blasted by Zeus’s thunderbolt for raising a man back from the dead
Apollo’s son Asclepius
But in heaven he became a patron god of medicine
Who killed the Cyclopes
Apollo,
They had made Zeus’s thunderbolts, and it was these which killed Apollo’s son Asclepiius
Zeus wasn’t happy though and would have thrown Apollo down to Tartarus had his mother Leto not intervened.
Instead he just had to serve a year under King Admetus (who Apollo liked)
How did Heracles save Admetus
Admetus was going to die, but Apollo begged the Fates for a stay
The fates agreed as long as replacement could be found
Only his wife, Alcestis agreed - a sacrifice Admetus unchivolrously accepted
However, Heracles wrestled dealth himself for the life of Alcestis and won
Who was Orpheus - what is his underworld story
Son of the Muse Calliope and Apollo
He fell in love the oak nymph Eurydice - and the charm of his music won her heart
However, in trying to escape a lusty god (Aristaeus the god of beekeeping) she got bit by a snake and died
He went into underworld after her. Orpheus played his music and the gods agreed that Eurydice could return from the dead - on one condition - Orpheus was not to look back at her until that left the halls of Hades
But near the exit, Orpheus couldn’t here her footfall so he looked over his shoulder - she stayed dead
Orpheus went off in a huff and got torn to shreds by some Maenads
Who is the Mistress of Animals
Artemis
Who carries a silver bow and hunts with Arcadian hunting hounds
Artemis
Who was Niobe, and what happened when she annoyed the gods
Queen Niobe was the arrogant wife of King Amphion, daugther or Tantalus and granddaughter of Apollo
She claimed her lineage was greater than Apollo’s mother Leto
For that insult Apollo removed all her blessings, killed her six sons, whilst Artemis killed her six daughters - leaving the corpses unburied for nine days
Niobe was turned to stone and carried of by a tornado to her native Lydia
Who as Tityus
A Giant, son of Gaia, who tried to rape Leto
Apollo and Artemis hunted him down, and sent him down to Hades where he was splatted on the ground and vultures feasted forever on his liver
Who was turned into a stag and hunted down and killed by his own hounds, because he had seen Artemis naked - by accident
Actaeon of Thebes
Who is Callisto and what is the story of Ursa Major
Callisto was daughter of King Lycaon of Arcadia and a companion of Artemis
One day Zeus tricked her and got her pregnant
When Artemis saw the preganancy she was not happy and turned Callisto into a Bear.
The Bear ‘Callisto’ gave birth to a son, Arcas, who was then raised by Maia the mother of Hermes
Unfortunately Callisto the Bear wondered into a forbidden sanctuary of Zeus, and was about to be killed by Arcas himself when Zeus took pity and turned her into the Great Bear constellation
Who was Orion
Son of Poseiden and lover of Eos (dawn)
A mighty hunter who could cross valleys at a bound, and wih the ability to walk on water
What did Zeus do to Orion for his boasts
Orion, who hunted with Artemis and Leto, boasted that there was no creature he couldn’t bring down
So Zeus put him in a contest with a giant scorpion, which Orion lost
He then bought the two fighters to heaven so that the Scorpion could chase Orion for ever
What was the chasing Orion was doing in heaven
He was being chased by a giant scorpion (as a punishment for boasting)
and he was in pursuit of the seven daughters of Atlas, the Pleiades
Zeus too mercy on the Pleiades and turned them into stars
Who were Hermes’ parents
Zeus and the nymph Maia
Who made the first lyre
Hermes, on the day of his birth he found and killed a tortoise, scooped out its flesh and made a lyre
That same night he stole some of Apollo’s cattle
He then invented the fire stick and roasted a couple of cattle
How were Hermes and Apollo briefly at odds and reconciled
Hermes, as a baby stole some of Apollo’s cattle
Apollo figured it out and was going to throw Hermes into Tartarus when Hermes made up by giving Apollo his lyre
Apollo responded by giving Hermes a three pronged living, golden staff which was then his symbol
Who was Hermes’ son
Pan
who invented the pipes when distracted by reeds whilst pursuing a nymph
Who is Echo
In one tradition, she is a nympth who could imitate any sound in the world
pursued by the god, Pan, she spurned him, so he drove some shepherds instane and they tore her to pieces
In another tradition, she was a talkative nymph who distracted Hera whilst Zeus had his way with other nymphs
In retaliation Hera made it so Echo could only repeat the worlds last said to her
She then fell in love with Narsissus, who spurned her so in grief she faded into just a voice
Who was the twice born God
Dionysus
He was the daughter of Semele
When Hera found out that Zeus was sleeping with Semele she tricked her into asking Zeus to reveal himself in his God form
He had made a promise so he did, and she died. He saved their son though, by implanting him into his thigh where he was born a second time
Dionysus and he later went down to Hades and brought her back to Olympus
He was a full on God because of this second birth in Zeus’s thigh
By what two other names is Dionysus known
Bacchus and Bromius
Who are the Maenads
‘Raving ones’ women who tear apart wild animals and eat them raw
They are followers of Dionysus who drink his blood as wine. Anyway who doesnt pay tribute to Dionysus can expect them to leave the location in utter chaos (like a really mental piss up)
In one tradition they killed Orpheus
Who drove the women of Athens mad (literally)
Dionysus, because they killed Kind Pandion, who Dionysus had taught wine-making
Who turned pirates into Dolphins
a young Dionysus
That’s what you get for kidnapping a god
Who is Zeus’s cup-bearer
Ganymede, once a mortal prince of Troy
Who is Hebe
Daughter of Zeus and Hera
She supervises the feasts of the Gods
