Athéna or Athéné (in attic Ἀθηνᾶ / Athênã or in Ionian Ἀθήνη / Athếnê ) is a goddess of the Greek Mythologie, identified with Minerve among Romans. It is also called “Pallas Athéna”.

Birth

Athéna is the girl of Zeus and Métis (a Océanide), his first wife, goddess of ingeniousness ( μῆτις / mễtis , “the council”). Ouranos, the starry Sky, warns Zeus that a son born of Mongrel would take his throne to him. Consequently, as soon as he learns that Métis is pregnant, Zeus takes the party to swallow it. But a few months later, it feels terrible headaches on the edges of the lake Triton (for certain authors, it is of a source or a river). He asks then Héphaïstos, the god blacksmith, to open to him cranium of a blow of axe, to release it from this evil: thus Athéna spouts out, holding up its lance and its shield, of the head of Zeus, by pushing a powerful war cry. Thereafter, Athéna is regarded as the girl of Zeus alone. Thus, at Eschyle, she declares: “I did not have of mother to give me the life. ”

Very quickly, it joined the gods of Olympe, where it takes an important place. Iliade , the Odyssey as the Homeric Hymnes represent it like the favorite one of Zeus, that with which it can nothing refuse. Just like Zeus, it holds the the aegis and can launch the lightning and the thunder. One calls upon his name beside those of Zeus and Apollon in the solemn oaths. It is the goddess of the City, but it is like goddess of the wisdom, represented by the Chouette and by the olive-tree, which it is essential and the Greek civilization during the centuries comes from there to symbolize, until our days.

Following the example Hestia and of Artémis, Athéna is a pure goddess, with whom one does not know adventures.

Roles

Protective of Athens

According to the legend of Cécrops, Athéna and Poséidon disputed the possession of the Attique. They choose like referee Cécrops, the first king of the territory. Poséidon strikes the Acropole of its three-pronged fork and in makes spout out a source of salt water and offers to Cécrops an invincible black standard with the combat. Athéna, it, offers an olive-tree. Cécrops judges the present of the goddess much more useful for her people, and it is it which becomes protective of Athens.

According to Varron, Cécrops requires of the inhabitants of Athens (women included/understood) to choose them-even to them protective. The men prefer the horse, likely to bring the victory in the battle to them. The women as for them prefer the olive-tree. The women, more of a voice, tip the scales in favor of Athéna. Furious, Poséidon submerges the Attic under the floods. To alleviate its anger, the Athenians must force to the women three punishments: the women will not have any more the right to vote; no newborn will bear the name of his mother; the women will not be called any more Athéniennes.

Thereafter, Athéna raises another mythical king, Érichthonios. It draws up to him the Érechthéion, the oldest sanctuary of the Acropolis, whose first priestesses are not other than the girls of Cécrops, Aglaure, Pandrose and Hersé, i.e. respectively the good weather, the dew and the rain, all three gifts of Athéna. It also creates in its honor the Panathénées, intended to celebrate the birthday of the goddess, the greatest religious holiday of Athens. As a civilizing divinity, the Athenians also venerate it to have learned how to him to use the swing-plow, and the attachment of oxen. On the whole, Athéna is the divinity poliade ( Πολιάς , “protective of the city”) of Athens.

Adviser of the heroes

Like Hermes, her half-brother, it is often given the responsability to protect the heroes. It is the case in the Trojan War, where after being refused by Pâris in the judgment of the mount Ida, it takes party for the Greeks. She protects Diomède particularly. After the war, it protects Ulysses and especially Télémaque, under the features of Mentor. It alleviates the anger of the Érinyes and makes discharge Oreste by the Aréopage.

It also helps Héraclès to achieve its Twelve work, and Persée to kill Méduse, of which the cut head flowering ash then its the aegis. It is it which advises Cadmos, the founder of Thèbes, enjoignant to him to kill the dragon then to sow its teeth to cause an army out of ground. It indicates to Bellérophon how to overcome PEGASE. Thereafter it went on the throne causing zeus.

Goddess of the war

It can seem strange that the goddess of wisdom is born out of weapons and is also the goddess of the combat. However, its épiclèse S shows it: she is Athéna Πρόμαχος / Prómakhos , that which fights in the forefront, or Athéna Νίκη / Níkê , goddess of the victory - many representations show it besides holding Nike, personification of the victory, in the hand, just like it is the case of Zeus. The Homeric Hymne in Athéna indicates as follows:

“I will sing Pallas Athènaiè, powerful protective cities, and which occupies, with Arès, of warlike work, the ransacked cities, the clamors and the frays. It protects the people which go to the combat or which return from there. Hello, Goddess! Give me the good destiny and the happiness. ”

These are the councils which guide the gods at the time of the Gigantomachie, and according to certain traditions, it kills itself the Géant Pallas, which would have been worth to him its name of “Pallas Athéna”.

It is not pain-killer that the wise Greeks covered Athéna of warlike attributes: the war is omnipresent in the world of the Greek cities; wisdom implies that the city is protected not only spiritually, but also physically. Athéna, by its with dimensions warrior more represents the art of to protect well and envisage the combat to come, that the art of the combat itself, incarnated by Arès in its brutality meutrière. Athéna incarnates the aspect more ordered of the war, the war which obeys rules, that which is done in certain places, at certain periods, and between the citizens.

Sponsor craftsmen and techniques

Lastly, Athéna is a civilizing goddess, as we saw in Athens, which venerates it inter alia for the gift of agricultural techniques. It is it always which shows with Érichthonios how to manufacture a tank, and with Danaos, Rhodos, how to design a ship with fifty oars - its role is similar in the legend of the Argonautes, it is it which shows how to build Argo. It is protective craftsmen and workers under his epithet of Ἐργάνη / Erganê , “the worker”.

All that is spun or bent is of its field, as the fable of Arachné shows it in addition, transformed in spider to have dared to claim that it slipped by better than the goddess. Many representations show it holding a spindle or a wheel.

Lastly, it is too Ὑγεία / Hygeia , the protective one of family health.

Epithets, attributes and sanctuaries

• Epithet Homeric:

• with the sea-green eyes ( γλαυκῶπις / glaukôpis ),
• of good council ( πολύϐουλος / polyboulos ),
• girl of Zeus the carry-aegis ( θύγατερ Διὸς αἰγιόχοιο / tygater Dios aigiokhoio );
• Its attributes: the the aegis, the olive-tree, the lance, the helmet, the Gorgoneion;
• Its favorite animals: the Owl;
• Sanctuaries: sanctuary of Athéna Khalkiokos (“at the Bronze House”) with Sparte; Érechthéion of Athens, which shelters the Palladium; Sanctuary of Athéna with Lindos, in the island of Rhodos, a high place of worship founded by the Doriens.

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