"In the battle
(Gigantomachy)... Enceladus fled, but Athena threw on him in his flight the
island of Sicily; and she flayed Pallas and used his skin to shield her own
body in the fight... Artemis slew Gration. And the Fates, fighting with brazen
clubs, killed Agrius and Thoas." (Apollodorus , The Library 1.6.2)
The Gigantomachy, the war
between the Giants and Gods occurred when Gaia, Mother Earth, grew angry at the
imprisonment of her son and grandson Titans by the Olympians. What is unique
about the Gigantomachy is that it is the first time in the Divine Wars of Greek
myth, where goddesses took up arms and actively participated. The
participation of Athena, Artemis, Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos is recognized in
literature, but many more goddesses (almost all of them) participated according
to sculptural evidence. So, why did the goddesses participate in this the
third Divine War and not the first two?
The first conflict was the
Castration of Uranus, presumably involving Uranus, Cronus and all the other
male Titans.
" But
these sons whom he begot himself great Heaven used to call Titans (Strainers)
in reproach, for he said that they strained and did a fearful deed, and
that vengeance for it would come afterwards." (Hesiod, The
Theogony 207)
The second war is the
Titanomachy, the war between the Olympians and Titans lead by the sons of
Iapetus. Based on lack of evidence from descriptions of the Titanomachy,
Hera's fostering and Pindar Fragment 301, Aaron Astma
believes that;
"During the Titan-War,
the Titanides (Titanesses) resided in
the house of Okeanos along with Hera and the other goddesses."
So why did the goddesses
wait until the third conflict to take up arms?
- This one was really serious? All hands on deck?
- Xenia, Warrior Princess, hasn't been born yet to set the example? Kidding of course, but there were no humans as we know them until this point. (Men of Cronus' Golden Age didn't reproduce.)
- Ares and Athena, deities of war hadn't existed until then?
- Is it possible that the abstractions represented by the goddesses didn't come into play cosmically until after the arrival of humanity?
- Did the existence of the demi-gods have something to do with the female deities taking up arms?
Any ideas out there?
- "First did the Moirai (Fates) in their golden chariot bring heavenly Themis, wise in counsel, by a gleaming pathway from the springs of Okeanos (Oceanus) to the sacred stair of Olympos, there to be the primal bride of the Saviour Zeus."
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