| Adonis | The youth whom Aphrodite (Venus) loved and who was slain by a wild boar. He resembles certain aspects of Dionysus in that he is a male fertility figure symbolizing the natural cycle of vegetative growth, death, and regeneration.
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| aegis | [EE-jis] The breastplate of Zeus—a protective garment decorated with a Gorgon's head and surrounded by a fringe of snakes—commonly worn by Athene in her role as goddess of victory.
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| Aphrodite | [af-roh-DYE-tee] (Venus) Goddess of love and beauty; in Hesiod, she was born from the castration of Uranus; in Homer, she was the daughter of Zeus and Dione.
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| Apollo | Son of Zeus and Leto, he is also called Phoebus, the radiant god of light, music, prophecy, and the arts. His most famous shrine was at Delphi, where his priestess, the Pythia, proclaimed the divine will. His son, Asclepius, the first physician, was patron of the healing arts.
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| Ares | [AR-eez] (Mars) Son of Zeus and Hera, he is the personification of male aggression and the fighting spirit, an unpopular god in Greece but highly respected in Rome, where he was identified with Mars, an Italian god of agriculture and war.
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| Argus | (1) The hundred-eyed monster whom Hera appointed to spy on Zeus; when Hermes killed him, Hera placed his eyes in the peacock's tail: (2) The faithful dog of Odysseus who died immediately after recognizing that his master had returned to Ithaca.
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| Artemis | [AR-te-mis] (Diana) Daughter of Zeus and Leto and twin sister of Apollo, she is virgin goddess of wildlife and the hunt. Although her arrows can inflict the pains of childbirth, she champions women's societies, such as that formed by the Amazons:
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| Asclepius | [as-KLEE-pee-uhs] (Aesculapius) Son of Apollo and Coronis, the Greek founder and patron of medicine. When his skills brought the dead back to life, Zeus killed him with a thunderbolt.
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| Athene | [uh-THEE-nuh] (Minerva) Virgin daughter of Zeus born from her father's brain, she was goddess of wisdom, women's handicrafts, and victory in war.
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| caduceus | A wand entwined by two serpents and topped by a pair of wings, emblematic of Hermes as Zeus's personal messenger and herald; it is also associated with Asclepius, god of healing.
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| Callisto | A virgin follower of Artemis, raped by Zeus and turned into a bear. In one version of her myth, she was nearly shot by her son Arcas but was rescued by Zeus, who transformed her into the Great Bear constellation.
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| Charon | [KA-rohn] Ancient boatman of the Underworld who ferried souls across the River Styx, the symbolic boundary between life and death.
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| Demeter | [de-MEE-ter] (Ceres) Daughter of Cronus and Rhea, she was the Olympian goddess of agricultural fertility. Her myth is closely related to that of her daughter Persephone. (See Persephone.)
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| Dionysus | [dye-oh-NYE-suhs] Son of Zeus and Semele, and god of the vine that produces wine, he was a male fertility figure who represented a great variety of natural forces, including the vegetative cycle of life, growth, death, and rebirth, and the conflicting power of human passions. He is also called Bacchus, Bromius, and Liber.
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| Eileithyia(e) | [ye-lye-THYE-ya] Daughter of Hera, a minor goddess of childbirth.
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| Eros | [AIR-ohs] (Cupid) God of love and sexual desire, he was represented as an unbegotten primal force (Hesiod) or as the son of Ares and Aphrodite (Homer).
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| Europa | A princess of Tyre whom Zeus, in the form of a bull, kidnapped and took to Crete, where she became the mother of Minos and Rhadamanthus.
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| Ganymede | Trojan shepherd boy with whom Zeus fell in love and, in the shape of an eagle, carried off to heaven, where he became cupbearer to the gods.
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| Hades | [HAY-deez] (Dis) (1) Son of Cronus and Rhea, and brother of Zeus, he was given dominion over the Underworld; he is also called Pluto. (2) The subterranean realm of the dead, which is named after its gloomy ruler.
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| Hebe | [HEE-bee] (Juventas) Daughter of Zeus and Hera and a personification of youth, she was cupbearer of the Olympian gods until displaced by Ganymede. After Heracles' deifi- cation, he married Hebe, symbol of the gods' eternal youthfulness.
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| Hephaestus | [he-FES-tuhs] (Vulcan) Son of Hera (Hesiod) or of Hera and Zeus (Homer), he was god of fire and the forge, the master of metalcraft who built the Olympians' palace and fashioned armor for Achilles. He was married to Aphrodite, who preferred Ares as her lover.
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| Hera | [HEE-ra] (Juno) Daughter of Cronus and Rhea and sister and wife of Zeus, she was goddess of marriage and domesticity. Her matriarchal spirit ill fit the patriarchal rule of Zeus.
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| Hestia | [HES-tee-uh] (Vesta) Eldest daughter of Cronus and Rhea and virgin sister of Zeus, she guarded the Olympian hearth.
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| Ida, Mount | (1) The mountain in Crete on which Zeus was born and hidden from Cronus. (2) A mountain near Troy.
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| Io | A young priestess of Hera in Argos whom Zeus raped and whom Hera vindictively changed into a heifer and drove mad with a gadfly.
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| ithyphallic | A term denoting figures displaying an erect penis, such as satyrs.
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| Moirae | The three Fates, pictured as ancient women who spun, wove, and cut off the individual threads signifying human lives. Named Atropos, Clotho, and Lachesis, they were the daughters of Zeus and Themis.
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| Niobe | Daughter of Tantalus, sister of Pelops, and wife of Amphion, king of Thebes, she foolishly boasted that, because she had twelve (or fourteen) children, she was the superior of Leto, who had only two. Leto's twins, Artemis and Apollo, shot all but two of her children. Eternally weeping, Niobe was changed into stone.
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| Palladium | A small wooden statue of Pallas Athene, the possession of which the Trojans believed would protect their city. After Odysseus stole it, Troy fell.
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| Pan | A son of Hermes and a daughter of Dryops (leader of an ancient pre-Greek people), he was the quintessential nature deity, usually pictured as a goat from the waist down, with a human torso, a goat's horns, and pointed ears. Patron of goatherds and flocks, he roamed the wilderness playing the panpipes and pursuing nymphs.
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| Parnassus, Mount | A rugged mountain on whose slopes Delphi is located; a landform sacred to Apollo and the Muses.
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| Phoebus | An epithet of Apollo, meaning the "shining one." (See Apollo.)
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| Pluto | [PLOO-toh] The "wealth giver," an epithet of Hades, whose subterranean realm contained precious minerals and other treasures. (See Hades.)
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| Poseidon | [poh-SYE-duhn] (Neptune) Son of Cronus and Rhea, brother of Zeus, and husband of Amphitrite (a nereid); god of the sea and earthquakes, he used his three-pronged trident to raise storms and swamp ships.
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| sparagmos | [spuh-RAHG-mohs] The ritual tearing asunder of a young male sacrificial victim, a dismemberment associated with Osiris, Dionysus, Pentheus, and Orpheus, as well as numerous Near Eastern dying and rising gods, such as Attis, Tammuz, and Adonis.
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| Theseus | [THEE-see-uhs] Son of Aegeus and legendary king of Athens, he won fame by slaying the Minotaur at Minos's palace on Crete. He fathered Hippolytus by the Amazon Antiope and later married Phaedra, daughter of Minos.
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| Vesta | [VES-tuh] Roman name for Hestia, goddess of the hearth. In Rome, the Vestal Virgins were charged with the sacred duty of keeping alight the Eternal Flame signifying the Roman state.
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