How old is athena the greek goddess

From the founding of Athens to the Trojan War, Athena played an important role in many Greeks myths and stories. Here, we will learn 7 key facts and stories about the goddess.

Unlike the rest of the Olympic gods, goddess Athena did not have two parents. Athena was most often represented in this form, a grown woman in full battle armor. Within mythology and literature, Athena is often referred to by her singular parentage.

In many versions of the story, Zeus impregnated Metis, his first wife. Their son was destined to overthrow Zeus just as he had his father and his father had before him. Afraid of his own demise, Zeus swallowed Metis in the form of a fly, hoping to prevent a son from usurping him.

Zeus was then afflicted by a pounding headache, and when Hephaestus split open his skull to relieve the pain, out came Athena. In some versions of the story, where the motherless nature of Athena is more clear, Metis is not involved at all. Orestes was on trial in Athens for the death of his mother, Clytemnestra. He claimed the killing was justified because Clytemnestra murdered Agamemnon, his father.

If this was not the case, how could it be that Athena was born without a mother? Goddess Athena was often referred to as Pallas Athena or simply Pallas. There are two prevailing myths as to why Athena took the name Pallas. According to Apollodorus, Pallas was a giant that Athena skinned in battle, later wearing his skin into battle to protect herself Bibliotheca I.

She then took on the name of the giant to commemorate her success in battle. However, another myth states that Pallas was her childhood friend, whom she accidentally killed while playing. Filled with grief, Athena took on the name in memory of her friend, placing it before her own Robert Graves, The Greek Myths. Parthenos , which translates to virgin or maiden, was an epithet given to goddess Athena to acknowledge her status as a virgin deity. In Athens, the Parthenon , the largest temple in the Acropolis, was dedicated to Athena.

The temple held Athena Parthenos , a 37 feet tall statue of the goddess. The original statue was sculpted by Phidias and has since been lost or destroyed. Athena and Poseidon competed to become the patron deity of Athens, back when the city had no name. The competition would be judged by Cecrops, the half-man, half-serpent king of the city.

Each god was asked to present a gift for the people of Athens. When Perseus killed the gorgon Medusa, whose face turned men to stone, he gave the gorgon head to Athena, and the goddess placed it on her aegis.

Toledo Athena wearing her aegis , with its snake-fringe and gorgon head Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Toledo Museum of Art When Hercules went mad and killed his children, Athena stopped the disaster from getting worse. Just as the insane hero turned to kill Amphitryon, Athena threw a stone at Hercules, knocking him unconscious, so his mortal father was spared. Athena also helped Hercules at many points during his Labors.

She provided him with the krotala he used to scare the Stymphalian Birds , and she carried the apples back to the garden of the Hesperides. Also known as Pallas Athena, she wore a breastplate made out of goatskin called the Aegis, which was given to her by her father, Zeus.

She had many names that explain her. Some of her names are helmet head, Athena the wise and others. Athena was an armed warrior goddess. The Parthenon at Athens was her most famous shrine.

She never had a true lover or someone to hug and hold her; all she had was her loving mother, caring father and most of all her brothers and sisters. For some very strange reason it was hopeless that she would fall in love; Hephaestus tried once, yet failed. One example of that is in The Odyssey, where Athena assists Odysseus' son Telemachus in finding his father; another is where she gives Perseus the shield he will need to fight Medusa.

Athena's mother was Metis. Metis warned Zeus that if she bore him a boy child, the child would be greater than him. Zeus swallowed her and started having a terrible headache.