The gods of Olympus

ods and Heroes, were for Greeks a source of inspiration and creation. Gods,
in their minds and believes, commanded the universe and ordered their destiny.
So Gods mainly, were the object of their myths and those myths the force to
make them create civilization, driving them to upper layers leading to the conquest of ambitious goals. The Greeks were among the earliest peoples to create myths, which
they used as a way of understanding and interpreting anything which transcended the human scale and struck them as inexplicable and impossible to control. Their
narratives were passed down orally from generation to generation, changing and
becoming richer in accordance with the needs and the stage of development of each era.

or the ancient Greeks, the gods, represented a single concept: nature, in all
its phases and each god or goddess was associated with one or more of the
powers of nature. Their role was not so much that of creating the world as of maintaining order and harmony in it. To the Greek mind, the gods were immortal
and magnificent.
They could control all mortal beings in every sphere of their lives, determining their fortunes, their relationships, and when they came into the world and left it. The gods
were not inaccessible beings. Man could approach them easily, seeing them, hearing
them and even touching them. As contradictory and mutually complimentary beings,
they constituted the incarnation of the perfect human, but a human who was free of
the deprivations and prohibitions of life, who could take pleasure in whatever
presented itself to him, who could injure himself without suffering pain or death, could
fall in love without being subject to the barriers applicable to mankind, who could experience anger or jealousy without having to suppress his feelings, who could
carouse and get drunk, who could live and enjoy himself with his creatures as if he
were both creator and creation. The ancient Greeks assigned to their gods all the properties that they themselves would have liked to possess, but which their human
nature prevented them from obtaining.
This is the light in which we have to view the anthropomorphism of the ancient Greek
gods. The twelve gods of Olympus,(Olympus is the highest mountain in Greece)
formed a special category of their own. Six male and six female, were divided
in accordance with their properties and activities into six couples united by bonds of friendship or kinship. The twelve gods of Olympus were:
ZEUS = the Leader of the gods
HERA = Zeus' wife and wedding protector
ATHENA = the goddess of wisdom and literature
POSEIDON = the god of the sea
APOLLO = the god of music
ARTEMIS = the goddess of hunt
DEMETER = the goddess of nature
HERMES = the god of commerce and messenger of the gods
APHRODITE = the goddess of love and beauty
ARES = the god of war
HEPHAESTUS = the god of iron and fire
HESTIA = the goddess was the protector of family and house
In certain local variations, positions among the "twelve" were occupied by Plouton, Dionysus, Heracles or other local cult heroes.

The 12 gods of Olympus		Athena	Laius-Oedipus
Orpheus-Eurydice	Pandora	The Olympic Games
The Muses	The Sirens - Scylla - Charybdis
Danae - Perseus - Medusa		*******	*******

( Information's collected from old mythology books, many "thanks" goes to "Greek Mythology and religion" book, by Maria Mavromataki, from HAITALIS editions. Please do not copy anything without permission )
(Page design by Anna Char. Copyright © 1998)

I wrote this in my Mythology pages, but unfortunately is not a Myth!
In simple and brief words:
Most of OUR small Parthenon statues, the special pediments of the temple, are in the British
museum... they don't give us back our properties, 'cause, as they say, will be better protected
in their museum... Years ago, some employees of that museum decided that, the yellow marble
color of those pediments was not good... and they cleaned(!!!!!) them with chemicals, to turn
them white! Doing this, they destroyed the original surface of these unique treasures...
NO COMMENTS...
(Related articles were published in British and Greek newspapers)