Athena

Athena, or PALLAS ATHENA, one of the greater Greek divinities, forming, with Zeus and Apollo, the supreme triad in Greek mythology. Of her origin and percentage different accounts are given, probably from the confusion of various local legends; but the best-known version of the myth represented her as the daughter of Zeus and Métis. Zeus, we are told, when he had attained supreme power after his victory over the Titans, chose for his first wife Métis ('wisdom'); but being advised by both Uranus ('heaven') and Gæa ('earth'), he swallowed her when she was pregnant with Athena. When the time came that Athena should have been born, Zeus felt great pains in his head, and caused Hephæstus (Vulcan) to split it with an axe, whereupon the goddess sprang forth—fully armed, according to the later stories. Under the gross accretions which conceal the significance of the myth, we may see in this account of Athena's parentage an effort to set forth a divine symbol of the combination of power and wisdom. Her father was the greatest, her mother the wisest of the gods. She is literally born of both, and so their qualities harmoniously blend in her. She is the personified reason, the wisdom of the divine father; while Apollo, no less beloved of Zeus, is his mouth, the revealer of his counsel. She is a maiden goddess, everlastingly young and fair. Though her heart is inaccessible to the passion of love, she is not a cold unfeeling divinity, but interests herself warmly in the affairs of both gods and men. She is the patroness of agriculture, the inventor of the plough and rake, the first to introduce the olive into Attica, and (in harmony with her character as the personification of active wisdom) to teach men the use of almost all the implements of industry and art; and she is said to have devised nearly all feminine employments. Philosophy, poetry, and oratory are also under her care. She is the especial patroness of the Athenian state, protects its liberties by her power and wisdom, maintains the authority of law and justice in her courts, and was believed to have instituted the court of justice on Mars' Hill (the Areopagus). The industries of its citizens are dear to her—she is the 'workmistress' (Erganê), the goddess of all useful and elegant arts. As a warlike divinity, she approves of those wars only which are undertaken for the public good, and conducted with prudence; and thus she is regarded as the protectress in battle of those heroes who are distinguished as well for their wisdom as their valour. In the Trojan wars she favoured the Greeks, and in the war of Zeus against the giants she assisted her father with her counsel, killed the giant Pallas, and buried Enceladus under the island of Sicily. Her worship was universal in Greece, and representations of her in statues, busts, coins, reliefs, and vase-paintings are numerous. She is always dressed, generally in a Spartan tunic, with a cloak over it, and wears a helmet adorned with figures of different animals; her ægis, the round Argolic shield, has in its centre the head of Medusa. Her countenance is beautiful, earnest, and thoughtful, and the whole figure majestic. One of the two masterpieces of Phidias was his great statue of the virgin Athena, on the Parthenon at Athens. In it were combined chastity with gentleness, victorious strength with calm peace, profound wisdom with perfect simplicity. It was not only a production of the highest art, but at the same time the expression of a profound religious idea. From Greece her worship was carried to greater Greece, and many temples were erected in her honour. In Italy proper she was identified with Minerva, a native goddess of wisdom, and worshipped with Jupiter and Juno.