Athena Goddess Of War [VERIFIED]

Athena (also pronounced Athene), also referred to as Pallas Athena (Παλλάς Αθηνά; pronounced /ˈpæləs/), was the goddess of Civilization, Wisdom, War, Strategy, Craft, Justice, and Skill in Greek Mythology. Minerva, Athena's Roman incarnation, embodied similar attributes. Athena was also a shrewd companion of heroes and the goddess of heroic endeavor. She was the virgin patron of Athens. The Athenians built the Parthenon on the Acropolis of her namesake city, Athens, in her honor (Athena Parthenos).

Athena Goddess Of War

In most of the God of War games, Athena was the least selfish and most noble goddess. In the early games, she would help Kratos on his goals to save fellow Olympian god Helios, and stop her brother Ares. Before the events of the series, Athena saved Kratos' life from Ares' wrath, as they were sent to capture the marked warrior who would bring the end of the Greek pantheon. Athena apologized to Kratos before leaving, as Kratos would later remember this during the events of Ghost of Sparta.

ATHENE (Athena) was the Olympian goddess of wisdom and good counsel, war, the defence of towns, heroic endeavour, weaving, pottery and various other crafts.She was depicted as a stately woman armed with a shield and spear, and wearing a long robe, crested helm, and the famed aigis--a snake-trimmed cape adorned with the monstrous visage of the Gorgon Medousa (Medusa).

The connexion of Athena with Triton and Tritonis caused afterwards the various traditions about her birth-place, so that wherever there was a river or a well of that name, as in Crete, Thessaly, Boeotia, Arcadia, and Egypt, the inhabitants of those districts asserted that Athena was born there. It is from such birth-places on a river Triton that she seems to have been called Tritonis or Tritogeneia (Paus. ix. 33. 5), though it should be observed that this surname is also explained in other ways; for some derive it from an ancient Cretan, Aeolic, or Boeotian word, tritô, signifying "head," so that it would mean " the goddess born from the head," and others think that it was intended to commemorate the circumstance of her being born on the third day of the month. (Tztez. ad Lycoph. 519.) The connexion of Athena with Triton naturally suggests, that we have to look for the most ancient seat of her worship in Greece to the banks of the river Triton in Boeotia, which emptied itself into lake Copais, and on which there were two ancient Pelasgian towns, Athenae and Eleusis, which were according to tradition swallowed up by the lake. From thence her worship was carried by the Minyans into Attica, Libya, and other countries. (Müller, Orchom. p. 355.) We must lastly notice one tradition, which made Athena a daughter of Itonius and sister of Iodama, who was killed by Athena (Paus. ix. 34. 1; Tzetz. ad Lycoph. 355), and another according to which she was the daughter of Hephaestus.

These various traditions about Athena arose, as in most other cases, from local legends and from identifications of the Greek Athena with other divinities. The common notion which the Greeks entertained about her, and which was most widely spread in the ancient world, is, that she was the daughter of Zeus, and if we take Metis to have been her mother, we have at once the clue to the character which she bears in the religion of Greece ; for, as her father was the most powerful and her mother the wisest among the gods, so Athena was a combination of the two, that is, a goddess in whom power and wisdom were harmoniously blended. From this fundamental idea may be derived the various aspects under which she appears in the ancient writers. She seems to have been a divinity of a purely ethical character, and not the representative of any particular physical power manifested in nature; her power and wisdom appear in her being the protectress and preserver of the state and of social institutions. Everything, therefore, which gives to the state strength and prosperity, such as agriculture, inventions, and industry, as well as everything which preserves and protects it from injurious influence from without, such as the defence of the walls, fortresses, and harbours, is under her immediate care.

She was further believed to have invented nearly every kind of work in which women were employed, and she herself was skilled in such work : in short Athena and Hephaestus were the great patrons both of the useful and elegant arts. Hence she is called erganê (Paus. i. 24. 3), and later writers make her the goddess of all widom, knowledge, and art, and represent her as sitting on the right hand side of her father Zeus, and supporting him with her counsel. (Hom. Od. xxiii 160, xviii. 190; Hymn. in Ven. 4, 7, &c.; Plut. Cim. 10; Ovid, Fast. iii. 833; Orph. Hymn. xxxi. 8; Spanh. ad Callim. p. 643; Horat. Carm. i. 12. 19; comp. Dict. of Ant. under Athênaia and Chalkeia.) As the goddess who made so many inventions necessary and useful in civilized life, she is characterized by various epithets and surnames, expressing the keenness of her sight or the power of her intellect, such as optiletis, ophthalmitis, oxuderkês, glaukôpis, poluboulos, polumêtis, and mêchanitis.

As the patron divinity of the state, she was at Athens the protectress of the phratries and houses which formed the basis of the state. The festival of the Apaturia had a direct reference to this particular point in the character of the goddess. (Dict. of Ant. s. v. Apaturia.) She also maintained the authority of the law, and justice, and order, in the courts and the assembly of the people. This notion was as ancient as the Homeric poems, in which she is described as assisting Odysseus against the lawless conduct of the suitors. (Od. xiii. 394.) She was believed to have instituted the ancient court of the Areiopagus, and in cases where the votes of the judges were equally diviled, she gave the casting one in favour of the accused. (Aeschyl. Eum. 753; comp. Paus. i. 28. 5.) The epithets which have reference to this part of the goddess's character are axiopoinos, the avenger (Paus. iii. 15. 4), Boulaia, and aguraia. (iii. 11. 8.)

As the prudent goddess of war, she is also the protectress of all heroes who are distinguished for prudence and good counsel, as well as for their strength and valour, such as Heracles, Perseus, Bellerophontes, Achilles, Diomedes, and Odysseus. In the war of Zeus against the giants, she assisted her father and Heracles with her counsel, and also took an active part in it, for she buried Enceladus under the island of Sicily, and slew Pallas. (Apollod. i. 6. 1, &c.; comp. Spanheim, ad Callim. p. 643; Horat. Carm. i. 12. 19.) In the Trojan war she sided with the more civilised Greeks, though on their return home she visited them with storms, on account of the manner in which the Locrian Ajax had treated Cassandra in her temple. As a goddess of war and the protectress of heroes, Athena usually appears in armour, with the aegis and a golden staff, with which she bestows on her favourites youth and majesty. (Hom. Od. xvi. 172.)

The character of Athena, as we have here traced it, holds a middle place between the male and female, whence she is called in an Orphic hymn (xxxi. 10) arsên kai thêlus, and hence also she is a virgin divinity (Hom. Hymn. ix. 3), whose heart is inaccessible to the passion of love, and who shuns matrimonial connexion. Teiresias was deprived of his sight for having seen her in the bath (Callim. Hymn. pp. 546,589), and Hephaestus, who made an attempt upon her chastity, was obliged to flee. (Apollod. iii. 6. 7, 14. 6; Hom. Il. ii. 547, &c.; comp. Tzetz. ad Lycophr. 111.) For this reason, the ancient traditions always describe the goddess as dressed; and when Ovid (Heroid. v. 36) makes her appear naked before Paris, he abandons the genuine old story. Her statue also was always dressed, and when it was carried about at the Attic festivals, it was entirely covered. But, notwithstanding the common opinion of her virgin character, there are some traditions of late origin which describe her as a mother. Thus, Apollo is called a son of Hephaestus and Athena -- a legend which may have arisen at the time when the Ionians introduced the worship of Apollo into Attica, and when this new divinity was placed in some family connexion with the ancient goddess of the country. (Müller, Dor. ii. 2. 13.) Lychnus also is called a son of Hephaestus and Athena. (Spanheim, ad Callim. p. 644.)

The sacrifices offered to her consisted of bulls, whence she probably derived the surname of taurobolos (Suid. s. v.), rams, and cows. (Horn. Il. ii. 550; Ov. Met. iv. 754.) Eustathius (ad Hom. l. c.) remarks, that only female animals were sacrificed to her, but no female lambs. In Ilion, Locrian maidens or children are said to have been sacrificed to her every year as an atonement for the crime committed by the Locrian Ajax upon Cassandra; and Suidas (s. v. poinê) states, that these human sacrifices continued to be offered to her down to B. C. 346. Respecting the great festivals of Athena at Athens, see Dict. of Ant. s. vv. Panathenaea and Arrhephoria.

Athena was frequently represented in works of art; but those in which her figure reached the highest ideal of perfection were the three statues by Pheidias. The first was the celebrated colossal statue of the goddess, of gold and ivory, which was erected on the acropolis of Athens; the second was a still greater bronze statue, made out of the spoils taken by the Athenians in the battle of Marathon; the third was a small bronze statue called the beautiful or the Lemnian Athena, because it had been dedicated at Athens by the Lemnians. The first of these statues represented the goddess in a standing position, bearing in her hand a Nike four cubits in height. The shield stood by her feet; her robe came down to her feet, on her breast was the head of Medusa, in her right hand she bore a lance, and at her feet there lay a serpent. (Paus. i. 24. 7, 28. 2.) We still possess a great number of representations of Athena in statues, colossal busts, reliefs, coins, and in vase-paintings. 041b061a72