Information ☽¤☾ Depth ☽¤☾ Texts ☽¤☾ Miscellania ☽¤☾ Site

Oddities

There are other texts that have come along working as compendiums to Greek mythology that have made the different theologies of Greek gods and goddesses even more confusing. It is hard to tell whether this is simply a more modern view of ancient creation myths or if it came from one that I have yet to find.


An example comes from the book "Myths of Greece & Rome":

"A Greek poet called Hesoid, who lived about eight centuries before Christ, wrote down many myths current among the Greeks of his time.
Among the Romans, at the beginning of the Christian era, a poet called Ovid put into verse the views then generally held by thoughtful pagans:

Ere land or water was, or circling sky,
Throughout the world Nature was uniform,
What men call Chaos, shapeless and obscure,
Where seethed the germs of things as yet to be.

Not yet the put light of the sun shone down,
Not yet the moon renewed her crescent horns;
No globe hung poised in the enfolding air,
Nor did the sea with its long arms embrace
The margent shores. Such was this vague, dark world:
Nor earth nor water yet, not hot nor cold,
Nor soft nor hard, but indeterminate.

Over this shapeless mass reigned a deity called Chaos [Khaos], whose personal appearance could not be described, as there was no light by which he could be seen. He shared his throne with his wife, the dark goddess of night, named Nyx or Nox, whose black robes and still blacker countenance did not tend enliven the surrounding gloom.

These two divinities wearied of their power in the course of time, and called their son Erebus (Darkness) [Erebos] to their assistance. His first act was to dethrone and supplant Chaos [Khaos]; and then, thinking he would be happier with a helpmeet, he married his own mother, Nyx. The ancients, who at first had no fixed laws, did not consider this union unsuitable, and recounted how Erebus [Erebos] and Nyx ruled over the chaotic world together, until their two beautiful children, Aether (Light) [Aither] and Hemera (Day), acting in concert, dethroned them, and seized supreme power."

It then carries on to how they illuminated space, saw it was "uncouth", decided to evolve it into something beautiful, created Eros for help, then how Pontus and Gaia were created and how Gaia created Ouranos.


Further on, the book brings up the Cosmic Egg myth. It seems to Aristophane's Birds as its structure, but it too has a difference. Rather than Nyx acting alone in creating the egg, it claims she and Erebos made it together:

"Another version stated that the first divinities, Erebus [Erebos] and Nyx, produced a gigantic egg, from which Eros, the god of love, emerged to create the Earth."





Book sources:
Myths of Greece & Rome. H. A. Guerber. Revised by Dorothy Margaret Stuart. London: Harrao & Co.



☽¤☾ Back