Gaia

The goddess and personification of the Earth.

—Hesiod

Gaia is a character and location in Hesiod's myth. She débuts, with her appearance in around 700 B.C. and usually ends at around the 9th Century. Gaia is the greek protogenoi and personification of Earth in Greek Mythology.

History[]

In Greek mythology, Gaia (from Ancient Greek, a poetical form of, "land" or "earth") also spelled Gaea, was the personification of the Earth and one of the Greek primordial deities. Gaia was the great mother of all: the primal Greek Mother Goddess; creator and giver of birth to the Earth and all the Universe; the heavenly gods, the Titans, and the Giants were born to her. The gods reigning over their classical pantheon were born from her union with Uranus (the sky), while the sea-gods were born from her union with Pontus (the sea). Her equivalent in the Roman pantheon was Terra.

Hesiod's Theogony tells how, after Chaos, "wide-bosomed" Gaia (Earth) arose to be the everlasting seat of the immortals who possess Olympus above, the depths of Tartarus below (as some scholars interpret it), Uranus (Sky) to "cover her on every side" and to be the abode of the gods, Ourea (Mountains) and Pontus (Sea). Afterwards with Uranus she gave birth to the Titans, as Hesiod tells it.

According to Hesiod, Gaia conceived further offspring with Uranus, first the giant one-eyed Cyclopes: Brontes ("Thunder"), Steropes ("Lightning") and Arges ("Bright"); then the Hecatonchires: Cottus, Briareos and Gyges, each with a hundred arms and fifty heads. As each of the Cyclopes and Hecatonchires were born, Uranus hid them in a secret place within Gaia, causing her great pain. So Gaia devised a plan. She created a grey flint (or adamantine) sickle. And Cronus used the sickle to castrate his father Uranus as he approached Gaia to have sex with her. From Uranus' spilled blood, Gaia produced the Erinyes, the Giants and the Meliades (ash-tree nymphs). From the testicles of Uranus in the sea came forth Aphrodite.

By her brother Pontus, Gaia bore the sea-deities Nereus, Thaumant, Phorcys, Ceto, and Eurybia.

Because Cronus had learned from Gaia and Uranus that he was destined to be overthrown by one of his children, he swallowed each of the children born to him by his Titan sister Rhea. But when Rhea was pregnant with her youngest child, Zeus, she sought help from Gaia and Uranus. When Zeus was born, Rhea gave Cronus a stone wrapped in swaddling-clothes in his place, which Cronus swallowed, and Gaia took the child into her care.

With the help of Gaia's advice, Zeus defeated the Titans. But afterwards, Gaia, in union with Tartarus, bore the youngest of her sons Typhon, who would be the last challenge to the authority of Zeus.