Читать книгу The Mythology of Greece and Rome, With Special Reference to Its Use in Art онлайн

11 страница из 40

Many marriages also took place among the Titans themselves. The numerous sea-nymphs are descended from Oceanus and Tethys; from Hyperion and Thia come the deities of the light—Helios (sun), Selene (moon), and Eos (dawn); from Cœus and Phœbe the deities of the night—Leto (dark night) and Asteria (starry night).

The most important of all the Titans, however, are Cronus and Rhea, who pave the way for the universal dominion of their son Zeus.

Uranus, fearing lest his last-born sons, the powerful Cyclopes and Centimanes, might one day seize his power, buried them directly after birth in the deep abyss beneath the earth. This displeased Gæa, their mother, who thereupon prompted the Titans to conspire against their father, and induced Cronus, the youngest and bravest of them, to lay violent hands on Uranus. Uranus was mutilated, cast into chains, and compelled by his sons to abdicate his sovereignty, which now passed to Cronus. But Cronus was not long destined to enjoy the fruits of his crime. The curse of Uranus, who prophesied that he would suffer a like fate at the hands of his own son, was fulfilled. So anxious was he to avert such a catastrophe, that he swallowed his children immediately after their birth. Five had already suffered this fate—Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Hades, and Poseidon. But their mother Rhea, grieved at their lot, determined to rescue her next son, Zeus, by a stratagem. In the place of her child, she gave to her suspicious and cruel husband a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes, which he swallowed without further examination. Zeus, who was thus rescued, was reared by the nymphs in a grotto on Mount Dicte, in Crete. The she-goat Amalthea served as his nurse, whilst the bees brought him honey to eat. In order that the cries of the child might not betray his presence to his suspicious father, the Curetes, or attendant priests of Rhea, drowned his voice in the clashing of their weapons. Zeus remained thus hidden until he had become a mighty though youthful god. He then attacked and overthrew his father Cronus, whom he also compelled, by means of a device of Gæa, to bring forth the children that he had devoured. One part of the Titans—Oceanus, Themis, Mnemosyne, and Hyperion—submitted without hesitation to the dominion of the new ruler of the world. The others, however, refused allegiance; but Zeus, after a contest of ten years, overthrew them, with the help of the Cyclopes and Centimanes. As a punishment, they were cast into Tartarus, which was then closed by Poseidon with brazen gates. Thessaly, the land which bears the clearest traces of natural convulsions, was supposed to have been the scene of this mighty war. Zeus and his adherents fought from Olympus; the Titans from the opposite mountain of Othrys.