Crystal Aura Gaze

I’m starting a series in which I attempt to uncover Greek mythology from start to finish. I’m going to be going along with the book “MYTHOS” by Stephen Fry.

The first order: primordial deities

In the beginning was Chaos. Chaos was nothingness. This was all that there was.

Chaos gave birth to son Erebus (the darkness) and daughter Nyx (the night.) The two of them then gave birth to Hermera (day) and Aether (light.) At the same time, Chaos also gave birth to Gaia (Earth) and Tartarus (depths and caves beneath Earth.)

These were known as “the first order” and are primordial deities meaning that they are devoid of form, personality, or character. They are undeveloped and have no dramas. This is all before the existence of time, so it happens all at once without any narrative whatsoever because there is no beginning or end, no plot to follow.

Gaia gave birth, independently by herself, to two sons: Pontus (the sea) and Ouranos (the sky.) Alongside, Hermera and Aether gave birth to Thalassa (female counterpart for Pontus.)

The second order: children of Gaia

Gaia and Ouranos begin the second order, in which the gods begin to have personalities, dramas, shape and form, and so forth. Their characters are now evolving and growing in complexity.

Gaia, and son Ouranos, came together to have twelve children: Oceanus, Coeus, Crius, Hyperion, Iapetus, Kronos (males); Theia, Themis, Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Tethys, Rhea (females.) This is when time began.

Following the set of twelve, Gaia and Ouranos also gave birth to two sets of triplets. One was a set of three cyclopes, one-eyed giants. The other was a set of three hecatonchires, each born with fifty heads and a hundred hands. They were ugly and violent.

In disgust, Ouranos cursed them and pushed them back into Gaia’s womb. We don’t known if Ouranos literally buried them into the ground of the earth, or if he truly was able to shove them back into Gaia’s actual womb.

The twelve children went on to continue populating the world. Theia and Hyperion gave birth to Helios (the sun) and Selene (the moon.) Oceanus and Tethys had Nilus (the Nile) and many other rivers, along with thousands of sea nymphs. They also had two daughters, Clymene and Metis.

Ouranos vs. Kronos

Gaia was seeking help from one of her children to take revenge upon Ouranos for pushing her babies back into her womb. All of them refused her. Finally, she asked her son Kronos, who agreed to help her out. He too, had great hatred for Ouranos.

Meanwhile, Erebus and Nyx, the primordial gods from the first order, were continuing to reproduce. Nyx independently gave birth to Moros (doom) who became the most feared entity in creation. There was also Apate (deceit), twins Oizys (the spirit of misery, depression, and anxiety) and Momos (mockery, scorn, and blame.) There was Hypnos (sleep), Phobetor (nightmares), and Hypnos’s son Morpheus (shapeshifting into the dream world.) And Thanatos (death) was also born.

So, Kronos agreed to get revenge on his father Ouranos. He did this by castrating him — and from his blood sprang more children: Alecto (remorseless), Megaera (jealous rage) Tisiphone (vengeance), and several others. Ouranos’s castrated part fell into the ocean of Cyprus, and thus was born Aphrodite, emerging from sea foam.

Ouranos had been cursed to live in the depths of the rocks and never return. Before his defeat, Ouranos declared to Kronos, “you will be overthrown by your son, just like I have now been overthrown by my son.” And spoiler alert, his prediction was right.

Following the defeat of Ouranos, Gaia also retreated from the world. She would remain the all powerful goddess Earth, but only play a passive role. And so, it was only Kronos left to rule the world. Kronos would rule a golden age, but forever live in fear of his own son someday growing up and overthrowing him, just as he did to his own father.