Curated playlist
Twelve Olympians
- ZeusZeus was hidden in a cave as a baby so his father could not swallow him. Rhea gave Cronus a wrapped stone instead.
- HeraThe Greek goddess Hera renewed her virginity every year in a spring near Nauplia. The rites were not to be spoken of.
- AphroditeAphrodite has two birth stories that contradict each other. One makes her Zeus's daughter, the other has no mother.
- ArtemisNo ancient Greek records describe the goddess Artemis as a moon deity. Romans linked her to the moon through Diana.
- DemeterGrief over her stolen daughter made the goddess Demeter let crops wither and mortals starve.
- ApolloApollo killed the serpent Python with a single arrow at Delphi. Then he had to be purified for the blood crime.
- PoseidonThe oldest records of Poseidon do not show a sea god at all. Bronze Age tablets from Pylos call him "earth shaker."
- AthenaThe Greek goddess Athena won Athens by offering the first olive tree. Poseidon's gift was a spring of salty water.
- DionysusZeus sewed the unborn Dionysus into his thigh after the child's mother died. That is why Dionysus is called twice-born.
- HephaestusHephaestus answered being thrown out of heaven by forging his mother a golden throne.
- HermesOn his first day of life, the Greek god Hermes stole Apollo's cattle. He also invented the lyre by nightfall.
- AresZeus called his own son Ares, the war god, the most hateful of all the gods on Olympus.
- HestiaGreek colonists carried fire from Hestia's public hearth to start new cities.