Mythos summary

For nine days and nights Gaia labors tirelessly at the top of a great mountain, Othrys. She forges a sickle from adamantine – meaning “untameable” – which consists of flint, granite, diamond, and ophiolite. After hiding it, she approaches each of her beautiful children, the Titans, to suggest they kill their father and rule the cosmos with her. Each has a reason or excuse not to – except Kronos, the youngest, strongest, most handsome, and moodiest of the siblings. He’s always hated his father and readily agrees.

Gaia leads him to mount Othrys, where Kronos takes the sickle and they wait for evening. As Ouranos covers Gaia once more, Kronos swings the sickle and slices off Ouranos’s genitals. Kronos catches them and hurls them far away while Ouranos writhes on the ground in agony. Ouranos curses Kronos telling him he’ll be destroyed by his own offspring. Kronos banishes his father to live out eternity deeper in the ground than even Tartarus.

Zeus is raised on milk from Amalthea and manna from the Meliae. Rhea visits him as often as she can and teaches him the art of revenge. Zeus grows into the strongest and most handsome male ever created. He’s so striking that he’s “almost painful to look upon.”

Zeus learns that his father is his enemy – he tried to eat him, after all. Rhea tells him that his father rules by fear and has no loyalty or trust.

Rhea and her children put some distance between themselves and the Titans. When the other Titans learn of the downfall of Kronos, it seems likely that war will ensue.

And indeed, it does. It’s a violent and destructive conflict that lasts ten years. Mountains bellow fire and the ground quakes and cracks. Islands and land masses form. Continents shift and reshape.

Prometheus is a strong, good-looking, well-mannered Titan. He’s also become Zeus’s favorite. The fondness is reciprocal.

One week before the inauguration of the dodecatheon Prometheus, who’s been sleeping in long grass, is woken up by Zeus who has a plan he wants to share. He excitedly tells Prometheus he wants to create a new race of beings similar in every way to the gods but smaller and with less power. They’ll have consciousness, though, and they’ll worship the gods and be their playthings. There’ll only be males so as not to anger Hera with more females for him to get involved with.

Later, Prometheus thinks to himself that it’s a shame that these creatures are only males. Yes, they’re happy, but they also have a life that’s safe and unchallenging. They have no zest. He decides what they really need is fire.

He’s never disobeyed Zeus before, yet in this matter he’s determined. He climbs Mount Olympus unseen, and while the gods are eating and drinking he ignites a fennel stalk and flees from the mountain with it. At first, humans are afraid of fire. But with the help of Prometheus, they soon learn that once tamed, fire has many uses.

We hope you’ve enjoyed listening to our Blink to Mythos, by Stephen Fry. Here’s a quick recap.

In the beginning, there was only Chaos. Everything in the Universe came from Chaos. The First Order of divine beings was overthrown by Kronos when, encouraged by his mother Gaia, he gelded his father, Ooronus. Later, Kronos was overthrown by his own son, Zeus.