Neptune, holding his trident, sits astride a sea-dashed rock in this fountain in Berlin. |
Poseidon
Roman name: Neptune
God of the sea and earthquakes.
Associated iconography: Poseidon is typically depicted with a trident (a three-pronged fish spear); he may also be pictured with dolphins, a horse or a bull.
Alternative name: Poseidon is frequently referred to as ‘Earth Shaker’ in Greek poetry and literature because of his ability to control earthquakes.
Poseidon: God of the sea
According to Greek Creation Myths, Poseidon was one of the oldest gods. His father was the tyrannical giant Cronus who, frightened by the prophecy that his son would overthrow him, swallowed all his children as soon as they were born. However he was tricked into swallowing a swaddled stone in place of his son Zeus, who was secretly raised in Crete and returned to overthrow his father. Cronus was tricked into swallowing an emetic so that he vomited out his five previous children: Hestia, Demeta, Hera, Hades and Poseidon.
Together the six children, led by Zeus, overthrew their father and consigned him to the dark regions under the Earth. Zeus became the Supreme God and ruler of the skies. He divided the universe between his brothers, making Hades god of the underworld and Poseidon god of the sea.
From his coral palace on the ocean floor, Poseidon controlled the waves. When he was in a good mood he would generate a calm sea and might create new lands in the water. When angry, he struck the ground with his trident and summoned up terrible storms and earthquakes. Sailors would pray to him for safe passage across the sea, sometimes drowning horses as sacrifices in his honour.
Poseidon the fighter
Poseidon had a reputation for being capricious and vengeful. He used his powers to wield earthquakes and to summon up violent storms at sea to frighten and punish gods and mortals. When Odysseus offered insufficient sacrifices to Poseidon, and then blinded the god’s son Polyphemus, Poseidon pursued him relentlessly. The god controlled the seas to prevent the hero from returning home from the Trojan Wars.
Poseidon sent a sea-monster to attack King Laomedon’s country when he failed to pay the god for building the walls of Troy. Similarly, when the sea-nymphs, the Nereids, were offended by the queen of Ethiopa’s claim that she (or her daughter Andromeda; accounts vary) was more beautiful than them, Poseidon sent a flood and a sea-monster to plague Ethiopia.
Poseidon battled with the goddess of war, Athena, for possession of the city of Athens. Poseidon tried to win the people over by striking the ground with his trident so that water flowed (variously a spring/ a sea / a well of sea water, according to various sources) on the Acropolis. But Athena won the people’s approval by giving them the gift of the olive tree, and the city was named after her. In some versions of the story, Poseidon then flooded the Attic plain in anger. Similarly, Poseidon battled with Hera for possession of the city of Argolis, and when his sister won he took revenge, either by drying up all sources of water in the city or, according to other accounts, creating a huge tidal wave to flood it.
Poseidon the lover
Poseidon had many love affairs and fathered numerous children. At one point he married the Nereid, or sea-nymph, Amphitrite, and their son, the Merman Triton, was half-human and half-fish.
Many of his couplings produced fantastical offspring: including Pegasus the flying horse, sired upon the Gorgon Medusa; Polyphemus the one-eyed Cyclops, sired upon the nymph Thoosa; Charybdis, a sea-monster, sired upon Gaia; and the shape-changing Proteus. He was also the father of Theseus, and Orion amongst many others.
Poseidon also fell in love with his sister, Demeter, who tried to resist him. In one version of the story she transformed herself into a mare to avoid him, but Poseidon transformed himself into a stallion, and their resulting offspring was the horse Arion. In another version, Demeter tried to distract him by commanding Poseidon to create the most beautiful animal the world had ever seen. To impress her, he created the first horse. In some accounts Poseidon’s early creative attempts were unsuccessful, and by the time he had produced the horse, his passion for his sister had cooled. Poseidon in Greek means ‘husband’ (as in husbandry or cultivation), and Demeter is the goddess of wheat (which requires cultivation). When honoured as a couple, they function as a god and goddess of fertility.