Uranus (mythology)
Uranus (IPA: /ˈjʊərənəs, jʊˈreɪnəs/) is the Latinized form of Ouranos (Οὐρανός), the Greek word for sky. In Greek mythology Uranus is personified as the son and husband of Gaia, Mother Earth (Hesiod, Theogony). Uranus and Gaia were ancestors of most of the Greek gods. Uranus is revered as Father Heaven.
Other sources claim a different parentage of Ouranos. Cicero, in De Natura Deorum ("The Nature of the Gods") claims that he was the offspring of the ancient gods Aether and Hemera. According to the Orphic Hymns, Ouranos was the son of the personification of night, Nyx.
His equivalent in Roman mythology was Caelus, likewise from caelum the Latin word for "sky".
Mythology
Creation of the Universe
As with many other mythological systems, the Greeks understood the primordial universe to consist of two divine entities, the earth and the sky. As Hesiod tells it in Theogony, the earth, personified as a maternal figure and named Gaia, came into existence by her own accord. She then gave birth to Uranus, the sky, so that he could cover her. In the nights that followed, Uranus faithfully lowered himself to earth to make love with Gaia.
From these original unions Uranus and Gaia created numerous offspring, most notably six sons and six daughters corresponding to various elements of the phenomenal world, later to be known as the Titans. They were: Cronus (the leader of the Titans), his wife Rhea (mother of the Olympians), Oceanus (the "world-ocean" which surrounds the universe), his wife Tethys (mother of the rivers), Hyperion (the sun, according to Homer), his wife Theia, Coeus (the most intelligent Titan), his wife Phoebe, Mnemosyne (the female personification of memory), Iapetus (father of Prometheus), Themis (mother of the Horae and Crius, who seems to have served no other function than filling out the list.[1]. With Gaia, Uranus also created the one-hundred handed, fifty headed giants known as Hecatonchires (Briareus, Cottus, and Gyes), the one-eyed giants, the Cyclopes, Brontes, Steropes and Arges ), and the generic giants, the Gigantes (Alcyoneus, Athos, Clytias, Enceladus and Echion. Uranus and Gaia also created Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone, together known as the Erinyes or the three furies, as well as the Meliae, a group of ash-tree nymphs.
Uranus Usurped
Uranus was immediatly filled with spite for the children Gaia bore him. Uranus imprisoned Gaia's youngest children in Tartarus, deep within Earth, where they caused pain to Gaia. She shaped a great flint-bladed sickle and asked her sons to castrate Uranus. Only Cronus, youngest of the Titans, was willing: he ambushed his father and castrated him, casting the severed testicles into the sea. For this fearful deed, Uranus called his sons Titanes Theoi, or "Straining Gods"[2].
From the blood which spilled from Uranus onto the Earth came forth the Gigantes, the three avenging Furies — the Erinyes — Meliae, the ash-tree nymphs and according to some, the Telchines. From the genitals in the sea came forth Aphrodite. Some say the bloodied sickle was buried in the earth and from this was born the fabulous Phaeacian tribe.
After Uranus was deposed, Cronus re-imprisoned the Hecatonchires and Cyclopes in Tartarus. Uranus and Gaia then prophesied that Cronus in turn was destined to be overthrown by his own son, and so the Titan attempted to avoid this fate by devouring his young. Zeus, through deception by his mother Rhea, avoided this fate.
These ancient myths of distant origins were not expressed in cults among the Hellenes (Kerenyi p. 20). The function of Uranus is as the vanquished god of an elder time, before real time began. After his castration, the Sky came no more to cover the Earth at night, but held to its place, and "the original begetting came to an end" (Kerenyi).
Uranus was scarcely regarded as anthropomorphic, aside from the genitalia in the castration myth. He was simply the sky, which was conceived by the ancients as an overarching dome or roof of bronze, held in place (or turned on an axis) by the Titan Atlas.
Cultural context of flint
The detail of the sickle's being flint rather than bronze or even iron was retained by Greek mythographers (though neglected by Roman ones). Knapped flints as cutting edges were set in wooden or bone sickles in the late Neolithic, before the onset of the Bronze Age. Such sickles may have survived latest in ritual contexts where metal was taboo, but the detail, which was retained by classical Greeks, suggests the antiquity of the mytheme.
Robert Graves' and others' identification of the name Ouranos with the Hindu Varuna is widely rejected. The most probable etymology is from Proto-Greek *worsanos, from a PIE root *wers- "to moisten, to drip" (referring to the rain).
Planet Uranus
The ancients Greeks and Romans knew of only five 'wandering stars' (Greek: πλανεται, planetai): Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Following the discovery of a sixth planet in the 18th century, the name Uranus was chosen as the logical addition to the series: for Mars (Ares in Greek) was the son of Jupiter, Jupiter (Zeus) the son of Saturn, and Saturn (Cronus) the son of Uranus.
Notes
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Kerenyi, Carl, 1951. The Gods of the Greeks
- Graves, Robert, revised edition, 1960. The Greek Myths.
External links
- Theoi Project, Ouranos references to Uranus in classical literature
- Greek Mythology Link, Titans summary of Uranus myth
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