Theogony: Clash of the Titans

According to Hesiod’s Theogony, in the beginning, there was only Chaos. Dense darkness covered everything until the Earth was born out of Chaos and the mountains, the sea, and then the sky (Uranus) with the sun, the moon and the stars. Then Uranus and Earth came together and gave birth to the Titans. But, Uranus was afraid that one of his children would take his throne. That is why he enclosed every one of them in the depths of the Earth. But his son, Cronus, the strongest of the Titans, defeated him and became world leader. He married Rhea, who gave birth to two gods and three goddesses: Hades, Poseidon, Hera, Hestia and Demeter.

But Cronus inherited the fear of his father and believed that one of his offspring would later take his throne. So, when they were born, he swallowed them. However, Rhea was expecting a sixth child and fearing it would share the same fate with her other children, she secretly gave birth on a mountain in Crete and hid the newborn there. She named the child Zeus. She also tricked Cronus into thinking he swallowed this child too, by giving him a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes, which Cronus swallowed thinking it was his newborn. The Nymphs took care of Zeus and fed the baby with the milk of a goat. When he grew up, Zeus found his father and tricked him into drinking a mixture of wine and mustard, which caused him to disgorge the contents of his stomach. Zeus’ older brothers and sisters came out of Cronus fully grown! T

his is how the great Titanomachy began, the war between the Titans and the Gods, with Zeus as their leader. This titanic battle lasted for ten years. The gods defeated the Titans and threw them into Tartarus, a dark and gloomy place as far from the earth as earth is from the sky. Then the gods fought with the Giants for the dominance of the world. The Gigantomachy lasted a long time as well. But the gods were again victorious. Thus, Zeus became the ruler of the whole world and he and the other gods settled in Olympus.