How the World and Mankind Were Created

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How the World and Mankind Were Created

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• In the beginning there was only Chaos. Then came
  Night (Darkness), Love, Light, and Day
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• The first creatures to appear were the children
  of Mother Earth(Gaea) and Father Heaven(Ouranos)
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Creation, contd

• Their children were personified monsters with
  incredible strength
• Earthquake
• Volcano
• Hurricane 
• Monsters with 100 hands,
• 50 heads.
• Then came the Cyclops
• Lastly, the Titans

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The Titans

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• Father Heaven did not care for his children, so
  he imprisoned them in the earth (Gaeas womb). He
  left, however, the Cyclopes and Titans to roam
  free.
• Mother Earth was enraged at the maltreatment of
  her children, so she convinced one Titan named
  Cronus to help her free the other children.
• He wounded his father, and the Giants, the fourth
  race of man sprang up from the blood.

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Cronus, a Titan
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Titans, contd

• Cronus (Saturn) became the new lord of the
  universe, with his sister-queen Rhea (Ops). They
  had six children together.
• Finally, one of their sons, Zeus, rebelled
  against his father.

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Cronus

• Cronus learned that one day one of his children
  would dethrone him, so as each child was born, he
  simply swallowed them whole.
• But, when Zeus was born, Rhea gave Cronus a great
  stone wrapped in swaddling clothes. Rhea secretly
  took Zeus to Crete where he was raised by a
  she-goat.

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Zeus

• Later, when Zeus was older, he forced his father
  to disgorge his brothers and sisters( Demeter,
  Hera, Poseidon, Hades, and Hestia)
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• A terrible war followed between Zeus and his
  brothers and sisters and Cronus and the Titans.
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Zeus

• Zeus won, but only because he had help-he
  released the imprisoned monsters and the Titan
  Prometheus helped too. He had the gift of
  foresight, so he wisely switched sides.
• Zeus punished all of the Titans
• Atlas
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• Atlas must
• Bear on his back forever/
• The cruel strength of the crushing world/
• And the vault of the sky.
• Upon his shoulders the great pillar/
• That holds apart the earth and heaven,
• A load not easy to be borne.

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Mankind

• There are several different creation myths
• The gods had Prometheus and Epimetheus create
  humans and animals. Prometheus, whose name means
  forethought, was very wise, wiser even than the
  gods, but Epimetheus, which means afterthought,
  was a scatterbrained person who would follow his
  first instinct.

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• Before making men, he gave the all the best
  gifts to the animals---strength and swiftness and
  courage, fur and feathers and wings and
  shells-until no good was left for men, no
  protective covering and no quality to make them a
  match for the beasts.

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• Prometheus took over the task of creation and
  thought of a way to make mankind superior. He
  fashioned them in a nobler shape than the
  animals, upright like the gods and then he went
  to heaven, to the sun, where he lit a torch and
  brought down fire.

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• According to another story, the gods themselves
  created men.
• They made first a golden race. These men lived
  like gods.
• The second race of silver was very inferior to
  the first they had little intelligence. They
  passed away.
• The third race was of brass. They were terrible
  men, immensely strong and such lovers of war and
  violence.
• Gold Brass Iron
• Silver Bronze

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• The fourth race was of bronze. They were
  splendid, godlike heroes.
• The fifth race was the iron race. This is the
  race currently on earth. They are evil by nature.
  As the generations pass, they grow worse sons
  are always inferior to their fathers

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• For a long time, only men were on earth there
  were no women. Zeus created women, in his anger
  at Prometheus caring so much for men. Prometheus
  had arranged that men should get the best part of
  any animal sacrificed and the gods the worst. He
  cut up a great ox and wrapped the good edible
  parts in the hide, disguising them further by
  piling entrails on top.

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• Beside the heap, he put another of all the
  bones, covered with shinning fat, and bade Zeus
  choose between them. Zeus choose the bones, and
  thereafter only fat and bones were burned to the
  gods as an offering.

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• Zeus swore to be revenged on mankind first and
  then on mankinds friend. He made a great evil
  for men, a sweet and lovely thing to look upon,
  in the likeness of a shy maiden, and all the gods
  gave her gifts because of what they gave her
  they called her Pandora, or the gift of all.

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• When this beautiful disaster had been made, Zeus
  brought her out and wonder took hold of the gods
  when they beheld her. From her, the first woman,
  comes the race of women, who are an evil to men,
  with a nature to do evil.

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Pandoras box

• Another story about Pandora is that the source
  of all misfortune was not her wicked nature, but
  only her curiosity. The gods presented her with a
  box into which each had put something harmful,
  and forbade her even to open it. Then they sent
  her to Epimetheus, who took her gladly.

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• Pandora, one day, lifted the lid and out flew
  plagues innumerable, sorrow, and mischief for
  mankind. In terror, Pandora closed the box. One
  good thing, however, remainedHope.

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Prometheus

• After Zeus punished mankind, he turned his
  attention to Prometheus. He had him taken to
  Caucasus where he was bound to a high-piercing,
  headlong rock in adamantine chains that none can
  break.

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• Every day an eagle red with blood shall come, a
  guest unbidden to your banquet. All day long he
  will tear to rags your body, feasting in fury on
  the blackened liver, and each night his liver
  would grow back.

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Creation

• There is still another account of the creation
  of mankind.
• All over the earth men grew so wicked that
  finally Zeus determined to destroy them. He send
  a great flood, but two beings were saved in a
  wooden chestDeucalion and PyrrhaPrometheus son
  and his niece.

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• After the flooding stopped, they tackled the
  task of creating the stone people. They heard a
  voice that said, Cast behind you the bones of
  your mother. Since Earth is the mother of all,
  her bones are stones. So they cast them, and as
  the stones fell they took human shape. They were
  called the Stone People.