Athena (mythology)

Athena is the goddess of Wisdom and Warfare, and one of the three virgin goddesses in Greek mythology. She is the daughter of Zeus, God of Storms and Metis, Titaness of Prudence. Greece's capital of Athens got it's name sake from Athena who was the city's patron goddess. The ancient myths portray Athena as cunning, brave, and caring, if occasionally too proud. She is likened to both a teacher and general. Along with Wisdom and Warfare, she also represented law and justice, strength, courage, mathematics, crafts and arts too. 
Athena also serves as the overarching protagonist of The Odyssey and one of the major characters in The Iliad.
== Birth==
The story of Athena goes back to that of her father and mother, Zeus and Metis. Zeus had met the titaness Metis, on his way to slay his father the titans Cronus, Metis and Zeus had fallen in love and Metis was willing to help Zeus get close enough to overthrow his father and her king. Thanks to a con by Metis involving a poison passed off as a vitality potion Zeus was able to defeat his father and free his siblings from Cronus. With all his children freed Cronus called for the titans to defeat them, thus began the Titanomachy, a battle between the gods and titans. In the conflict Metis, along with a few other titans sided with the gods against Cronus. The gods eventually won the conflict and sentenced the defeated titans to an eternity in the fiery Tartarus, with exceptions made for the titans that had sided with the gods, including of-course Metis. Zeus married Metis and served as his wizened adviser. Over time Zeus' attention wandered and he became enamored with the goddess Hera. After Zeus seduced Hera, Metis saw the romance was more than a passing fling agreed to step-down as Zeus' wife, she however, stayed on as Zeus's adviser.
Zeus soon found though that Metis was pregnant, while Zeus was happy at first he became worried when the Titan Prometheus, another who had originally sided with the gods, warned Zeus that his first child would become even greater than he, just as he had to his father before overthrowing him and his father had to his grandfather; This was Prometheus' last prediction before being banished by Zeus for stealing the fire from the gods, and so the final warning left an ominous and serious implication over Zeus' future. Zeus wanted to secure his rule but he did not wish to banish Metis. Zeus decided to trick Metis. Metis and Zeus would play a game in which they changed their forms to fit certain criteria; One day Zeus challenged Metis to one such game with the criteria being who could come up with the smallest animal and Metis was happy to play. Zeus turned himself into a rodent but Metis had assumed the form of a mayfly. Zeus congratulated Metis, but then quickly breathed her in and swallowed her whole. Zeus's plan had worked, he had removed the threat of Metis giving birth but without sentencing her to Tartarus and being able to constantly hear her advice with her in his head. Over time Metis was completely absorbed into Zeus' brain, granting him great wisdom and for a long time Zeus considered it the best solution for the situation for though he might have many children his first would never actually be born.
One day Zeus began to have great headaches. Zeus' elder sister, Hestia, gave him nectar and ambrosia to help clear his head, but they only seemed to delay the pain and before long it was back. One day at a feast the pain flared up uncontrollably and neither nectar nor ambrosia seemed to help any longer. Hera told Zeus to wait for the pain to pass, but it would not. Soon Zeus was in monumental pain. Quickly Zeus and Hera's, son Hephaestus - god of the forge, grabbed one of his blades and neatly carved open his father's head at the point of the pain. From the single point exploded a fully clothed and armored woman. Hestia quickly healed her brother's wound and Hephaestus took back his blade and stepped aside. When Zeus asked who the woman was she said her name was "Athena" - the daughter of him and Metis. Though Metis had been absorbed as part of Zeus' brain her child was still born separately from him. Athena had been clothed, educated, and cared  for by Metis in the back of his mind until she was too big to be contained in his head any longer. As Zeus waited for his daughter to declare her intentions she pledged her loyalty to Zeus, she was not angry or vengeful, but had been raised to be loyal to her father/king. Zeus still feared Prometheus' prediction that she would become greater than he but would not raise a hand to her if she had no plan to do so to him, so was Athena welcomed as one of the Twelve Olympians.
==Accomplishments ==
Athena taught mortals arts and crafts, she showed people how to sew, calculate, and fight. She introduced the concept of democracy as a form of government and taught mortals the value of winning wars with strategy instead of pure strength. She was attentive to her followers and encouraged them to be open-minded and honorable. As a result of her gifts to mankind, she became hailed as the most popular goddess in Greece, a celebrity among deities. Though some mortals considered her greater still than Zeus, she made sure they knew to praise her father still as the King of Olympians, her included. Zeus saw that the prophesy had come true but not in the way he had thought. Though Athena was greater than he in the eyes of mortals, she had no intent to oppose her father and her glory simply reflected upon him, thus did the cycle of child overthrowing parent come to an end thanks to Athena's loyalty. Far from being his enemy, Athena became Zeus' favorite child.
When a new settlement was being formed in Greece, Zeus saw it would be a great city and called forth the Olympians to ask who wished to be the patron of the city. Athena wanted to be patron of the city to prove her capability to her father, but her uncle Poseidon, Zeus' older brother, also wanted to city, for with it he might be praised even higher than Zeus. Both Poseidon, as Zeus's elder brother and Athena as Zeus' first child, were of equal rank among the Olympians and so Zeus proposed a contest, each would present one gift to the people of the city, the one with the more beneficial gift would win the city. Poseidon presented a magnificent warhorse, strong, fast and obedient, it and it's kind would grant the people of the city a great advantage in combat. Athena presented and olive branch. Poseidon mocked the simple gift and asked what good an olive would do. Athena explained to Zeus that with olives as a main crop the city-state would have food and oil, the trunk made a fine lumber and it's roots fertilize the soil, with such a crop the city-state would not only never run low on the basic amenities but they would had a stable trading resource. Zeus was impressed more by Athena's forethought in the simple gift than Poseidon's brazen beast of burden and gave the city-state to Athena and the people took on the name Athens for their city-state. Ever since the contest Poseidon considered Athena to be a rival and many Athena plays portrayed him as her envious uncle constantly looking for a leg up on her.
During the Trojan War, Athena constantly competed with her brother Ares and the two were by all accounts evenly matched, just in different areas. Both specialized in winning wars, Ares fought with a sword, Athena with a spear; Ares with brute-force, Athena with tactics; Ares played off primal fury, Athena, nationalist pride; Ares encouraged rulers to take action over talk, Athena encouraged rulers to talk over taking action; both of which worked to tremendous effect but lead to extreme violence when the two gods, and by extension followers, clashed. Most of their fights, however, ended in her victory.
==Skills and Abilities==
*Aegis: Zeus's shield and breastplate set, passed down to her. It was created from the impregnable skin of the divine goat Amaltheia, who had nursed her father since birth, and was tough enough to serve as the only defense against his thunderbolts. Athena covered it in bronze and set the image of Medusa, which terrified the holder's enemies.
*Genius Intellect: As the Goddess of Wisdom, Athena's primary skill was her intellect.. She had a variety of skills she is said to have taught mortals purely to better them such as weaving, mathematics, and political debate. That doesn't mean that she couldn't be tricked, as she was in multiple occasions. Like all lesser Olympians. she was semi-omnipotent and semi-omniscient but still far removed from her father and his siblings in this regard.
*Shapeshifting: Athena often visited mortals by making herself appear to be a mortal, the word "Mentor" comes from the name of one of her mortal aliases and has long since been used to now indicate that someone is a learned teacher.
==Personality==
Athena is portrayed her mainly as a reasonable and empathetic goddess towards mortals in most Greek cities, but at the same time, she is very proud and sometimes condescending. A prime example was her punishment of Arachne - Athena was sore at the mortal woman for beating her in a weaving contest but still willing to admit defeat, however, when Arachne weaved a tapestry of Zeus portraying him as a sex-fiend, Athena punished her by turning her into a spider and condemned her to weave forever. Many Greek fables on the dangers of hubris say the same things about Athena - she was rational and calm most of the time unless her father's pride was insulted. 
Athena was not above crossing other gods, but usually tried to do so covertly so as not to ruffle any divine feathers. Her answer to Odysseus, one of her favorite mortals, being victimized by Poseidon, was to counsel him in dreams and conspire with her father to free him from Poseidon's grasp while the latter was on holiday. She was good friends with the Nike, goddess of victory, her half-sister Artemis, goddess of the moon and hunt, and her half-brother Apollo, god of the sun and arts. Nike is often seen in temples with Athena to symbolize how intellect and victory tend to go hand-in-hand, Artemis' followers often viewed Athena as their secondary benefactor, and bards who viewed Apollo as their patron were well received in city's dedicated to Athena. 
==Gallery==
Athena bust.png|Classical Bust of Athena
Screen Shot 2017-12-03 at 5.32.14 PM.png
1 -22GCq2W0WBJLbWICdb-hg@2x.jpg
Screen Shot 2017-12-03 at 5.32.06 PM.png
Screen Shot 2017-12-03 at 5.33.28 PM.png
Athena, Isabella Rossellini.png|Isabella Rossellini as Athena, The Odyssey film.
Athena GoW.png|Athena as shown in God of War II.
Athena-Percy-Jackson.jpg|Athena, illustrated by Viktoria Ridzel (Viria) for the Percy Jackson books.
Athena (a la Susan Fleetwood).png|Susan Fleetwood as Athena from Clash of the Titans.
Deities and Demigods Athena.png|Athena as illustrated in Deities and Demigods.
Athena, Diseny's Hercules.png|Athena, Disneys Hercules animated series.
Athena (WO4).png|Athena in Warriors Orochi 4.
==Trivia==
*Athena's Roman name was Minerva.
* Athena kept a pet owl, but there is no record of what it was called, if anything. It is likely a patriotic mark by Athens to associate it's national bird to that of their goddess, as Athens was rich with owls. (A concept similar to The US's national paragon, Uncle Sam, often having a bald eagle on his shoulders).
*In the Mycenaean period (pre-ancient Greece) Athena saved Dionysus after he was vivisected by saving his heart and planting it in the womb of Semele, where he eventually was reborn from. But as many records from Mycenaean Greece were lost to the ancient Greeks, myths from their era were acknowledged but re-written.
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