Athena In Greek Mythology

Athena was one of Zeus’s many daughters, but she was often called the lone child because of the way she was born. Instead of coming out of her mother, Athena was born from Zeus’s forehead after he ate her mother, Metis. There’s three stories about how she was birthed from his forehead. One of the three being that Zeus envied Metis for her wisdom so he devoured her. Zeus eventually got this enormous headache and Hermes cleaved Zeus’s head open with a double headed Minoan Axe, and Athena shot out of his head fully grown and armed. The second tale is that Zeus had thought up of one word to basically describe the making of a world, and Athena came to mind and then she was born from his head. The last tale Athena was born outside of Olympus and …show more content…
But one day, Hephaestus attempted to rape Athena, but she quickly eluded him. The semen from his body fell to Earth and impregnated the soil, making the Earth give birth to Erichthonius. Athena then raised him as a foster mother. She took Erichthonius and put him in a box, gave the box to her three sisters, Herse, Pandrosus and Aglaulus, telling them not to open the box until she returns. Two of the three sisters didn’t listen and opened the box, only to reveal a serpent. A tale about Erichthonius floats around saying he drove Herse and Aglaulus off the …show more content…
It’s told in Metamorphoses by the Roman poet, Ovid. The tale is that Hermes falls in love with Herse. She and her two sisters goes to the temple to offer sacrfices to Athena. Hermes demanded help from Aglaulus to seduce Herse. In exchange, Aglaulus wanted money. Hermes gives her the money as promised and the sisters give it to Athena. Athena punished Aglaulus for her greed by asking the goddess of Envy to make Aglaulus jealous of Herse. When Hermes arrives to seduce Herse and get help from Aglaulus to do so, she stands in between Hermes and Herse instead. He sees her standing between them and turns her into stone for not upholding her half of the