Greek Mythology Test

Medusa’s Early Life, Punishment, and Death

* Medusa was a very beautiful woman who was loved by all
* One day, Poseidon rapes her in a temple of Athena
* In punishment, Athena makes her ugly, with snakes for hair. As ugly as her gorgon sisters.
* Athena also takes away what Medusa loved most--human interaction. Anyone who looks at her turns to stone.
* She isolates herself to protect herself, but more and more people are dying.
* Perseus is told to go kill her to protect his mom
* Hermes gave him winged sandals
* Athena gave him an invisible cap and a mirror shield
* Perseus sneaks into Medusa’s quarters and slays her by looking at her in the shield
* He uses the head to save his mom, then gives it to Athena who keeps it on her shield

Artemis and Actaeon

* Artemis, the goddess of chastity, is bathing naked in a pool
* Actaeon, a hunter, sneaks up on her and sees her naked
* In punishment, Artemis turns him into a stag
* Actaeon calls for his hunting hounds, but they only see him as prey and kill him.

Medea and Jason

* Jason’s dad is overthrown by Paleis.
* Paleis tells him to go get the Golden Fleece so his dad can be reinstated
* Jason goes with the Argonauts to get it from Medea’s dad
* He gives Jason many impossible tasks. Even after Jason completes them, he says he will kill Jason
* Medea saves Jason and helps him defeat the dragon guarding the fleece by putting it to sleep
* They then escape by boat, but Medea’s brother is chasing them
* Medea goes with her brother, but after getting let off at a nearby island, she kills him
* Then, they return to Greece. Paleis goes back on his promise and Medea slays him by tempting him into a bath of boiling hot herbs she said would rejuvenate him
* In punishment, Hera turns her into an old hag.
* Jason divorces Medea. When Jason is about to marry a new bride, Medea gives her a beautiful robe that burns her alive.

King Midas and the Golden Touch

* Midas saves Dionysus’s traveling companion, Silenus.
* In return, Dionysus says he will grant Midas a wish.
* Midas asks for the golden touch
* Dionysus warns him, but grants it eventually
* Midas is happy at first, but then his food turns to gold
* His daughter turns to gold
* He asks Dionysus how to get rid of the power
* Dionysus says he needs to bathe in the river Patroclus, which turns the river gold and frees him from the power

Bellerophon and Pegasus

* Stheneboea (king’s wife) hits on Bellerophon
* Bellerophon rejects her bc he doesn’t want to anger the king
* Stheneboea goes to the king, Proteas, and says that Bellerophon tried to rape her.
* In punishment, Proteas sends Bellerophon to kill the chimera
* Bellerophon gets Pegasus w/ the help of Athena
* He defeats chimera by putting lead on the tip of his sword. When chimera breathes fire, it melts the lead and clogs his throat.
* On the way back to Lysia, he also defeats the Amazons and the Solymains
* Then, Bellerophon becomes arrogant and tries to fly to Olympus. Zeus sends a gadfly down to scare Pegasus, causing Bellerophon to fall to earth and be crippled for the rest of his life

The Contest between Athena and Arachne

* Arachne from Lydia is said to be the best weaver in the land
* She says she is better than Athena
* Athena and Arachne compete.
* Athena weaves something showing the gods’ graciousness
* Arachne weaves a tapestry showing their faults
* The judges say that Arachne’s is more beautiful
* In punishment for her arrogance, Athena turns Arachne into a spider

Pyramus and Thisbe

* Thisbe’s dad won’t let her marry Pyrasmus
* Thisbe goes to meet Pyrasmus, but she is scared away by a lion and drops her cloak on the ground
* When Pyrasmus shows up, he thinks that Thisbe has died and stabs himself
* Thisbe sees Pyrasmus right before he dies and she also dies by suicide after wishing that the mulberry trees near the site of their death would bear dark red fruit in their memory

Persephone and Demeter

* Persephone is picking flowers when Hades sees her and thinks she’s pretty
* Hades kidnaps her and takes her to the underworld
* In her grief for her daughter, Demeter withers the earth away
* Zeus tells Hermes to go retrieve Persephone
* Persephone has taken a bite of pomegranate from Hades, so now she must stay in the underworld for a third of each year, causing winter

Daedalus and Flight of Icarus

* Daedalus is a great inventor living in Athens
* He’s jealous of his nephew, Talus, and pushes him off a cliff.
* He then flees to Crete with his son, Icarus
* King Minos of Crete asks him to make a maze for the minotaur.
* After Theseus kills the minotaur, Daedalus and Icarus are trapped in the maze
* They make wings out of feathers and wax to try to escape
* Minor finds them before the wax dries. They try to escape, but Daedalus warns Icarus not to fly too close to the sun bc the wax isn’t dry
* Icarus disobeys and falls to his death.
* Daedalus flies on to Sicily

Clash of the Titans

* Kronos eats his kids bc he fears that they will overthrow him
* Zeus leads his siblings to battle against the titans
* Zeus goes to Tartarus to free the cyclopes and the giants
* The cyclopes make a lightning bolt for Zeus, a trident for Poseidon, and the helmet of invisibility for Hades
* W/ the help of the monsters, the gods win
* The Titans are trapped in Tartarus, with the exception of Atlas, who is condemned to hold up the sky

Apollo and Daphne

* Apollo insults Eros’s archery skills
* Eros shoots Apollo with a golden arrow to make him fall in love with Daphne
* He shoots Daphne with an arrow that makes her despise love
* Apollo chases after Daphne, asking her to marry him, but she doesn’t return the feelings
* Daphne asks her dad, Peneus, a river god, to save her.
* He turns her into a laurel tree
* Apollo takes a branch of laurel and wears it as a wreath

Pandora’s Box

* Zeus and Prometheus are fighting, and Prometheus steals fire from Olympus for the humans
* In fury, Zeus asks Hephaestus for a weapon against humanity
* Hephaestus makes Pandora, the first woman
* The gods take turns giving her gifts, including beauty
* She marries Epimetheus
* Zeus also gives her a box containing all evils in the world
* She is too curious and opens it, unleashing all evil in the world

Cupid and Psyche

* People are saying that Psyche is more beautiful than Aphrodite
* Aphrodite is offended and sends Eros to make her fall in love with an ugly monster
* Eros falls in love with Psyche
* He tells her parents to send her to the middle of a valley to be married to a monster
* Eros is invisible and takes her instead
* He only comes home at night and Psyche cannot see him, otherwise she will not truly love him
* Eros allows her to have visitors
* She invites her sisters (who are jealous of her beauty), but they say that she should not trust Eros and that he is probably a monster waiting to devour her
* She takes a candle to go see Eros, sees his real face, and is so shocked, she burns his face
* He runs away in anger and sadness
* Psyche goes to Aphrodite for help
* Aphrodite makes her sort seeds with the help of ants, get golden wool from the golden sheet w/ the help of a talking reed, and get Persephone’s beauty in a box
* Psyche is curious and opens the box with Persephone’s beauty, causing her to faint.
* Eros then begs Zeus to save her and he makes her an immortal goddess, or they get married, which makes her immortal

Fall of Phaeton

* Phaeton is angry because nobody believes that Helios is his dad, despite that being what his mom, Cleymene, told him
* Cleymene tells him to go to Helios’s palace
* Phaeton goes, and Helios says he’ll grant Phaeton a gift
* Phaeton wishes to ride the chariot of the sun
* Helios says it’s a bad idea but can’t renege on his promise
* Phaeton thinks it feels very free, but eventually lets go of the reins, causing the horses to scorch the heavens and the earth
* Zeus kills Phaeton with a lightning bolt

Tantalus - His Crime & Punishment

* Tantalus serves the gods the flesh of his son, Pelops, in an attempt to be equal to the gods and gain their power
* In punishment, the gods sent him to tartarus, where he lives for eternity in a pool of water that recedes when he tries to drink, and under an apple tree where the apples pull away when he reaches for them

Death of Achilles

* Thetis, Achilles’s mom, dips him into the River Styx, giving him invulnerability except where she held him, his heel
* Agamemnon steals Achilles’s lover, so he refuses to help in the trojan war
* Achilles’s BFF, Patroclus, dresses up as Achilles to lift Greek spirits
* Trying to kill Achilles, Hector kills Patroclus
* In vengeance, Achilles joins the war and kills Hector
* Paris then kills Achilles

Perseus and Andromeda

* King Cepheus and Queen Cassiopeia of Aethiopia have a beautiful daughter named Andromeda. The Queen says that Andromeda is more beautiful than the nereids
* In anger, Neptune/Poseidon sends a sea monster to eat the city
* To stop this, the King and Queen must sacrifice their daughter, Andromeda. They tie her to a rock.
* Perseus shows up at the last minute to saves her
* Her parents say that he can marry her if he slays the monster, which he does.

Theseus Slays the Minotaur

* Theseus infiltrated King Minos’s palace and seduced Ariadne
* Minos has the minotaur hidden in the labyrinth in shame
* It was created bc Poseidon caused Minos’s wife to have a relationship with a bull
* Theseus goes to Crete because Minos has been forcing Athens to send 14 ppl every 9 years to feed the minotaur
* Theseus decapitates the minotaur and leaves Ariadne stranded on an island

The Three Sisters of Fate

* Clotho, the weaver, creates the thread of life
* Atropos, the unavoidable, cuts the thread of life
* Lachesis, the allotter, measures the thread
* One time, they drank wine and allowed Admetus to live longer than he was supposed to

Prometheus

* Prometheus creates humans out of clay and gives meat to the humans by tricking Zeus and fire by stealing it
* In punishment, he’s chained to a mountain and gets his liver eaten by an eagle every day

Io and Zeus

* Zeus falls in love with Io and uses a cloud to hide them from Hera
* Zeus then turns her into a cow to hide her from Hera
* Hera asks for Io as a gift and tells Argus to guard Io
* Hermes is sent by Zeus to save io. he does so by putting Argus to slep and salying him
* A gadfly chases Io to Egypt, where Zeus finds her and turns her back into a woman

Hermes

* Hermes is

Orpheus & Eurydice

Pygmalion and Galatea