Poseidon

Poseidon is the son of the Titans Cronus and Rhea, one of the six divine children whom his father devoured at birth for fear of being dethroned, and whom Zeus later freed. After the Titanomachy, the war that overthrew the Titans, the three brothers (Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades) divided the cosmos by lot: Zeus obtained the sky, Hades the underworld, and Poseidon the seas and oceans as his eternal domain, while the earth and Olympus remained common territory. According to Hesiod in the Theogony, his birth marks the beginning of maritime sovereignty in Greek mythology and establishes his role as lord of the primordial waters. He dwells in a palace in the depths of the sea, near Aegae, and rides over the waves in a chariot drawn by horses.

Absolute lord of the seas, Poseidon causes storms, earthquakes, and tidal waves by striking the ground with his trident, a weapon forged by the Cyclopes with which he can split rocks and mountains. Hence his most famous epithet, Enosichthon, «the earth-shaker». He is credited with the creation of the horse and is the patron of navigation and of chariot racing; his wrath unleashes maritime catastrophes and shipwrecks, but he also grants calm seas and safe voyages to pious sailors. His power extends to the oceanic abysses, to springs, and to the fertility of the coasts. He is depicted as a mature, bearded man, majestic and of changeable temperament, similar to his brother Zeus but always bound to the element of water.

In the Iliad, Poseidon supports the Achaeans (the Greeks) against the Trojans, intervening on their behalf behind Zeus's back, especially in books XIII and XIV; he bears a grudge against Troy because King Laomedon denied him his pay after he built its walls. He disputed with Athena the possession of Attica: Poseidon made a spring of salt water gush forth (or the first horse) by striking the Acropolis with his trident, but the Athenians preferred the olive tree offered by Athena, who gave the city its name and patroness. From his many unions came a wide progeny: Triton, herald of the seas (with Amphitrite); the Cyclops Polyphemus (with the nymph Thoosa); Pegasus and Chrysaor (from his union with Medusa); the prodigious horse Arion (with Demeter) and the hero Theseus (with Aethra). He was not the father of the Minotaur: that creature was born of Pasiphae and the bull that Poseidon himself sent to Minos as a punishment. Worshipped at the Isthmus of Corinth and at Cape Sounion, Poseidon symbolizes the untamable power of the sea in Greek culture, and his trident inspires nautical emblems to this day.