MYTHOLOGY (noun.)
1. a collection of myths, especially one belonging to a particular religious or cultural tradition.
2. the study of myths
─ IN WHICH THE ADMINS GIVE YOU INFORMATION PERTAINING TO THE MANY BELIEFS OF MULTIPLE MMYTHOLOGIES
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PROMETHEUS
Prometheus (not to be confused with that weird-ass alien movie) was a titan during the battle between the Titans and the Olympian gods, a struggle which was said to have lasted ten years (an oddly specific amount of time). Prometheus did, however, switch sides and support the victorious Olympians when the Titans would not follow his advice to use trickery in the battle.
According to Hesiod's Theology, Prometheus' father was Iapetus, his mother was Clymene (or Themis in other versions) and his brothers were fellow Titans Epimetheus, Menoetius, and Atlas. One of Prometheus' sons was Deucalion, who survived a great flood by sailing in a great chest for nine days and nights and who, with his wife Pyrrha, became the founder of the human race (sound familiar?).
In some tales, Prometheus made the first man from clay, whilst in others, the gods made all creatures on Earth, and Prometheus was given the task of endowing them with gifts so that they might survive. Epimetheus spread around gifts such as fur and wings but by the time he got around to man, he had run out of gifts.
THE CRIME Feeling sorry for man's weak and naked state, Prometheus raided the workshop of Hephaistos and Athena on Mt. Olympus and stole fire, and by hiding it in a hollow fennel-stalk, he gave the valuable gift to humanity which would help them in life's struggle.
In a different version of the story, mankind already had fire, and when Prometheus tried to trick Zeus into eating bones and fat instead of real meat, Zeus, in anger, took away fire so that man would have to eat his meat raw. Prometheus then stole the fire. This also explained why, in animal sacrifices, the Greeks always dedicated the bones and fat to the gods and ate the meat themselves.
THE PUNISHMENT Zeus was outraged by Prometheus' theft of fire and so punished the Titan by having him chained to a rock (or pillar) where Zeus sent an eagle to eat the Titan's liver. Even worse, the liver re-grew every night and the eagle returned each day to torment Prometheus. Fortunately for our protagonist, but only after many years, the hero Hercules, when passing one day during his celebrated labours, killed the eagle with one of his arrows. In Hesiod's Works & Days it is written that Zeus punished man for receiving the fire by instructing Hephaistos to create the first woman, Pandora, from clay. Through her, all the negative aspects of life would befall the human race - toil, illness, war, and death- and definitively separate mankind from the gods.
