Out of Chaos came Gaia/Ge ("earth"), Erebus ("gloom"), Tartarus ("hell"), Eros ("sexual passion") and Night, the precedents of the foundations for the universe. Gaia's procreates with her children Pontus ("Sea") and Uranus ("Sky") in Hieros Gamos, or holy matrimony.
+ Pontus
+ Uranus = 12 titans, Oceanus-Tethys, Iapetus-Themis, Cronus-Rhea, Mnemosyne, Coeus-Phoebe,
Hyperion-Theia, Crius.
= 3 Cyclopes ("orb-eye"), Thunder, Lighting, and Shining.
= 3 Hecatonchires ("100-Handers" with 50 heads each)
Hyperion + Theia = Helius/Sol ("sun"), Selene/Luna ("moon"), Eos/Aurora ("dawn")
- Phaethon, son of Helius and Clymene, questions his patronage. To affirm his son, Helius grants
him one wish, in which Phaethon demands to drive Daddy's chariot. Helius abides, bound by oath,
and Phaethon naturally loses control of the chariot, scorching the earth. Jupiter intervenes, and
Phaethon is struck from the chariot and hurls to his death below. The Heliades, daughters of Helius,
bury him, weeping, and are transformed into Poplar trees with tears of amber.
- Selene falls in love with the handsome shepherd Endymion, bearing 50 daughters. In order to
preserve him, she asks Zeus to grant him Eternal Sleep as well as Eternal Youth, and he is rests
forevermore, beautiful in death. Now, he is a motif frequently found on sarcophagi as a symbol
of the timelessness of youth in memory.
- Eos, not as clever as her sister, asks for a similar gift for her Trojan prince Tithonus, but forgets
to mention eternal youth along with his eternal life. His gift becomes a curse, as he becomes
undesirable to the goddess and shrivels away to a Cicada.
Uranus + Gaia = 12 titans.
- Uranus inseminates Gaia each night, but prevents her from giving birth. Gaia and Cronus conspire
and Cronus emerges from the womb to castrate his father.
From his spilled blood, that drips on Gaia, the Erinyes ("Furies"), Gigantes ("giants", "earth born")
and the Ash-Tree Nymphs are born. From his severed genitals that are cast into the sea, the
Goddess Aphrodite emerges from the foam
- The prophecy repeats itself with the birth of Zeus from Cronus and Rhea, see Zeus.
