Since Hades resided in the underworld , he was not considered an Olympian god and did not visit the great mount often. The nine muses, the daughters of Mnemosyne and Zeus, resided at the foot of the mountain. According to some sources, the goddesses were water nymphs and were responsible for the following: Clio — history; Calliope — epic poetry; Thalia — comedy; Euterpe — lyric poetry; Terpsichore — dance; Melpomene — tragedy; Erato — love poetry; Urania — astronomy; and Polyhymnia — sacred poetry.
The Olympians ruled Olympus until the monster Typhon attacked their stronghold. Typhon was allegedly a headed fire-breathing dragon. When he attacked Olympus, the majority of the gods chose to flee, except for Zeus, Athena and Dionysus.
Zeus was able to eventually defeat the giant monster with lightning bolts, and banished him to Tartarus. There, they drank nectar and ate ambrosia, which perpetuated their immortality. Allegedly, when the gods drank ambrosia, the blood in their veins was replaced by ichor, a substance toxic to humans. Ichor also ran through the veins of Talos, the Greek giant automaton.
No human could ever come near Mount Olympus, yet authors relay the story of Bellerophon , the son of Eurynome and Poseidon, who tried to reach the top of the mountain! One day he captured Pegasus when the horse was about to drink from a fountain in his town.
Bellerophon was later exiled from his home town and supposed to be put to death, but he was given a second chance. Instead, he had to conquer a Chimera, a fire-breathing monster! After winning at two further tough challenges, he was finally recognized as the son of a god, but Bellerophon wanted more!
He decided to fly Pegasus up to Mount Olympus, the home of the gods! Zeus was furious at his actions and sent a vicious fly to bite Pegasus. The fly did as required, causing the horse to throw its rider from its back, sending Bellerophon tumbling back to Earth. Today, a group called the Return of the Hellenes hope to revive ancient Greek religion and mythology. They gather at the foot of Mount Olympus in Greece to celebrate the hero Prometheus , through the Prometheus Festival.
The celebrations commence with runners, in full ancient battle gear, wielding shields and spears, running up the sacred mount! The golden tables and tripods of the feast were automatons animated by the divine smith Hephaestus , and trundled in and out of the hall as required. Before the palace of Zeus was a large, cloistered courtyard where the full assembly of the gods would gather--including all of the earth-, river- and sea-deities as well as nymphs.
The peak of Olympus functioned as the secondary seat or throne of Zeus, apart from the rest of other gods. The Olympian akropolis lay above the clouds and the paths of the stars, near the apex of the solid bronze-dome of the sky. It existed in the zone known as the aither--the bright upper-air of heaven or shining blue of the sky. The gods feasted on ambrosia and nectar, substances collected from the meadows of the earth-encircling river Okeanos or the smoke of sacrificial offerings wafting to heaven.
Apart from the gods, the foot of the mountain was also the place where the Muses and the The Kharites lived. Greek Mythology Wiki Explore. Bureaucrats Messenger of Heaven. It is here where the lives of the gods and goddesses fell into a rhythm similar to he way mortals lived. They slept, ate, socialized, and ruled from the mountaintop. Some stories indicate that each of the gods and goddesses had their own palaces.
Other accounts indicate that they all lived in a central palace. The following is an overview of the most commonly accepted structure to Mount Olympus. Though they did rule from the mountaintop for a long time, Typhon, a god who was also portrayed as a monster, tested their status. Typhon was a giant who wanted to control Mount Olympus. Most of the gods and goddesses fled, except Athena who stayed to fight. Though the Olympians were eventually successful, the war did weaken them somewhat.
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