Fortuna is the Roman Goddess of Luck, Fate, and Fortune, as Her name implies. She was a very popular Goddess, and was worshipped under many epithets depending on the type of luck one wished to invoke or the circumstances in play. The God of second chances will do the same thing for you today. God gives his enemy a second chance. If anybody in the Bible deserved a lightning bolt from heaven to incinerate him on the spot, it was Saul of Tarsus. He is introduced in Chapter 9 of the book of Acts. Tyche is the Greek goddess of luck, chance, and fortune. Her Roman counterpart is Fortuna.
Tykhe, also known as Tyche, was the Greek goddess of chance, fate and fortune. She represented not only the positive aspects of these characteristics but also the negative ones. The ancient Greeks thought she was the reason for unexpected events in their lives, good and evil. For example, if someone had much success in life without having to try hard, people said that Tyche blessed him at birth. When someone worked hard but still had bad luck, they thought this goddess was responsible.
According to Hesiod, a Greek poet, she was the daughter of Oceanus and Tethys while others thought that Zeus was her father. People from various Greek regions worshiped Tyche, but she was especially popular in Athens. Athenians believed that this goddess favored their city. Some of her other famous sites of worship included temples at Argos and Thebes.
When the ancient Greeks honored her beneficial traits, they usually referred to her as Eutychia or Eutiykhia, goddess of prosperity, success and good fortune. Tyche was usually pictured with wings, a regal staff and a crown. However, many images also showed her with other items. These objects related to various traits. For example, when she was pictured holding rudders or a wheel, it meant that she was directing world events.
If she had a horn of plenty, she was a giver of abundant prosperity and wealth. When Tyche was balancing on a ball, it symbolized unstable fortune that could come and go, just like a ball might roll in any direction. In later times, she appeared wearing a blindfold and was shown with other assorted items that suggested risk and uncertainty.
In Rome, this goddess was known as Fortuna. To the Romans, Fortuna was much more important than Tyche to the Greeks. Additionally, Fortuna was not pictured with wings or a ball, especially in later times. This suggests that the Romans only saw her as a goddess of good luck who blessed mankind with beneficial fortune.
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The predominant mythologies handed down through the ages are those of the Greeks and Romans. The Greek mythology names and the Roman mythology names of each culture include gods and goddesses who interacted with humans, with good, bad, and indifferent motives.
Zeus (a Greek god) is depicted here throwing lightning. However, the Romans would assume this was a depiction of Jupiter, the king of gods.
The Greek mythology names of the gods and goddesses varied from the Roman names, although each culture ascribed to deities with comparable powers and spheres of influence. The following table shows those areas and the names of the important deities in each mythology:
Greek and Roman Mythology Names
Greek Name | Roman Name | Description |
---|---|---|
Zeus | Jupiter | King of Gods |
Hera | Juno | Goddess of Marriage |
Poseidon | Neptune | God of the Sea |
Cronos | Saturn | Youngest son of Uranus, Father of Zeus |
Aphrodite | Venus | Goddess of Love |
Hades | Pluto | God of the Underworld |
Hephaistos | Vulcan | God of the Forge |
Demeter | Ceres | Goddess of the Harvest |
Apollo | Apollo | God of Music and Medicine |
Athena | Minerva | Goddess of Wisdom |
Artemis | Diana | Goddess of the Hunt |
Ares | Mars | God of War |
Hermes | Mercury | Messenger of the Gods |
Dionysus | Bacchus | God of Wine |
Persephone | Proserpine | Goddess of Underworld |
Eros | Cupid | God of Love |
Gaia | Gaea | Goddess of Earth |
Besides the gods and goddesses named here there were many other gods and immortals in Greek mythology.
The Greek mythology names of other gods include the goat-god Pan; Rhea, Cronos’s sister and the mother of his children; Heracles, the son of a mortal and Zeus who had to earn his immortality; Ganymede, a beautiful prince that Zeus brought to Olympus to be his cup-bearer; and the four winds: Zephyrus, Eurus, Notus, and Boreas.
Like the Christian god, Jehovah, Zeus/Jupiter was considered the all-mighty father, but instead of being the father of man, he was the father of the lesser gods. Harrahs online casino promo code. Zeus actually was a third-generation god. How do you play craps at the casino.
So, who were the first- and second-generation gods? Glad you asked. Gaia was the first goddess, also known as Mother Earth, and gave birth (with her son Uranus being the father) to the second-generation Titans. The Titans were led by Cronos or Saturn, and he seized power from Uranus. Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades are the sons of Cronos, and Zeus was considered primarily responsible for overthrowing his father.
The Olympians as teachers
Hera/Juno was his mate, although not the mother of all of his children. Zeus, Hera, and the other third-generation gods of Ancient Greece were Olympians; that is, they lived at the top of Mount Olympus, the highest peak in Ancient Greece, or a heaven in the skies. Sometimes, these gods intermingled with mortals, even falling in love and bearing children with mortal men and women.
Although modern man views these Greek gods and goddesses as creatures of mythology, remember that to the ancient Greeks, they were no less real than current beliefs in God or Buddha. With the passage of time, modern society has come to view the stories of the gods as metaphors for teaching lessons about behaviors and actions, although the gods and goddesses in Greek and Roman mythology exhibited many of the weaknesses and pettiness that modern man would never associate with deities.
Greek God Of Luck
One lesson that the Greek myths loved to teach was the lesson of hubris, or pride. Whenever a mortal (or god) exhibited hubris, thinking he or she was better than the gods, they inevitably would also experience a resulting tragedy. If one of the lesser gods started thinking he was more powerful than Zeus, then he, too, would be knocked down a peg or two. This type of metaphorical lesson continues in the stories of the Bible, Shakespearian tragedies, and even into modern literature and art.
Of course, the stories of these ancient gods were not just provided as a way to guide the behavior of men. Many of the myths explain various aspects of the world. Of course, there’s a story about how the world was created, but there are also stories to explain things such as the changing of the seasons. Persephone or Proserpine (Zeus and Demeter’s daughter in Greek mythology and Jupiter and Ceres’s daughter in Roman mythology) was stolen by Hades or Pluto to be his queen in the underworld. Her mother, the earth goddess, was saddened by her loss and refused to fulfill her duties. A compromise was reached whereby Persephone would spend 4–6 months (depending on the version of the myth) with her mother, and the rest of the year in the underworld. Thus, when she is with Hades, the earth goddess refuses to fulfill her duties, resulting in fall and winter, but Persephone returns, resulting in spring and summer.
Parallels to Christianity and other modern religions
Every religion has a creation “myth,” although those who currently practice a religion would argue that it isn’t myth. Christianity has the story of God created the Heavens and the Earth, and the story of the first man and woman in the Garden of Eden. The Greeks actually had several creation myths including one involving an egg from which all planets, the Earth, and all creatures hatched.
It is interesting to note some other parallels. For example, Eve, the first woman in Christianity, was tempted into sin by the serpent and ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. As a punishment, Adam and Eve are kicked out of the garden of Eden where they had everything they desired. In Greek mythology, the first woman is Pandora. Ring a bell? Pandora is tempted to open a forbidden box (jar in some versions) and brings chaos by releasing all the ills of the world.
The first humans were destroyed in a great flood sent by Zeus. The only survivors were one man, Deucalion, and his wife. Signs of a compulsive gambler. Of course, this parallels the story of Noah and his ark.
Greek God Of Change And Transformation
Mount Olympus itself is often considered to be the Ancient Greek’s version of Heaven, and Hades, named for the god who ruled the underworld, is the equivalent of the Christian’s Hell.
Greek God Of Chance
Interested in other culture’s mythologies?