upright=1.8, Fragment of a

relief Relief is a sculpture, sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces remain attached to a solid background of the same material. The term ''wikt:relief, relief'' is from the Latin verb , to raise (). To create a sculpture in relief is to give ...

(1st century BC1st century AD) depicting the twelve Olympians carrying their attributes in procession; from left to right: Hestia (scepter), Hermes (winged cap and staff), Aphrodite (veiled), Ares (helmet and spear), Demeter (scepter and wheat sheaf), Hephaestus (staff), Hera (scepter), Poseidon (trident), Athena (owl and helmet), Zeus (thunderbolt and staff), Artemis (bow and quiver) and Apollo (lyre) from the Walters Art Museum. In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, the twelve Olympians are the major Deity, deities of the Greek pantheon, commonly considered to be

Zeus Zeus (, ) is the chief deity of the List of Greek deities, Greek pantheon. He is a sky father, sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. Zeus is the child ...

Poseidon Poseidon (; ) is one of the twelve Olympians in ancient Greek religion and mythology, presiding over the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses.Burkert 1985pp. 136–139 He was the protector of seafarers and the guardian of many Hellenic cit ...

Hera In ancient Greek religion, Hera (; ; in Ionic Greek, Ionic and Homeric Greek) is the goddess of marriage, women, and family, and the protector of women during childbirth. In Greek mythology, she is queen of the twelve Olympians and Mount Oly ...

Demeter In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Demeter (; Attic Greek, Attic: ''Dēmḗtēr'' ; Doric Greek, Doric: ''Dāmā́tēr'') is the Twelve Olympians, Olympian goddess of the harvest and agriculture, presiding over cro ...

Aphrodite Aphrodite (, ) is an Greek mythology, ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, procreation, and as her syncretism, syncretised Roman counterpart , desire, Sexual intercourse, sex, fertility, prosperity, and ...

Athena Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretism, syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarde ...

Artemis In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Artemis (; ) is the goddess of the hunting, hunt, the wilderness, wild animals, transitions, nature, vegetation, childbirth, Kourotrophos, care of children, and chastity. In later tim ...

Apollo Apollo is one of the Twelve Olympians, Olympian deities in Ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek and Ancient Roman religion, Roman religion and Greek mythology, Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, mu ...

Ares Ares (; , ''Árēs'' ) is the List of Greek deities, Greek god of war god, war and courage. He is one of the Twelve Olympians, and the son of Zeus and Hera. The Greeks were ambivalent towards him. He embodies the physical valor necessary for ...

Hephaestus Hephaestus ( , ; wikt:Hephaestus#Alternative forms, eight spellings; ) is the Greek god of artisans, blacksmiths, carpenters, craftsmen, fire, metallurgy, metalworking, sculpture and volcanoes.Walter Burkert, ''Greek Religion'' 1985: III.2. ...

Hermes Hermes (; ) is an Olympian deity in ancient Greek religion and mythology considered the herald of the gods. He is also widely considered the protector of human heralds, travelers, thieves, merchants, and orators. He is able to move quic ...

, and either

Hestia In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Hestia (; ) is the virgin goddess of the hearth and the home. In myth, she is the firstborn child of the Titans Cronus and Rhea, and one of the Twelve Olympians. In Greek mythology, newborn Hestia, alo ...

Dionysus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, myth, Dionysus (; ) is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre. He was also known as Bacchus ( or ; ...

. They were called ''Olympians'' because, according to tradition, they resided on

Mount Olympus Mount Olympus (, , ) is an extensive massif near the Thermaic Gulf of the Aegean Sea, located on the border between Thessaly and Macedonia (Greece), Macedonia, between the regional units of Larissa (regional unit), Larissa and Pieria (regional ...

. Besides the twelve Olympians, there were many other cultic groupings of twelve gods.

Olympians

The Olympians are a race of

deities A deity or god is a supernatural being considered to be sacred and worthy of worship due to having authority over some aspect of the universe and/or life. The ''Oxford Dictionary of English'' defines ''deity'' as a God (male deity), god or god ...

, primarily consisting of a third and fourth generation of immortal beings, worshipped as the principal gods of the Greek pantheon and so named because of their residency atop

. They gained their supremacy in a ten-year-long war of gods, in which

led his siblings to victory over the previous generation of ruling immortal beings, the

Titans In Greek mythology, the Titans ( ; ) were the pre-Twelve Olympians, Olympian gods. According to the ''Theogony'' of Hesiod, they were the twelve children of the primordial parents Uranus (mythology), Uranus (Sky) and Gaia (Earth). The six male ...

, children of the primordial deities

Gaia In Greek mythology, Gaia (; , a poetic form of ('), meaning 'land' or 'earth'),, , . also spelled Gaea (), is the personification of Earth. Gaia is the ancestral mother—sometimes parthenogenic—of all life. She is the mother of Uranus (S ...

and

Uranus Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gaseous cyan-coloured ice giant. Most of the planet is made of water, ammonia, and methane in a Supercritical fluid, supercritical phase of matter, which astronomy calls "ice" or Volatile ( ...

. They were a family of gods, the most important consisting of the first generation of Olympians, offspring of the Titans

Cronus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Cronus, Cronos, or Kronos ( or ; ) was the leader and youngest of the Titans, the children of Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (mythology), Uranus (Sky). He overthrew his father and ruled dur ...

and Rhea: Zeus,

and

, along with the principal offspring of Zeus:

and

. Although

Hades Hades (; , , later ), in the ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, is the god of the dead and the king of the Greek underworld, underworld, with which his name became synonymous. Hades was the eldest son of Cronus and Rhea ...

was a major deity in the Greek pantheon and was the brother of Zeus and the other first generation of Olympians, his realm was far away from Olympus in the

underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. ...

, and thus he was not usually considered to be one of the Olympians. Olympic gods can be contrasted to

chthonic In Greek mythology, deities referred to as chthonic () or chthonian () were gods or spirits who inhabited the underworld or existed in or under the earth, and were typically associated with death or fertility. The terms "chthonic" and "chthonian" ...

gods including Hades and his wife

Persephone In ancient Greek mythology and Ancient Greek religion, religion, Persephone ( ; , classical pronunciation: ), also called Kore ( ; ) or Cora, is the daughter of Zeus and Demeter. She became the queen of the Greek underworld, underworld afte ...

, by mode of sacrifice, the latter receiving sacrifices in a '' bothros'' (, "pit") or ''

megaron The ''megaron'' (; , , : ''megara'' ) was the great hall in very early Mycenae, Mycenean and Ancient Greece, ancient Greek palace complexes. Architecturally, it was a rectangular hall that was supported by four columns, fronted by an open, two- ...

'' (, "sunken chamber") rather than at an altar. The canonical number of Olympian gods was twelve, but besides the (thirteen) principal Olympians listed above, there were many other residents of Olympus, who thus might be considered to be Olympians.

Heracles Heracles ( ; ), born Alcaeus (, ''Alkaios'') or Alcides (, ''Alkeidēs''), was a Divinity, divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of ZeusApollodorus1.9.16/ref> and Alcmene, and the foster son of Amphitryon.By his adoptive descent through ...

became a resident of Olympus after his

apotheosis Apotheosis (, ), also called divinization or deification (), is the glorification of a subject to divine levels and, commonly, the treatment of a human being, any other living thing, or an abstract idea in the likeness of a deity. The origina ...

and married another Olympian resident Hebe. According to

Diodorus Siculus Diodorus Siculus or Diodorus of Sicily (; 1st century BC) was an ancient Greece, ancient Greek historian from Sicily. He is known for writing the monumental Universal history (genre), universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty ...

, some said that Heracles was offered a place among the twelve, but refused as it would mean one of the original twelve being "cast out". In the ''

Iliad The ''Iliad'' (; , ; ) is one of two major Ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Odyssey'', the poem is divided into 24 books and ...

'', the goddess

Themis In Greek mythology and religion, Themis (; ) is the goddess and personification of justice, divine order, law, and custom. She is one of the twelve Titan children of Gaia and Uranus, and the second wife of Zeus. She is associated with oracles a ...

, who is listed among the twelve

, dwells on Olympus alongside the other gods, making her a Titan and an Olympian at the same time. According to Hesiod, the children of

Styx In Greek mythology, Styx (; ; lit. "Shuddering"), also called the River Styx, is a goddess and one of the rivers of the Greek Underworld. Her parents were the Titans Oceanus and Tethys, and she was the wife of the Titan Pallas and the moth ...

— Zelus (Envy),

Nike Nike often refers to: * Nike, Inc., a major American producer of athletic shoes, apparel, and sports equipment * Nike (mythology), a Greek goddess who personifies victory Nike may also refer to: People * Nike (name), a surname and feminine giv ...

(Victory), Kratos (Strength), and Bia (Force)—"have no house apart from Zeus, nor any dwelling nor path except that wherein God leads them, but they dwell always with Zeus". Some others who might be considered Olympians include the

Horae In Greek mythology, the Horae (), Horai () or Hours (, ) were the goddesses of the seasons and the natural portions of time. Etymology The term ''hora'' comes from the Proto-Indo-European ("year"). Function The Horae were originally the ...

, the Graces, the

Muses In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, the Muses (, ) were the Artistic inspiration, inspirational goddesses of literature, science, and the arts. They were considered the source of the knowledge embodied in the poetry, lyric p ...

Eileithyia Eileithyia or Ilithyia (; ; (''Eleuthyia'') in Crete, also (''Eleuthia'') or (''Elysia'') in Laconia and Messene, and (''Eleuthō'') in literature)Nilsson Vol I, p. 313 was the Greek goddess of childbirth and midwifery, and the daughter o ...

, Iris, Dione, and Ganymede.

Twelve gods

Throughout ancient Greece, there were many cultic groupings of twelve gods, with varying members. The earliest evidence of Greek religious practice involving twelve gods (

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

: , , from , "twelve", and , "gods") comes no earlier than the late sixth century BC. According to

Thucydides Thucydides ( ; ; BC) was an Classical Athens, Athenian historian and general. His ''History of the Peloponnesian War'' recounts Peloponnesian War, the fifth-century BC war between Sparta and Athens until the year 411 BC. Thucydides has been d ...

, an

altar of the twelve gods The Altar of the Twelve Gods (also called the Sanctuary of the Twelve Gods), was an important altar and sanctuary at Athens, located in the northwest corner of the Classical Agora. The Altar was set up by Pisistratus the Younger, (the grandson o ...

was established in the

agora The agora (; , romanized: ', meaning "market" in Modern Greek) was a central public space in ancient Ancient Greece, Greek polis, city-states. The literal meaning of the word "agora" is "gathering place" or "assembly". The agora was the center ...

Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

by the

archon ''Archon'' (, plural: , ''árchontes'') is a Greek word that means "ruler", frequently used as the title of a specific public office. It is the masculine present participle of the verb stem , meaning "to be first, to rule", derived from the same ...

Pisistratus (son of

Hippias Hippias of Elis (; ; late 5th century BC) was a Greek sophist, and a contemporary of Socrates. With an assurance characteristic of the later sophists, he claimed to be regarded as an authority on all subjects, and lectured on poetry, grammar, his ...

and the grandson of the tyrant

Pisistratus Pisistratus (also spelled Peisistratus or Peisistratos; ; – 527 BC) was a politician in ancient Athens, ruling as tyrant in the late 560s, the early 550s and from 546 BC until his death. His unification of Attica, the triangular p ...

), around 522 BC. The altar became the central point from which distances from Athens were measured and a place of supplication and refuge. Olympia apparently also had an early tradition of twelve gods. The '' Homeric Hymn to Hermes'' () has the god

divide a sacrifice of two cows he has stolen from Apollo, into twelve parts, on the banks of the river Alpheus (presumably at Olympia): Pindar, in an ode written to be sung at Olympia c. 480 BC, has

sacrificing, alongside the Alpheus, to the "twelve ruling gods": Another of Pindar's Olympian odes mentions "six double altars". Herodorus of Heraclea (c. 400 BC) also has Heracles founding a shrine at Olympia, with six pairs of gods, each pair sharing a single altar. Many other places had cults of the twelve gods, including

Delos Delos (; ; ''Dêlos'', ''Dâlos''), is a small Greek island near Mykonos, close to the centre of the Cyclades archipelago. Though only in area, it is one of the most important mythological, historical, and archaeological sites in Greece. ...

Chalcedon Chalcedon (; ; sometimes transliterated as ) was an ancient maritime town of Bithynia, in Asia Minor, Turkey. It was located almost directly opposite Byzantium, south of Scutari (modern Üsküdar) and it is now a district of the city of Ist ...

Magnesia on the Maeander Magnesia may refer to: Chemistry and geology *Magnesium oxide ** Periclase or magnesia, a natural mineral of magnesium oxide * Magnesian limestone (disambiguation) *Magnesium * Milk of magnesia, a suspension of magnesium hydroxide Geography * M ...

, and

Leontinoi Lentini (; ; ; ) is a town and in the Province of Syracuse, southeastern Sicily (Southern Italy), located 35 km (22 miles) north-west of Syracuse. History The city was founded by colonists from Naxos as Leontini in 729 BC, which in its beginning ...

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

. As with the twelve Olympians, although the number of gods was fixed at twelve, the membership varied. While the majority of the gods included as members of these other cults of twelve gods were Olympians, non-Olympians were also sometimes included. For example, Herodorus of Heraclea identified the six pairs of gods at Olympia as: Zeus and Poseidon, Hera and Athena, Hermes and Apollo, the Graces and Dionysus, Artemis and Alpheus, and

and Rhea. Thus, while this list includes the eight Olympians: Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Athena, Hermes, Apollo, Artemis, and Dionysus, it also contains three clear non-Olympians: the Titan parents of the first generation of Olympians, Cronus and Rhea, and the river god Alpheus, with the status of the Graces (here apparently counted as one god) being unclear.

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

connected "twelve gods" with the twelve months and implies that he considered

Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of Trans-Neptunian object, bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Su ...

(or Hades) one of the twelve in proposing that the final month be devoted to him and the spirits of the dead.Rutherford, pp. 45–46;

, '' The Laws'' 82
b-d
The Roman poet

Ennius Quintus Ennius (; ) was a writer and poet who lived during the Roman Republic. He is often considered the father of Roman poetry. He was born in the small town of Rudiae, located near modern Lecce (ancient ''Calabria'', today Salento), a town ...

gives the Roman equivalents (the ) as six male-female complements, preserving the place of Vesta (Greek Hestia), who played a crucial role in

Roman religion Religion in ancient Rome consisted of varying imperial and provincial religious practices, which were followed both by the people of Rome as well as those who were brought under its rule. The Romans thought of themselves as highly religious, ...

as a state goddess maintained by the

Vestals In ancient Rome, the Vestal Virgins or Vestals (, singular ) were priestesses of Vesta, virgin goddess of Rome's sacred hearth and its flame. The Vestals were unlike any other public priesthood. They were chosen before puberty from several s ...

List

There is no single canonical list of the twelve Olympian gods. The thirteen Greek gods and goddesses, along with their Roman counterparts, most commonly considered to be one of the twelve Olympians are listed below.

Genealogy

Notes

References

* Burkert, Walter, ''Greek Religion'',

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...

, 1985. . * Chadwick, John, ''The Mycenaean World'', Cambridge University Press, 1976. . * Dillon, Matthew, ''Girls and Women in Classical Greek Religion''. London: Routledge. (2002). . *

, ''Library of History, Volume III: Books 4.59-8'', translated by C. H. Oldfather,

Loeb Classical Library The Loeb Classical Library (LCL; named after James Loeb; , ) is a monographic series of books originally published by Heinemann and since 1934 by Harvard University Press. It has bilingual editions of ancient Greek and Latin literature, ...

No. 340. Cambridge, Massachusetts,

, 1939.
Online version at Harvard University Press
* Dowden, Ken, "Olympian Gods, Olympian Pantheon", in ''A Companion to Greek Religion'', Daniel Ogden editor, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. . * Gadbery, Laura M., "The Sanctuary of the Twelve Gods in the Athenian Agora: A Revised View", ''Hesperia'' 61 (1992), pp. 447–489. * Gantz, Timothy, ''Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources'', Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, Two volumes: (Vol. 1), (Vol. 2). * Hansen, William, William F. Hansen, ''Classical Mythology: A Guide to the Mythical World of the Greeks and Romans'', Oxford University Press, 2005. . * Hard, Robin (2004), ''The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology"'', Psychology Press, 2004,
Google Books
*

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

; ''Histories'', A. D. Godley (translator), Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1920;
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
*

Hesiod Hesiod ( or ; ''Hēsíodos''; ) was an ancient Greece, Greek poet generally thought to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer.M. L. West, ''Hesiod: Theogony'', Oxford University Press (1966), p. 40.Jasper Gr ...

, ''

Theogony The ''Theogony'' () is a poem by Hesiod (8th–7th century BC) describing the origins and genealogy, genealogies of the Greek gods, composed . It is written in the Homeric Greek, epic dialect of Ancient Greek and contains 1,022 lines. It is one ...

'', in ''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White'', Cambridge, Massachusetts., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
*

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

, ''The Iliad with an English Translation by A. T. Murray, Ph.D., in two volumes''. Cambridge, Massachusetts., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1924
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
*

; ''The Odyssey with an English Translation by A. T. Murray, Ph.D., in two volumes''. Cambridge, Massachusetts., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1919
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
, . * ''Homeric Hymn to Hermes (4)'', in ''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White'', Cambridge, Massachusetts., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
* Long, Charlotte R., ''The Twelve Gods of Greece and Rome'', Brill Archive, Jan 1, 1987
Google Books
* Morford, Mark P. O., Robert J. Lenardon, ''Classical Mythology'', Eighth Edition, Oxford University Press, 2007. . * Müller, Karl Otfried, ''Ancient Art and Its Remains: Or, A Manual of the Archaeology of Art'', translated by John Leitch, B. Quaritch, 1852. * Ogden, Daniel "Introduction" to ''A Companion to Greek Religion'', Daniel Ogden editor, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. . * Pache, Corinne Ondine, "Gods, Greek" in ''The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome, Volume 3'', Oxford University Press. 2010. . *

Pindar Pindar (; ; ; ) was an Greek lyric, Ancient Greek lyric poet from Thebes, Greece, Thebes. Of the Western canon, canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, his work is the best preserved. Quintilian wrote, "Of the nine lyric poets, Pindar i ...

, ''Odes'', Diane Arnson Svarlien. 1990. *

, ''

Laws Law is a set of rules that are created and are law enforcement, enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a Socia ...

'' in ''Plato in Twelve Volumes'', Vols. 10 & 11 translated by R. G. Bury. Cambridge, Massachusetts,

; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1967 & 1968
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
* Rutherford, Ian, "Canonizing the Pantheon: the Dodekatheon in Greek Religion and its Origins" in ''The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations'', editors Jan N. Bremmer, Andrew Erskine, Edinburgh University Press 2010. . * Shapiro, H. A., "Chapter 20: Olympian Gods at Home and Abroad" in ''A Companion to Greek Art'', editors Tyler Jo Smith, Dimitris Plantzos, John Wiley & Sons, 2012. . * Thomas, Edmund, "From the pantheon of the gods to the Pantheon of Rome" in ''Pantheons: Transformations of a Monumental Idea'', editors Richard Wrigley, Matthew Craske, Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2004. . *

, ''Thucydides translated into English; with introduction, marginal analysis, notes, and indices. Volume 1.'', Benjamin Jowett. translator. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1881
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library