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Appendix: Chart of Olympian Gods and
their Akkadian Counterparts

Greek (and Roman) Olympian Gods and their Akkadian

Counterparts:
Zeus (Jupiter), the sky god, rules the other gods. He uses the thunder-
bolt to subdue rebellious gods, incinerate evildoing humans, and signal
his intentions. As god of hospitality and suppliants, he oversees what we
might today call international law.
Anu (An) is Zeus’s Babylonian (Sumerian) counterpart as supreme
sky god and impartial ruler. Enlil is Zeus’s Babylonian counterpart as
punitive storm god.
Poseidon (Neptune), lord of the sea, wields the trident. When angered
he can cause earthquakes and turbulent waters; and when propitiated
properly he can prevent or calm the same. He is associated with horses
and bulls. He protects both Greeks and Trojans.
Ea (Enki) is Poseidon’s Babylonian (Sumerian) counterpart. Ea,
however, is lord of all waters, both salt and sweet, that come from deep
below the earth’s surface. Ea’s wisdom and devotion to human well-
being are more characteristic of Athena than Poseidon.
Hades (Pluto), lord of the dead, drew as his lot the dark realms beneath
the earth. His queen is Persephone (Proserpine), daughter of
Demeter.
Ereshkigal is Persephone’s Sumerian/Babylonian counterpart as
Queen of the dead and ruler of the netherworld. She is the sister of
Ishtar.
Hera (Juno), queen of the gods, is the goddess of marriage and legiti-
mate rulers. Ironically, her own marriage is far from perfect, and she is
often angry at Zeus’s infidelities. She aids the Greeks in their war against

Ancient Epic Katherine Callen King

© 2009 Katherine Callen King ISBN: 978-1-405-15947-0
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190 APPENDIX

the Trojans partly because she is offended by the Judgment of Paris

(see Chapter Two) and partly because Paris adulterated the marriage of
a Greek king.

Demeter (Ceres) is the goddess of agriculture. She is an extremely

important goddess in Greek and Roman culture, but she does not play
a large role in the epics of Homer and Virgil.

Aphrodite (Venus) is the daughter of Zeus and Dione in the Iliad,

which prefers not to evoke the divine succession myth. Elsewhere
Aphrodite is born from the severed genitals of Uranos which fall into the
sea after Kronos castrates his father and takes his place. She is the goddess
of sexual attraction and generation in all living creatures. Aphrodite is
also the goddess of beauty. She protects the Trojans both as patron of
Paris and mother of Aeneas.
Ishtar (Inanna) is Aphrodite’s Babylonian (Sumerian) counterpart.
As goddess of both fertility (human, animal and plant) and warfare, she
is the highest ranking Babylonian goddess.

Athena (Minerva), daughter of Zeus (and Metis), is normally the execu-

tor of Zeus’s will. She is goddess of wisdom, victorious war, strategy,
and the craft of weaving. Zeus swallowed Metis, whose name means
Craftiness or Counsel, while she was pregnant with Athena; a few months
later Zeus had a dreadful headache, and Athena sprang out in full armor.
She protects the Greeks partly because she is offended by the Judgment
of Paris (see Chapter-Two) and partly because Zeus is offended at Paris’s
abuse of Menelaos’ hospitality. She carries Zeus’s aegis, a goat-skin shield
with Gorgon head meant to terrify mortals with whom Zeus is angry.

Hephaistos (Vulcan), son of Zeus and Hera, or of Hera alone. He is

the god of fire and of the forge, patron of metalworkers. In the Iliad he
is married to Charis, whose name means Grace, but elsewhere he is
married to Aphrodite/Venus; both wives apparently represent the beauty
that graces his creations. The forge-work that creates a beautiful iron
spear, bronze shield, or decorated silver bowl is itself hard and dirty, and
perhaps for this reason Hephaistos himself is considered ugly. He is
lame either from a birth defect or from being thrown from Olympos.
One story has him thrown by Hera who wanted to hide her lame
newborn from the other gods (Il. 18.395–397); another has him thrown
by his father when Hephaistos tried to help his mother avoid Zeus’s
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APPENDIX 191

punishment (Il. 1.590–594). As god of the male metalworking crafts, he

is often allied with Athena, goddess of the female cloth-working crafts.
Ares (Mars), son of Zeus and Hera, is god of war. He delights in battle,
in hacking with swords, piercing with spears, trampling with chariots,
burning with fire. He is not associated with victory or with stratagem,
but merely with war per se. In Rome, he is a much more important
god, second only to Jupiter, and he has agricultural as well as military
associations.
Apollo is the son of Zeus and the goddess Leto. He is the god of the
sun and patron of civilized arts associated with light: truth, prophecy,
poetry, and the lyre (that is, what today we would call classical music).
He is the god of healing and, if angered, of sickness. In classical Greece
and Rome he becomes associated with hierarchy and the aristocracy.
Shamash (Utu), his counterpart in Babylonian (Sumerian) culture,
represents light, truth, and justice.
Artemis (Diana) is the twin sister of Apollo and goddess of the moon.
As patron both of wild animals and the hunt, she is a nature goddess,
operating almost exclusively outside the city. Her only function within
the city is as goddess of childbirth, which the Greeks associated entirely
with nature.
Hermes (Mercury) is the son of Zeus and the minor goddess Maia. He
is the boundary crosser, bringing messages from the gods to humans and
escorting the souls of the dead to Hades. He is the patron god of heralds,
travelers, and the lucky finders of buried treasure.
Dionysos (Bacchus, Liber) is the son of Zeus and the princess Semele.
He is god of wine, of night, of transformations, and of the passionate
music of flute and drum. A god of the people, he becomes associated
with equality as opposed to hierarchy. Like Artemis, he is associated more
with nature than with the city.
Hestia (Vesta), goddess of the hearth and third sister of Zeus, is not an
active player in divine or human affairs. One story says that she yielded
her place as one of the twelve great Olympians to the deified Herakles.