Athena

:This article is about the goddess Athena. For other uses see Athena (disambiguation).

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Athena, (Greek {{polytonic|?????}} Ath?ná or {{polytonic|?????}} Ath?n?; Doric: {{polytonic|?????}} Asána), the Greek goddess of wisdom, strategy, and war associated by the Etruscans with their goddess Menrva, and later by the Romans as Minerva, is attended by an owl, wore a goatskin breastplate called the Aegis given to her by her father and is accompanied by the goddess of victory, Nike. Athena is also a goddess associated with mentoring heroes. Athena is an armed warrior goddess, never a child, always a virgin (parthenos); she is said to have found the advances of men to be childish. The Parthenon at Athens, Greece is her most famous shrine. She never had a consort or lover, although once Hephaestus tried and failed. Herodotus and Plato incorrectly identified Athena with the Libyan (modern Berbers) goddess Neith. According to Plato, Athena was derived from A-???-??? (A-theo-noa) or H-???-??? (E-theo-noa) meaning the mind of God (Crat.407b).

Related Topics:
Greek - Doric - Greek - Goddess - Wisdom - Etruscan - Minerva - Owl - Aegis - Nike - Virgin - Parthenon - Hephaestus - Herodotus - Plato - Libyan - Berber - Neith

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Pallas is sometimes thought to be her father, hence the epithet Pallas Athena (?????? ?????). According to Plato, "Pallas is derived from armed dances. For the elevation of oneself or anything else above the earth, or by the use of the hands, we call shaking ??????? (pallein), or ?????? (dancing)" Crat. 406.d. Other stories say that Pallas was Athena's childhood friend. During a game, Athena accidentally killed Pallas. Athena then decided to put Pallas's name before hers so that Pallas will always be remembered.

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