Hey everyone, Welcome to Mythology Explained. In today’s video, we’re going to discuss the
five most powerful male Titans in Greek mythology. We’ll make a separate video for
female Titans later on. Let us know in the comments if you agree with our selection.
Let’s get into it.
Beginning our list is Oceanus
Oceanus was the eldest of the 12 first-generation Titans. He personified the river Oceanus,
which was the great river that encircled the world. In this way, more so than his 11 siblings,
he was similar to his parents, both of them primordial deities, for Uranus personified
the sky and Gaia, the earth. Tethys, his sister and another of the 12 first-generation Titans,
was his consort, and by her he sired the Oceanids, a group of 3,000 water nymphs. Also born to them
were all the rivers of the world, which, with the exception of the river Styx, were exclusively
male. As well, it was thought that Oceanus was the source from which all the rivers of the world fed
and flowed. In appearance, Oceanus is depicted as bearded and mature, with more fantastical versions
including horns and a fish tail. Because the earth was thought to be flat back in the time antiquity,
Oceanus, by nature of him being the great river that encircled the earth, was thought of as
the outer-boundary of the mortal world, thereby becoming a dividing line that separated opposites:
known and unknown, what is prosaic and familiar from what is exotic and mysterious,
like civilization and chartered territory from remote tribes and monsters, even the realms of
life and death. The Hesperides, the nymphs who guarded the golden apples gifted to Hera by Gaia,
the Gorgons, the Hecatonchires, the hundred-armed giants who helped the gods defeat the Titans,
Geryon, a triple-bodied giant killed by Hercules, and the Ethiopians, all of these nymphs, monsters,
and people were thought to dwell near the waters of Oceanus - their proximity to
him symbolizing the divide he embodied between the realm of mortality and the realm of magic,
monsters, and divinity. In one tradition, Helios, the personification of the sun, and Eos,
the personification of the dawn, rose up from Oceanus’ Eastern bank in the morning, then, after
completing their daily arc, setting and sinking into the waters of the West. Oceanus makes for an
interesting addition to this list because, without a doubt, he was one of the greatest of the Titans;
however, he also never tested his might against the gods, choosing to remain a neutral party
with his wife instead of bolstering the titan forces with his strength in the primordial past.
At number 2 we have Atlas
Today, Atlas is perhaps best known for his iconography, which consistently shows him bearing
the earth on the mantle of his shoulders - even though it is actually the sky, not the earth, he
holds up. This unending burden was not something Atlas chose for himself, some sort of constant
sacrifice; rather, it was a perpetual punishment he was condemned to by Zeus, a diabolical
consolation prize awarded for challenging the gods and failing to win. Atlas was a formidable force.
His prowess as a warrior made him an indomitable opponent on the battlefield, and his sage counsel
made him an invaluable addition anytime strategy and tactics were discussed.
Born to Iapetus, a first-generation Titan, and to Clymene, one of the Oceanids,
Atlas was younger than many of the other Titans he fought side by side with; regardless, his strength
and wisdom were admired, and he rose to become one of the foremost leaders of the Titan forces.
He was a significant reason the Titan war became so intractable and interminable,
becoming a war of endurance that lasted 10 long, devastating years. His implacability
resulted in him being singled-out and condemned to hold up the sky for all of eternity, while
the rest of the Titans who fought against the gods were cast down into the depths of Tartarus.
The heavens bearing down on him, he stood near the westernmost shore of the river Oceanus,
near the Hesperides and the golden apples they tended. Beyond battling the gods and ending up
with the sky bearing down on him like the palm of some cosmic hand trying to flatten him against the
earth, perhaps Atlas’ most important contribution to Greek mythology comes during Hercules’ 11th
labor, which was to retrieve the golden apples of the Hesperides. Atlas offers to fetch the apples
for Hercules if he temporarily holds the sky up in his place. Hercules’ agrees, but once the
errand is accomplished, Atlas is loath to resume his post; so Hercules has to trick the Titan,
asking him to take the sky back for a moment while he finds something to cushion his shoulders with,
then promptly leaving with the apples once the switch back is made.
Up next we have Cronus
Cronus is an entry I’m sure everyone guessed would be on this list. He was the youngest of
the first-generation Titans, but his youth didn’t hinder him; for he was ambitious and audacious,
a combination of traits that would allow him to capitalize on an opportunity
to catapult himself to the pinnacle of the cosmic hierarchy. Uranus, the personification of the sky,
enveloped Gaia, the personification of the earth, in a constant embrace.
Pressed tightly against each other, virtually conjoined at this point, there was no separation
between earth and sky, so Gaia’s children, while fully grown, couldn’t emerge from her,
trapped in the earth as they were. She beseeched her children to rise up against their father
to free her from her predicament, and of them, it was Cronus who came to his mother’s aid.
He lay in wait, a sickle of adamant in hand, and he ambushed his father and castrated him,
tossing the severed genitals into the sea. In this act, Cronus supplanted his father,
becoming the new ruler of the cosmos. Once king, he proved himself no better than his predecessor.
Cronus reimprisoned his older siblings, the trio of Hecatonchires and the trio of Cyclopes,
and he took Rhea, his older sister and another of the 12 first-generation Titans,
as his consort. Together they had six children, the first generation of Olympians: Hestia,
Demeter, Hera, Hades, Poseidon, and Zeus. Cronus learnt of a prophecy that foretold his downfall
at the hands of one of his children, so in order to forestall such an eventuality, he swallowed
each of his children as they were born, trapping them inside himself. However, his preemptive ploy
didn’t go as planned. Rhea tricked him into swallowing a stone instead of his last child,
Zeus, who was whisked away and raised in secret until the bloom of manhood was upon him. Once
fully grown, Zeus caused Cronus to disgorge the five children he had swallowed, and out came
five gods fully grown as Zeus was. And so, the stage was set for the Titanomachy, the great war
between the gods and the Titans, the end result of which was the utter defeat of the Titans. Nearly
every Titan, even Cronus, who fought against the gods was cast down into the dark of Tartarus.
At number 4 we have Prometheus
Prometheus certainly doesn’t jump to mind when thinking about Titans
who made the gods tremble. He’s not known for his strength or skill as a warrior,
and what’s more, he betrayed his own kind: rather than reinforce the Titans with his
fighting abilities, he decided that the life of a turncoat suited him better,
leaving the Titans in the lurch, quickly stitching a proverbial patch emblazoned with the emblem of
Olympus onto his clothes to crystallize his new loyalty. As we’ll see, Prometheus is someone who
earned a spot on this list not for his brawn but for his brains, his intellect and cunning.
Prometheus’ name means ‘foresight or ‘forethought’, and since the gods defeated
the Titans, since Prometheus wasn’t cast down into Tartarus like the rest of his cousins and uncles
who fought tooth and nail for supremacy over the cosmos, you could say that Prometheus’ actions,
in this instance, truly were worthy of his name. What’s strange here is that Prometheus, someone
who had no qualms about abandoning the Titans - self-interest and self-preservation clearly
guiding his actions here - proceeds to spend the rest of his days championing the underdog, laying
bet after bet on the wrong horse. Here, of course, we’re talking about Prometheus’ compulsive need
to champion humanity and defy Zeus, popping his head into the crosshairs of peril again and again.
When the matter of sacrifice was being decided, Prometheus tricked Zeus into choosing the worse
of the two piles, consigning the gods to the bones, winning the meat for humanity.
Zeus, his mind now like a black cloud bristling with bolts of lightning, retaliates by taking
away fire, subjecting humanity to cold and dark. Once again, Prometheus plays the part of the hero,
stealing fire back from Zeus and returning it to the mortal plane.
He also thwarted Zeus’ efforts to exterminate humanity.
Armed with forewarning passed on by Prometheus, Deucalion, Prometheus’ son, built a boat with
his wife Pyrrah. Aboard this boat, they survive the storm that drowned the earth,
nearly killing everyone, and not only that, they go on to repopulate the human race. Unfortunately
for Prometheus, though, championing humanity didn’t work out as well as betraying the Titans.
Eventually, Zeus loses patience, chains him to a rock, and subjects him to endless torture in the
form of a giant eagle that swoops in to devour his ever-regenerating liver each and every day.
Taking up our last spot is Hyperion.
Called “The One on High” and “He Who Walks above”, Hyperion was one of the 12 first-generation titans
born to the primordial deities Uranus, the personification of the sky,
and to Gaia, the personification of the earth. His consort was Theia, called “Far-Shining”,
another of the 12 first-generation Titans,
and together, they had three children” Selene (the “Moon”), Helios (the “Sun”), and Eos (the “Dawn”).
Of Hyperion’s three children, Eos most followed in her father’s footsteps in that she produced
many of the other manifestations of the material world, including: Boreas, the North wind, Notus,
the South wind, Zephyr, the West wind, and all the stars in the sky, including Eosphorus,
better known by his Latin name, Lucifer, the Morning Star.
Hyperion was a solar deity. Thus he was identified with his son,
Helios, and later with Apollo. One thought is that Hyperion’s original role was to oversee the cycle
in which his children shined in the sky,
orchestrating the continuous cyclical symphony of dawn, sun, and moon, constantly in motion.
Like the other Titans that fought against the Olympians during the Titanomachy,
Hyperion was cast into the depths of Tartarus,
the cavernous abyss beneath the earth. The only exception to this was Atlas, who was saddled with
a special punishment, condemned to bear the vault of the heavens upon his shoulders for eternity.
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