Titans Versus The Gods?

Question

Someone once said the Titans were once more powerful than the Gods, What does it mean. Weren't the Titans, Medusa, The Cyclops Et Al.

Answer 1

No, the Gorgons (Nymphs, well they were anyway) were not titans and neither was the Cyclops (Son of Poseidon and something else). The Titans existed before the Olympian gods, and they were the parents of the Olympian gods. They were supposed to be more powerful, but that changed depending on what part of Greece you're looking at the mythology of.

In Greek mythology, the Titans are a race of godlike giants who were considered to be the personifications of the forces of nature. They are the twelve children (six sons and six daughters) of Gaia and Uranus. Each son married, or had children of, one of his sisters. They are: Cronus and Rhea, Iapetus and Themis, Oceanus and Tethys, Hyperion and Theia, Crius and Mnemosyne, and Coeus and Phoebe.

Answer 2

The Titans were children of Uranus and Gaia (sky god and earth goddess). Cronus led them. He ate his children, because it was predicted that his son would overtrow him. He ate 2 sons and 3 daughters, but his wife Rhea gave him a stone to swallow, rather than Zeus the 3rd son. When Zeus grew up, he forced Cronus to vomit the gods he had swallowed, and they joned him in a ten year war against the Titans, now led by Atlas who was strongest. The Cyclops and Hekatoncheires were siblings of the Titans and had been imprisoned. Zeus released them, and they joined him in the war. Cyclops had one eye each and made him thunderbolts, and Hekatoncheires each had 100 arms with which they tore off tops of mountains and crushed Titans. There were 3 Gorgons, of whom Medusa was the only mortal one. They were born later and not involved in the war between Zeus and Atlas.

Answer 3

The Gods of Olympus were the children of the Titans. Zeus led them in conquering Cronos, who had tried to kill his children (by swallowing them!) for fear they would overthrow him. Which, of course, they did.

The younger Gods are the ones that we recognise as the Gods of Olympus. Medusa and the Cyclops et al were either cursed by these Gods or their monstrous children.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_(mythology)

Answer 4

My theory, unsupported by anything I have read, is that the Titans were the gods of the old Greek civilisation - the Mycenaeans. When the Doric Greeks, who became the Classical Greeks, conquered Greece they had to legitimise their power by creating legends whereby their gods - the Olympian gods - defeated the Titans.

Of course, the gods of the Iliad are the Olympian gods but that may be also part of cultural supplanting.

Answer 5

read the lithing thife it is childish but fun to read