Dione
Dione was an obscure goddess. It was not certain whether she was either a Titaness or an Oceanid. None of the writers I had come across said anything about her attributes, but she was most likely the goddess of the sea, mainly because Dione was also known by another name, Thalassa, who was a sea deity. Under this name, she was possibly the wife of the ancient sea god, Pontus.
According to Hesiod, in Theogony she was an Oceanid, the daughter of Oceanus and Tethys.
According to Homer in the Iliad, Dione was mother of the love goddess Aphrodite by Zeus. Dione comforted her daughter when the Greek hero Diomedes had wounded Aphrodite. Homer didn't give any indication of who Dione's parents were, nor what her functions were. The Greek mythographer Apollodorus and the tragedian Euripides, in his play Helen, also named her the mother of Aphrodite, except that they listed her as the daughter of Uranus and Gaea, which therefore made her a Titaness. (Hesiod gave a different account on the birth of Aphrodite, the love goddess of the Olympians.) The Roman mythographer likewise listed Dione as a Titaness and the mother of Venus (Aphrodite).
Dione shared with Zeus the sacred oracle of Dodona.
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Oceanid | Hesiod: Theogony. |
In the Homeric Hymns (to Delian Apollo), she was one of the goddesses to witness Leto giving birth to Apollo on the island of Delos.
The importance of a name is shown from the fact that it was a feminine form of Zeus. In the Linear B tablets, Dione's name was DI-WI-JA or Diwia, whereas Zeus' name was DI-WO, DI-WE or DI-WI-JE-U. She may have been an important goddess before the Dorian migration and the time of Homer. It is believed that when the Hellenic Greeks migrated to Greece (1150-950 BC), they brought their gods with them. Originally Dione was the wife and consort of Zeus, their supreme god of heaven and earth. However, she was later displaced by another pre-Hellenic Argive goddess Hera who became Zeus' consort in Olympus.
According to the Pelasgian Creation Myth, Dione was assigned by Eurynome to rule the power of the moon, alongside the Titan Atlas.
By Jimmy Joe
