Greek Mythology

Mnemosyne was the daughter of Uranus and Gaea, and therefore a Titanid, the Goddess of Memory. She does not appear in many myths and is primarily known as the mother of the nine Muses, by Zeus. The daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (Memory), were nine in number. At first, they were not distinguished from each other. Later, the Muses were named and each received a special field. (Source)

The Nine Muses (source)
The embodiment of the classical idea of the poetical faculty as a divine gift, these famous sisters dwelt on Mount Helicon, and drank of the fountain Hippocrene. Minerva presented to them the winged horse Pegasus, upon which, if one rode, she would soar aloft among the creatures and creations of fancy.
The nine Muses are the daughters of the Zeus and of Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory. The Muses preside over the arts and sciences, inspire all artists, especially poets, philosophers, and musicians. Calliope. was the muse of epic poetry, Clio. of history, Euterpe of lyric poetry, Melpomene. of tragedy, Terpsichore. of choral songs and the dance, Erato of love poetry, Polyhymnia. of sacred poetry, Urania of astronomy, and Thalia of comedy.

Mnemosyne--the goddess of memory--and her sister Lesmosyne, who presides over forgetting, once occupied high places in Western cosmology. Appropriately, Mnemosyne was in Greek legend the mother of the muses, the source from which all human culture--art, history, science--springs. (Source)

Since very few people in ancient times knew how to read and write, poetry and prose were not written but memorized. The ancients felt that it was only proper that the daughters of Mnemosyne be the goddesses of the various fine arts such as poetry, music, dance, literature, the theater, and the sciences. (Source)

Adaptation of ancient myths to modern scientific knowledge.

The Christian Bible refers to the White Horse which appears in the sky. Being a Greek document, one can easily understand that the Bible is referring to Pegasus. The one and only white horse whose location is the sky. But Pegasus is not limited to the sky. In the human body the place of memory is called "hippocampus" The word hippocampus means sea horse. The father of Pegasus was Poseidon the God of the Sea. In addition, Stedmans medical dictionary defines the hippocampus of the brain as a white eminence. Thus Pegasus is the white sea horse of Revelation and the white sea horse in the sky, and in addition, the white sea horse of memory within you.

What makes this even more interesting is the fact that Pegasus was sacred to the Muses. The mother of the Muses is Mnemosyne who is the goddess of memory.

Pegasus represents the hippocampus of the brain responsible for memory. Pegasus connected to Mnemosyne who is the goddess of memory. The Muses are nine entities of mythology who lived on Mt Helicon the sacred Mountain of Apollo. Remember, these things did not physically exist.

They are symbolic references to your head. Pegasus was connected to the Muses because he created their fountain, (Hippocrene) on Mt. Helicon. The Muses were Calliope, Epic stories, Erato Love, Enterpe, lyric (word), Melpomeny tragedy, Thalia, Comedy, Clio history, Urania, Astronomy, Polyhymnia, sacred song (see the word Hymn), and Terpsichore, dance.

So the thought patterns that are part of the human psyche or consciousness that eventually manifest into the physical realms are represented by the Muses. But there is something as we connect Pegasus and the Muses. The word Muse means the art of meditation.

Pegasus is the white horse that caused the fountain of the Muses to activate. This was on Mount Helicon. Considermeditation and the spiral energy called Kundalini or the coiled serpent which rises up from the base of the spine to the Pineal Gland of the brain. Now consider the fact that the word Helicon which is the sacred mountain of the Muses, means spiral. So Helicon the sacred mountain of the Muses is the spiral energy which rises in meditation to bring us to the place of enlightenment. Also keep in mind that this mountain is sacred to Apollo. Do you "remember how we showed you the Harmony of Apollo which is a geometric pattern created by the Greeks that fits perfectly over the picture of Supernova 1987A . Everything is connected in perfect harmony, within and without. (source)

Titans
Before the reign of the Gods of Olympus there were the Titans. The Titans were the 12 children of Uranus and Gaea, Heaven and Earth, and some of the children of the 12. Often called the Elder Gods, they were for many ages the supreme rulers of the universe and were of enormous size and incredibly strong. Cronus, the most important of the Titans, ruled the universe until he was dethroned by his son Zeus, who seized power for himself. The other important Titans were Rhea, mother of the gods, Oceanus, the river that flowed around the earth; Tethys, his wife; Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory; Themis, the goddess of divine justice; Hyperion, the father of the sun, the moon, and the dawn; Iapetus, the father of Prometheus, who created mortals; and Atlas, who carried the world on his shoulders. Of all the Titans only Prometheus and Oceanus sided with Zeus against Cronus. As a result, they were honored and the others were bound in Tartarus. Eventually, however, Zeus was reconciled with the Titans, and Cronus was made ruler of the Golden Age. Other Titans included Leto and Thaumas. (source)

Mnemosyne was the goddess of memory.

Mnemosyne in modern myth.

(source of the following) In Greek mythology, a rod intertwined by two snakes (caduceus) was a medicinal symbol to

indicate healing. Certainly snake bites would have been one of the original medical problems about which cultural knowledge would have accumulated in many cultures. In Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey the caduceus is mentioned as the tool with which Hermes (the messenger of the gods) opened and closed the eyes of mortals, which sounds like an initiation rite or surce of god-given knowledge. Greek art often depicts multiple snakes in initiation rites, one for opening the senses to the world and another for opening the inner eye of thought and intelect. In Paradise Lost, Milton mentions Hermes’ "opiate rod" and refers to the belief that the caduceus has been associated with medicine because it is similar to the symbol of Aesculapius, the Greek demigod of medicine. The rod with two snakes carried by Hermes is similar to the Staff of Aesculapius which had a single serpent encircling a tree branch. Thus, the Staff of Aesculapius is the original symbol of medicine, however the Caduceus is now the more commonly used symbol for medicine.

The origin of these Greek snake symbols is not clear. A vase excavated from the ancient Mesopotamian city of Lagash has a figure of two entwined snakes on a rod. The vase has been dated as early as 4000 to 3000 B.C. Other images cast into the vase include Ningizzida, who was the predecessor of the Egyption god Thor. Ninazu, who was called the "Lord of Healing" was the father of Ningizzida. Ningizzida may be the same as Babu who inturn is the Greek Hermes. Also, early illustrations of the "Babylonian Mother Goddess" who is identified as Ishtar, who inturn is associated with the Greek goddess Aphrodite had a caduceus in them. Sometimes a two headed snake is shown in association with a wooden rod. Aesculpius’ daughter or wife Hygia, the Greek demigoddess of health, is usually depicted with a serpent entwined and sometimes with an Aesculpius Staff. In Greece, the early caducei were figure 8 shaped, with the top circle opened. Snakes were added as early as the fifth century B.C. but remained unusual until the Middle Ages or the early Renaissance period.

In Greek mythology, we find the serpent guardian figure from Sumerian or Akkadian times. A great and wise serpent, called Ladon, guards the tree of the golden apples of the Hesperides. This mythic tree is guarded by an immense horned serpent which coils up around the tree, rising from a cave in the earth.(source)

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Apollo
In many early legends, all primordial serpents are derived from the Sumerian Arch-Serpent which dwelt in the subterranean waters, or chaos. In Greek legend, Apollo took over the Delphic oracle by killing a serpent already there, at the earth's navel. (source)
Python: Serpent killed by Apollo. It sprang from the stagnant waters left by the flood sent by Zeus in the age of
Deucalion. A son of Gaea who guarded the omphalos in Delphi. The Pythian Games were founded by Apollo in his
honor to appease the earth mother. (source)

Athena. She is known as a warrior Goddess as well as the Goddess of Wisdom; her symbol being the Serpent as displayed on her personal shield. (source) Her bird is the owl, also a symbol of wisdom.

(Source of the following)
"The Perseus myth was invented to explain the appearance of Gorgon Medusa's face, or mask, on Athena's shield and aegis, the image of Athena that was inherited from the pre-Hellenic period. It is not surprising to learn that the earliest images of Athena had a striking resemblance to the revered Cretan serpent-goddess-priestess. Although Athena changes, in art she is consistently associated with snakes as they appear on her shoulders and on her armor, along with Medusa's face as the central image.

The Perseus myth was also an attempt to conceal Athena's roots in the Libyan Amazon Serpent-Goddess-Trinity-Athene, (a deity that was also present in Minoan Crete). In pre-Hellenic myths Athena was said to have come from the uterus of Lake Tritonis, (meaning Three Queens), the same place that Medusa is said to have ruled, hunted and led troops in Athenian myth. The older myths are more specific, they say that Athene was born of the Three Queens of Libya themselves, the Triple Goddess, with Metis-Medusa as her destroyer aspect."

Gorgon
The Medusa Gorgon was the Goddess of Righteous Wrath. In some traditions she was a serpent of the Libyan Amazons and represented female wisdom. The Greek Daemons [daemonae] were the invisible divine beings which were assigned by Zeus to every god and every important human being as sort of a guardian angel creature to give good advice and lead them properly. The Daemons (from which, of course we get our word demon) could appear as a handsome young youth or as a wise serpent. (source)

A Goddess associated with the Serpent was the Greek Triple Goddess of the Moon, the Underworld and the
chthonic forces of the Earth Hecate, Her priestess in Greek mythology Medea.

Greek Philosophy
What were the links between Greek mythology and Greek philosophy? Why did the early philosophers like Thales (who was actually a Phoenician) suggest water as the "fundamental substance"? These questions can be addressed as part of written history.

more memory myths:
Egypt
Africa
China
Celtic
India
Norse
Mesoamerican
Judaic
return to main Memory Mythology page.