177 Fun Facts About Greek Mythology

Which god of dreams, a son of Sleep, visits sleepers in human form?

Morpheus; pharmacist Friedrich Sertürner named morphine after him because the drug brings on sleep.

Which bird, sacred to the goddess of wisdom, was stamped on the silver coins of ancient Athens?

The owl; the coins were so identified with it that Athenians simply called their silver tetradrachms glaukes, 'little owls'.

Which hero beheaded Medusa?

Perseus looked only at her reflection in a polished shield, then used her severed head, which could still turn onlookers to stone, as a weapon.

Who was the Greek god who ruled over the Underworld and the dead?

Hades drew the underworld when he and his two brothers cast lots for the world; later Greeks called him Plouton, 'the wealthy one', for the riches underground.

What type of creature was the Minotaur, famously confined in the Labyrinth?

Half-man, half-bull: its name means 'bull of Minos', and Athens had to send seven youths and seven maidens to Crete to feed it.

Which mountain, home of the Muses, rises above Apollo's oracle at Delphi?

Mount Parnassus; the Montparnasse district is named after it, a nickname from 17th-century students who went there to recite poetry.

Which goddess was associated with love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation?

Aphrodite, whose name Hesiod traced to aphros, 'sea foam', because she rose from the waves; modern scholars call that a folk etymology.

Who was the Greek god of the sea, earthquakes, and horses?

Poseidon; long before Homer, Bronze Age clay tablets from Pylos show he was that city's chief god.

Arrows bounced off which beast's golden fur, so Heracles strangled it and wore its pelt?

The Nemean Lion; Heracles could only skin it using one of the lion's own claws, then wore the pelt as armour.

What did Prometheus famously steal from the gods to give to humanity?

Fire, which he smuggled to humans hidden in a hollow fennel stalk; his punishment was an eagle eating his ever-regrowing liver.

Which Greek god was known as the divine blacksmith?

Hephaestus, in one telling, was cast off Olympus at birth by his own mother because he was lame.

Which goddess presided over agriculture, grain, and the harvest?

Demeter; while she grieved for her abducted daughter nothing would grow, a story often read as the origin of the seasons.

Which two sons of the Greek war god gave their names to the moons of Mars?

Phobos and Deimos, Fear and Dread; Eton science master Henry Madan suggested the names after Asaph Hall found the two moons.

Which aged king slipped into the Greek camp to beg Achilles for his dead son's body?

Priam; he kissed the hands of the man who had killed his son, and Achilles, moved to tears, gave back the body.

Which herald's staff, twined with two snakes, is often misused as a symbol of medicine?

The caduceus; its adoption as the US Army Medical Corps insignia popularised the mix-up with the one-snake Rod of Asclepius.

What kind of container held the world's evils in Hesiod, before translators turned it into a 'box'?

A pithos, a large storage jar; the 'box' is usually attributed to Erasmus, whose 16th-century Latin turned it into a pyxis.

In Greek myth, which ferryman rows the dead across the Styx, and only those buried with a coin to pay him?

Charon's fare is real archaeology: low-value coins known as Charon's obols have been found in or on the mouths of the dead in some burials.

Which Trojan hero carried his father Anchises out of the burning city?

Aeneas; he escaped to Italy, and Virgil's Aeneid made him the ancestor of the Roman people.

What was the name of the many-headed hound that guarded the gates of the Underworld?

Cerberus, usually shown with three heads; for his last labour Heracles had to overpower him without weapons and carry him out of the underworld.

Which Athenian hero ventured into the Labyrinth to defeat the Minotaur?

Theseus, with the help of Ariadne and her thread, navigated the Labyrinth and slew the beast, freeing Athens from the tribute of youths sent to Crete.

Which blind prophet of Thebes spent seven years living as a woman?

Tiresias; even among the dead he kept his prophetic powers, and Odysseus sails to the edge of the underworld to consult him.

Which snake-haired sisters could turn anyone who looked at them to stone?

Gorgons: only Medusa of the three was mortal, and after she was beheaded, her sisters chased her killer but couldn't see him under his cap of invisibility.

Who was the Greek god of wine, revelry, and ecstasy?

Dionysus was born twice: when his mortal mother Semele died while pregnant, Zeus sewed the unborn baby into his thigh until he was ready.

Which beautiful youth, beloved of a goddess, was killed by a wild boar while hunting?

Adonis; Greek women mourned him every year at the Adonia, and anemones were said to spring up where his blood fell.

Which Titan was known for bearing the sky on his shoulders as punishment?

He was made to stand at the western edge of the earth after the Titans lost their war with the Olympians, which is why the Atlantic Ocean and the Atlas Mountains carry his name.

Which monster of Greek myth was part lion, part goat and part serpent?

The Chimera's name now labels any creature made of mixed parts, and in biology an organism built from the cells of two embryos.

Who was the goddess of the rainbow and a messenger of the gods?

Iris; her name is simply the Greek word for rainbow, the same word later used for the coloured part of the eye and for the flower.

What was the name of the winged horse that sprang from Medusa's blood?

Pegasus; wherever his hoof struck the ground a spring burst out, including the Muses' Hippocrene, the 'horse spring', on Mount Helicon.

Who was the primordial deity representing the personification of the Earth?

Gaea, or Gaia; when Uranus hid their children away inside her, she made the sickle that one of her sons used to castrate him.

Which hero led the Argonauts in search of the Golden Fleece?

Jason's ship, the Argo, gave his crew their name; Medea later murdered their children after he abandoned her for a Corinthian princess.

Which Greek goddess of the hearth received the first offering at household sacrifices?

Hestia; for all that honour, some ancient lists of the twelve Olympians leave her out and seat another god instead.

Which king of Greek myth, who once chained up Death himself, was condemned to roll a boulder uphill for eternity?

Sisyphus chained up Thanatos so that nobody on earth could die; the boulder rolls back every time it nears the top, which Camus made a parable of absurd life.

What did the hero Odysseus use to trick the Cyclops Polyphemus?

Wine and a sharpened stake: Odysseus got Polyphemus drunk on strong wine, then drove a glowing-hot wooden stake into his eye.

What object, inscribed 'To the fairest', set off the quarrel among three goddesses that led to the Trojan War?

Eris, left off the guest list for the wedding of Thetis, threw the Golden Apple among the guests in anger.

Which goddess was the personification of victory and often depicted with wings?

Nike; the headless Winged Victory of Samothrace in the Louvre shows her alighting on the prow of a warship.

Which old friend of Odysseus did a goddess impersonate to guide his son Telemachus?

Mentor, whose name became the English word for a wise adviser and trusted guide.

Which Underworld river wiped the memories of any soul that drank from it?

Lethe means 'forgetting'; Ovid has the river flowing through the cave of Hypnos, god of sleep, where its murmur makes visitors drowsy.

Which Greek king offered his daughter Iphigenia as a sacrifice so his stranded fleet could sail for Troy?

Agamemnon; in Aeschylus, his wife Clytemnestra killed him on his return, partly in revenge for their daughter.

Which goddess of magic, witchcraft and necromancy is often shown with three faces or bodies?

Hecate, guardian of crossroads; each month on the night of the new moon, Greeks left food offerings for her known as 'Hecate's supper'.

What was the name of the monster that guarded the Golden Fleece?

The Colchian Dragon was said never to sleep, until Medea lulled it with magic and drugs so that the fleece could be taken.

Which instrument did Orpheus play so sweetly that even trees and rocks were said to dance?

The lyre; after Orpheus was killed, his head kept singing as it floated with the lyre down the river Hebrus and out to Lesbos.

What was the name of the first mortal woman, moulded from earth on the orders of the king of the gods?

Pandora; Hesiod says she was named for the gifts that every god on Olympus gave her before she was sent to punish mankind.

Which goddess was carried off to the Underworld to rule as queen of the dead?

Persephone ate pomegranate seeds before leaving, and because she had tasted the food of the dead she had to return for part of every year.

Which mythical nation's queen Penthesilea brought her warriors to help defend Troy?

Amazons: graves of women buried with weapons on the Eurasian steppe suggest Scythian warrior women likely inspired the myth.

Who killed his mother Clytemnestra to avenge his murdered father?

Orestes; hounded by the Furies for the killing, he was tried by a court of Athenians and acquitted when the votes tied.

Which nymph kept Odysseus on her island for seven years, hoping to marry him?

Calypso offered Odysseus immortality to stay on Ogygia, but the gods ordered his release, and she gave him the tools to build a boat.

Which Titan swallowed his own children at birth to head off a prophecy that one would overthrow him?

Cronus was tricked into swallowing a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes instead of his youngest son, who later made him vomit up the others.

What was the name of the beautiful youth who fell in love with his own reflection?

Narcissus, in the best-known telling, wasted away beside the pool, and a flower bearing his name was all that remained.

What punishment did the goddess of grain inflict on Erysichthon of Thessaly for felling her sacred grove?

Insatiable hunger: nothing could fill Erysichthon, so he kept selling his shape-shifting daughter Mestra for food and finally ate himself.

What does Hesiod's Theogony say came into being first of all?

Chaos, which to Hesiod meant a yawning gap or void; the sense of utter confusion arrived in English only around 1600.

Which bronze man guarded Crete by hurling boulders at approaching ships?

Talos; his life ran through a single vein of ichor, and Medea's magic made it give way so that he bled to death.

Which god lulled the hundred-eyed watchman guarding Io to sleep and then killed him?

Hermes, sent by Zeus, charmed the watchman to sleep with music and stories, then killed him to free Io.

In Ovid, which tree of mourning did a youth loved by Apollo become after killing his tame stag?

Cypress: Cyparissus had struck the stag by accident with his hunting javelin as it slept, and his grief turned him into the tree.

Which blissful afterlife realm for heroes gave its name to a famous French avenue?

Elysium; the Champs-Élysées is French for the Elysian Fields, the paradise reserved for dead heroes.

In Sophocles' play, which woman defied King Creon by burying her brother Polynices?

Antigone; sentenced to be buried alive, she hanged herself in her tomb, and Creon's son, her fiancé, then killed himself.

The twin giants Otus and Ephialtes held which Olympian in a bronze jar for thirteen months?

Ares; he would have perished in the jar had the twins' stepmother Eriboea not tipped off the messenger god, who rescued him.

In Ovid, the hospitable Baucis and Philemon became which pair of trees at death?

An oak and a linden: the couple asked that the same hour take them both, so after hosting two disguised gods they became trees side by side.

At which Cretan palace did Arthur Evans dig up ruins he linked to the legendary Labyrinth?

Knossos; Evans named the whole Bronze Age civilisation of Crete 'Minoan' after the legendary King Minos.

Alcestis volunteered to die in place of which king of Pherae, her husband?

Admetus; his guest Heracles wrestled Death at her tomb and brought Alcestis back, though she could not speak for three days.

Which Arcadian nymph was turned into a bear and later set among the stars as Ursa Major?

Callisto; when her son Arcas nearly speared her while hunting, Zeus set them both among the stars, and a moon of Jupiter bears her name.

In later tellings, the ever-ageing immortal Tithonus became which creature?

A cicada: Eos asked Zeus to make Tithonus immortal but forgot to ask for eternal youth, so he withered while living on forever.

Which winged monsters kept snatching the food of the blind king Phineus until the Argonauts arrived?

The Harpies, whose name means 'snatchers'; the flying sons of Boreas, the North Wind, finally chased them away.

The infant Erichthonius was hidden in a box entrusted to the daughters of which early king of Athens?

Cecrops's daughters were told never to open it; those who peeked saw a snake coiled around the baby, went mad and leapt from the Acropolis.

Heracles performed his twelve labours in the service of which king of Mycenae?

Eurystheus, so frightened of Heracles after his first labour that he hid in a bronze jar and sent every later order through a herald.

Whose stables did Heracles have to clean in a single day as one of his labours?

King Augeas promised Heracles a tenth of his cattle, but after the hero rerouted two rivers through the stables, he refused to pay.

Which nephew helped Heracles defeat the Lernaean Hydra by burning its neck stumps?

Iolaus scorched each neck stump with a torch so no new heads could grow, but his help later got the labour discounted.

Whose belt did Heracles have to obtain as one of his labours?

Hippolyta offered the belt freely, but a disguised goddess spread word that Heracles was abducting her, and her warriors attacked his ship.

On which island did Circe turn most of Odysseus's crew into swine?

Aeaea, where the herb moly let Odysseus resist Circe's potion and force her to restore his men; he then stayed a year.

How did Odysseus manage to hear the Sirens' song and survive?

He was bound to the mast on Circe's advice, and when the song made him beg to be freed, his wax-deafened crew only tied him tighter.

Which sea-swallowing whirlpool monster sat across a narrow strait from Scylla?

Charybdis swallowed the sea three times a day, so Odysseus hugged Scylla's side instead and lost six men rather than his whole ship.

Penelope stalled her suitors by secretly unravelling a burial shroud meant for which of Odysseus's relatives?

His father Laertes: for three years she wove by day and unpicked by night, until a maid betrayed the trick to the 108 suitors.

What false name did Odysseus give the Cyclops Polyphemus?

Nobody: when the blinded Cyclops bellowed that Nobody was hurting him, the other Cyclopes decided nothing was wrong and left.

Which loyal animal recognised Odysseus on his return to Ithaca after twenty years?

Argos was lying neglected in piles of manure, but dropped his ears and wagged his tail.

In the Odyssey, who gave Odysseus an ox-hide bag of winds that his crew opened too soon?

Aeolus; nearly home, the crew opened the bag, and the escaping winds drove the ship all the way back to his island.

What effect did the food of the Lotus-eaters have on those who ate it?

Sleepy, peaceful apathy: the crewmen who ate the lotus lost all wish to go home, and Odysseus dragged them weeping back to the ships.

Which Trojan priestess was fated by Apollo to speak true prophecies that no one believed?

Cassandra; in the usual telling she spurned Apollo after he gave her the gift of prophecy, so he made sure no one would ever believe her.

Which Trojan priest and his sons were killed by serpents after warning against the horse?

Laocoön, who warned 'I fear Greeks, even bearing gifts'; after the serpents killed him and his sons, the Trojans pulled the horse inside.

Which Trojan prince killed Patroclus, who was fighting in Achilles' armour?

Hector, who stripped Achilles' armour from Patroclus's body and later put it on himself to rally the Trojans.

Who finally killed Achilles near the end of the Trojan War, according to most sources?

Paris, with an arrow guided by Apollo; the Iliad ends before Achilles dies and only foretells his death.

Achilles was the son of the Nereid Thetis and which king of Phthia?

Peleus, who won the sea nymph by holding on while she turned into fire, water, a lioness and a serpent to escape him.

Which three goddesses did Paris judge in the divine beauty contest?

Hera, Aphrodite and Athena each offered Paris a bribe; Aphrodite won by promising him Helen, the most beautiful woman alive, which started the Trojan War.

Menelaus, whose wife Helen fled to Troy, was king of which city?

Sparta: Menelaus won Helen after every suitor swore to defend her marriage, so when she fled, they all had to go to war.

Helen of Troy was said to be the daughter of Zeus and which mortal queen?

Leda, who in the most familiar account laid an egg from which Helen hatched.

Which son of Zeus shared his immortality with his mortal twin, so they take turns on Olympus and in the underworld?

Pollux: when Castor was killed, he begged Zeus to let his brother share his immortality, and the twins became the stars of Gemini.

Which king of Thebes unknowingly killed his father Laius and married his mother?

Oedipus, who won the throne by solving the Sphinx's riddle, then blinded himself with his mother's brooches when the truth came out.

Whose boast of outshining the Nereids led to Andromeda being offered to a sea monster?

Cassiopeia, who was set among the stars on her throne, spending half her time hanging upside down.

On which island did Dionysus find and marry Ariadne after she was abandoned there?

Naxos, where Dionysus later set Ariadne's wedding crown in the sky as the constellation Corona Borealis.

Why did King Aegeus of Athens kill himself?

His son's ship came home with a black sail: the victorious prince forgot to hoist white, and Aegeus, believing him dead, leapt to his death, in one version into the sea later called the Aegean.

Medea was the daughter of which king?

Aeëtes, who set a visiting hero to yoke flame-breathing oxen and plough a field with them.

The Golden Fleece came from a winged ram named Chrysomallos that rescued whom?

Phrixus rode the ram to safety, but his sister Helle fell off on the way and gave the Hellespont its name.

Orpheus is said to have met his death at the hands of whom?

Maenads tore him to pieces, enraged that while mourning Eurydice he had spurned them.

Besides the Labyrinth, Daedalus built a wooden cow for whom?

Pasiphaë, queen of Crete, hid inside it to mate with the creature she had been cursed to desire, and bore the Minotaur.

King Midas of the golden touch ruled which kingdom?

Phrygia; he was later cursed with donkey's ears, and his barber, bursting to tell someone, whispered the secret into a hole in the ground.

In Ovid, the mortal Arachne challenged which goddess to a weaving contest?

Minerva, Athena to the Greeks, ripped up Arachne's tapestry of the gods' misdeeds, and when the weaver hanged herself, turned her into a spider.

Actaeon was turned into a stag and killed by his hounds after seeing which goddess bathe?

Artemis: in Ovid, Actaeon stumbles on her bath purely by chance, yet she punishes him all the same.

Zeus abducted the Phoenician princess Europa while disguised as which animal?

A bull: Europa climbed onto the tame white bull's back and it swam off with her to Crete, a scene still shown on Greece's 2-euro coin.

Ganymede was carried off by an eagle to serve the gods in what role?

Zeus's cup-bearer; to make up for taking the boy, Zeus gave his father, King Tros, the finest horses under the sun.

Which hero fell to earth trying to fly his winged horse up to Mount Olympus?

Bellerophon; Zeus sent a gadfly to sting the horse, and in one version the fallen hero ended his days blind, wandering alone.

Which Muse gave her name to the steam organ of old circus parades?

Calliope was said to be the mother of Orpheus, whose singing moved even the rulers of the underworld to let his dead wife go.

Which of the three Fates spun the thread of life?

Clotho; when Tantalus cooked his son Pelops and served him to the gods, she is said to have brought the boy back to life.

Which three names did Virgil give the Furies (Erinyes)?

Alecto, Megaera and Tisiphone; Greeks also called them by the flattering name Eumenides, 'the gracious ones'.

The nymphs called the Hesperides tended an orchard in the far west belonging to which goddess?

Hera; the trees had been a wedding present, and a never-sleeping dragon, Ladon, was set to guard their fruit.

In Hesiod's Theogony, the three Cyclopes forged what for Zeus?

His thunderbolt: Zeus had freed the Cyclopes from their prison beneath the earth, and they gave him the weapon out of gratitude.

Which three brothers, each with fifty heads, did Zeus free to fight on his side?

The Hecatoncheires, or Hundred-Handers; in the war for heaven they hurled three hundred rocks, one after another, at Zeus's enemies.

Which Titaness saved her newborn son by handing her husband a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes to swallow?

Rhea; she hid the baby on Crete, where warriors beat their spears on their shields so his father could not hear him cry.

Which monstrous serpentine giant tried to overthrow Zeus for supremacy of the cosmos?

Typhon; in most accounts, Zeus finally defeated him and trapped him for ever beneath Sicily's Mount Etna.

Which serpent, slain by Apollo, presided over the oracle at Delphi?

Python; Delphi's old name, Pytho, was said to come from the Greek for 'to rot', after the stench of the serpent's corpse, and gave the Pythia her title.

Which seven sisters, pursued by the hunter Orion, did Zeus turn into stars?

The Pleiades; Japan calls the star cluster Subaru, which is why the carmaker's badge shows six of its stars.

Which centaur taught the healer Asclepius the art of medicine?

Chiron; though a master healer, he could not cure his own wound from a poisoned arrow, and he gave up his immortality so he could die.

Nemesis personified retribution for which specific sin?

Hubris; Pausanias says her statue at Rhamnus was carved from marble the Persians had brought with them to make a trophy of their expected victory.

Which deep abyss served as the prison for the Titans?

Tartarus; Hesiod says a bronze anvil dropped from the earth would fall for nine nights and days before reaching it.

In Greek myth, Tantalus stands forever in a pool beneath a fruit tree whose branches did what whenever he reached up?

The fruit always eluded his grasp and the water receded whenever he bent to drink, which is where the word 'tantalise' comes from.

What eternal task were the Danaïdes condemned to perform?

Carrying water in a sieve, the punishment for murdering their husbands on their wedding night; only one of the fifty sisters spared hers.

Why did Zeus make the gods swear their oaths by Styx?

She sided with him against the Titans, arriving first with her children, and any god who broke an oath sworn on her lay breathless for a year.

Meleager died when his mother Althaea threw what into the fire?

A log tied to his life: the Fates said he would live until it burned, so she snatched it from the fire and hid it, then burned it after he killed her brothers.

Niobe's children were slain by the twin archer gods at the command of which goddess?

Leto was stung because Niobe had boasted that she was more blessed in children than Leto, who had borne only two.

The bandit Procrustes forced travellers to fit what?

An iron bed: he stretched guests who were too short and cut the legs off those too tall, which is why brutal one-size-fits-all rules are called Procrustean.

Apollo accidentally killed his beloved Hyacinthus while they were doing what?

Throwing the discus; in one version the jealous west wind Zephyrus blew it off course, and the hyacinth flower sprang from the youth's blood.

Fleeing Apollo, Daphne was transformed into which tree?

Laurel is 'daphne' in Greek, and Apollo made its leaves his emblem, which is why poets and victors have been crowned with laurel wreaths ever since.

Which satyr challenged Apollo to a music contest and lost his hide and his life?

Marsyas; after Apollo flayed him alive, the tears of those who mourned him were said to form a river that bears his name.

Which legendary Phoenician was the founder of Boeotian Thebes?

Cadmus; Herodotus credits him with bringing the Phoenician alphabet to the Greeks, who adapted it into their own letters.

Which god has the hindquarters, legs and horns of a goat?

Pan; his angry shouts when disturbed were said to strike sudden terror in lonely places, which is where the word 'panic' comes from.

According to Daedalus, what happens to Icarus's wings if he flies too close to the Sun?

The wax melts, and it did: Icarus flew too high, lost his feathers and drowned in the sea still called the Icarian Sea.

How did Zeus's wife punish the chatty nymph who shielded his lovers?

She could only repeat others' last words: the nymph was Echo, and after a youth spurned her she wasted away until only her voice remained.

Which huntress made her suitors race her for her hand, until Hippomenes won by distracting her with a goddess's gifts?

Atalanta; beaten suitors were put to death, and after the wedding the couple were turned into lions for making love in a sacred precinct.

In Ovid, the sculptor Pygmalion carved the woman he fell in love with from which material?

Ivory; once the statue came to life, the myth went on to inspire Shaw's play Pygmalion and, through it, the musical My Fair Lady.

The only full ancient telling of Cupid and Psyche appears in which 2nd-century work by Apuleius?

Metamorphoses, better known as The Golden Ass, a comic novel whose narrator is accidentally turned into a donkey by a spell gone wrong.

What did the princess Ariadne hand the hero entering the Labyrinth so that he could find his way out?

A ball of thread was once called a 'clew', and this myth is why 'clue' now means anything that guides you through a puzzle.

Later legend says Achilles's mother dipped him in the Styx as a baby, leaving which body part unprotected?

Heel: she held him by it, so the water never touched it. The tale first survives in a Roman poem written in the first century AD, long after Homer.

In the riddle of the Sphinx, which creature goes on four feet, then two, and finally three?

A human crawls as a baby, walks upright as an adult and leans on a stick in old age. The Sphinx killed and ate every traveller to Thebes who failed to work that out.

Leading his wife Eurydice up from the Underworld, what did Orpheus do that lost her for ever?

Looked back at her: the one condition of her release was that he walk ahead and not turn round until both reached the upper world. He turned at the very threshold.

Eating the seeds of which fruit tied the harvest goddess's kidnapped daughter to the Greek Underworld?

Pomegranate seeds eaten in the land of the dead meant she had to go back there for part of every year, which is how the Greeks explained the seasons.

Which animal's ears did King Midas grow after he took the losing side in a divine music contest?

Donkey ears were his penalty. He hid them under a turban until his barber whispered the secret into a hole in the ground, and the reeds that grew there told everyone.

Which creatures did the baby Heracles strangle in his cradle after a jealous goddess sent them to kill him?

Two snakes slid into the nursery when, in one telling, he was eight months old. His twin brother cried, but Heracles grabbed one in each hand and was found playing with them like toys.

Chained to a rock for defying Zeus, Prometheus had which organ torn out by an eagle day after day?

His liver grew back every night, so the torture never ended. The Greeks chose well: the liver is the only internal organ that can regenerate.

What did the slayer of Medusa watch her reflection in so that he never met her gaze directly?

A polished shield lent by a goddess let him strike while looking only at the reflection. Even cut off, the head could still turn onlookers to stone.

Which feature of the night sky was made, Greek myth says, when a goddess pushed away the baby Heracles?

The Milky Way was her spilled milk, and the idea stuck: the word 'galaxy' comes from gala, the Greek for milk.

From which part of Zeus's body did the goddess Athena spring, fully grown and dressed in armour?

His head had to be split with an axe to let her out, after he swallowed her pregnant mother for fear of a child who would overthrow him.

Which food of Homer's gods shares its name with a marshmallow fruit salad from the American South?

Ambrosia means 'immortality' in Greek. In Homer a goddess even uses it as a beauty treatment, stripping the years from Penelope while she sleeps.

After the hundred-eyed watchman of Greek myth was slain, a goddess set his eyes in which bird's tail?

Peacock tails keep his hundred eyes as a tribute to a faithful servant. In another telling, the goddess turned the whole watchman into the bird.

Io, Europa and Ganymede, each seduced or carried off by the same Greek god, now name moons of which planet?

Jupiter is the Roman name of that god, Zeus. The astronomer Simon Marius named the moons after his conquests on a suggestion from Johannes Kepler.

Which marble temple crowning the Acropolis of Athens housed a giant gold-and-ivory statue of the city's patron goddess?

The Parthenon takes its name from parthenos, Greek for 'maiden', a title of Athena. Centuries later it became a church dedicated to another virgin, Mary.

Which gift to the city won Athena the patronage of Athens over a rival god's salt-water spring?

An olive tree beat the salt spring because it brought wood, oil and food, and it became a symbol of Athenian prosperity.

In Greek myth, what power did the cap belonging to the god of the Underworld give its wearer?

Invisibility let the slayer of Medusa slip away from her vengeful sisters in some stories. The cap's Greek name means 'dog-skin'.

Which boy lost control of his father's sun chariot and scorched the earth until Zeus struck him down?

Phaethon had asked to drive it for a single day and could not hold the horses, swinging too close to the earth and burning it, or too far away and freezing it.

In one well-known telling, which creature killed the mighty hunter Orion and joined him among the stars?

A scorpion was sent after he threatened to kill every beast on earth. The story explains why the constellations Orion and Scorpius are never in the sky at the same time.

In early Greek art the Sirens were shown as women joined to which creatures, not the fish of later legend?

Birds with women's heads, feathers and scaly feet were the original Sirens. The fish-tailed mermaid version only became the familiar one in the medieval period.

The seated Statue of Zeus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, stood at which Greek sanctuary?

Olympia was the home of the Olympic Games, held in his honour. The geographer Strabo wrote that if the 12-metre seated god ever stood up he would take the temple roof off.

The two headlands that the Greeks called the Pillars of Heracles flank the entrance to which strait?

Gibraltar and its famous Rock form the European pillar. Renaissance tradition said the pair carried the warning 'Ne plus ultra', nothing further beyond.

Hidden in a cave from his child-eating father, the infant Zeus was usually said to be raised on which animal's milk?

A goat fed him, and its horn became the 'horn of Amalthea', better known by its Latin name: the cornucopia, a magical horn that poured out endless food and drink.

Which winged Greek god of love is wrongly named as the statue in London's Piccadilly Circus?

Eros is what Londoners call it, but the figure on the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain was made as his brother Anteros, chosen to stand for selfless love.

Which king of Crete forced Athens to send seven youths and seven maidens to feed the monster in his Labyrinth?

Minos demanded the tribute in revenge for the death of his son Androgeus. After his own death he became one of the three judges of the dead in the underworld.

In the best-known version, Zeus turned King Lycaon of Arcadia into which animal for serving him human flesh?

A wolf in Greek is lykos, the root of 'lycanthropy', the werewolf's condition. In one telling the meal was the king's own son, cooked to test whether the god really knew everything.

Which Greek god of sleep, twin brother of Death, lived where the rays of the sun never reached?

Hypnos is the origin of the word 'hypnosis'. He and his twin Thanatos shared a home in the underworld.

Which goddess of strife, the one deity not invited, started a quarrel at the wedding of Achilles's parents?

Eris kept her talent for discord: the dwarf planet named after her looked bigger than Pluto, which pushed astronomers into defining 'planet' and demoting Pluto.

How did King Midas finally rid himself of the golden touch that had turned even his food to metal?

Washing in a river, the Pactolus, carried the power away. The tale explained a real marvel: its sands held the gold and silver alloy used to mint the first coins.

How did Thetis hide her young son Achilles on Skyros to keep him out of a fated war?

Dressed as a girl among the king's daughters, he gave himself away when Odysseus set out weapons among the gifts and sounded a trumpet: only one 'princess' reached for a weapon.

Which Greek warrior, second only to Achilles, killed himself after losing the contest for that hero's armour?

Ajax lost the armour to the smoother-talking Odysseus and killed himself out of shame. Amsterdam's famous football club is named after him.

What did the three Graeae, the grey-haired sisters robbed by the slayer of Medusa, share between them?

A single eye, and a single tooth as well, which they took turns using. The hero seized the eye and would not give it back until they told him what he needed to know.

Which cave-dwelling creature, half fair maiden and half snake, bore many of Greek myth's most famous monsters?

Echidna may have given her name to Australia's spiny anteater, an egg-laying mammal that seemed to mix mammal and reptile just as she mixed woman and snake.

After Zeus's great flood, what did Deucalion and Pyrrha throw over their shoulders to make new people?

Stones solved an oracle's riddle: told to throw 'the bones of your mother' behind them, the couple worked out that their mother was the earth and her bones its rocks.

What gift from his wife Deianeira, stained with the blood of a dying centaur, killed Heracles?

A shirt smeared with that blood burned him so terribly that he built his own funeral pyre and threw himself on it. A 'shirt of Nessus' still means a fatal present.

The phrase 'halcyon days' comes from the Greek myth of Alcyone, who was turned into which bird?

Kingfisher is alkyon in Greek. The halcyon days were the calm spell around midwinter, when the winds were held back so that she could nest on the shore.

Which goddess of the dawn secured immortality for her lover Tithonus but not eternal youth?

Eos is the 'rosy-fingered' dawn of Homer's epics, named for the colours of the sky at daybreak. The Romans knew her as Aurora.

In what form did Zeus reach the princess Danaë after her father locked her in a bronze chamber?

A rain of gold streamed through the roof of the underground chamber where her father had shut her away to cheat a prophecy.

Penelope promised to marry the suitor who could string Odysseus's bow and shoot through twelve what?

Axe heads, set up in a row. None of the suitors could even string the bow; the stranger who managed it was Odysseus himself in disguise.

What noisy tool did Heracles use to scare the man-eating Stymphalian birds into the air?

A rattle made by the smith god did the job. The birds were worth fearing: bronze beaks, metal feathers they could launch at their victims, and poisonous dung.

In Greek legend, Leander drowned while swimming which strait by night to visit his lover Hero?

The Hellespont, now the Dardanelles, divides Europe from Asia. The story inspired Lord Byron to swim across it himself in May 1810.

Which soldiers commanded by Achilles in Homer's Iliad began, in Ovid's telling, as worker ants?

Myrmidons were said to be as fierce and hardy as ants, and intensely loyal to their leader. The Greeks read the name as 'ant-people', from their word for an ant-nest.

The Titaness Mnemosyne, who bore the nine Muses to Zeus, was the goddess of what?

Memory is mnēmē in Greek, the root of her name. Zeus came to her disguised as a shepherd for nine nights running, one night for each daughter.

Which mortal woman became the mother of Heracles after Zeus persuaded her that he was her husband?

Alcmene was visited on a night that Zeus stretched to three times its length by ordering the sun not to rise.

Which king was bound to an ever-spinning fiery wheel for trying to seduce the wife of Zeus?

Ixion never touched her: Zeus shaped a cloud in her likeness to trap him, and from that union the Centaurs descended.

What did the Argonauts release between the Clashing Rocks to judge how fast they would have to row?

A dove got through with only its tail feathers clipped. The crew then rowed for their lives and lost just part of the ship's stern ornament.

Which Phaeacian princess found the shipwrecked Odysseus on the shore while washing clothes with her maids?

Nausicaa gave the castaway clothes and led him to the edge of her town. Hayao Miyazaki named the heroine of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind after her.

The omphalos stone at Delphi marked the spot where Zeus's two eagles met; what does its Greek name mean?

Navel: the Greeks believed Delphi was the centre of the world, the point where birds released from its two ends crossed paths.

Which German businessman began digging at Hisarlik in 1870, convinced that Homer's cities were real?

Schliemann dug down through layer upon layer of buried cities there, but his trenching is blamed for wrecking much of the very layer he was looking for.

What name did the Greeks give the ethereal fluid that ran in the veins of their gods instead of blood?

Ichor has this divine meaning only twice in Homer's Iliad: it is what flows when a mortal hero spears a goddess in the hand.