#ancient greek mythology
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wukyma · 3 days ago
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Helios, who made himself so bright mortals can't look at him for more than a few seconds
The bunch of 2nd graders having a 'who-can-stare-at-the-sun-the-longest' competition:
Everything above except the second graders are Ody and Eury trying to prove a point ✨️👁👁
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AND YOU GOT HIS DESIGN SO WELL OMG I ADOREEEEE IT (chill is occasional, sunburn is eternal)
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FRIEND. BUDDY. you're living in my inbox atp 😭 seriously you've thrown infinitely fun ideas in there, I'm SO upset about being constantly busy rn and not able to do at least some scribbles... BUT I'LL GET TO IT PROMISE. also your cute furballs disappeared into the Tumblr fog. Drop 'em again if you still want a hamster post lmao
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sarafangirlart · 22 hours ago
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Some of y’all would ship Odysseus with anybody except his fucking wife whom he went to hell and back to return to.
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kurzler · 16 hours ago
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in my opinion, many modern greek retellings/stories inspired by greek mythology don't fail because they're inaccurate. they fail because they have nothing new to say.
i don't mind changes to the original myths, as long as they make sense and they have a narrative purpose! i understand that making changes is sometimes necessary to convey a certain narrative, especially to modern audiences.
is epic the musical mythologically accurate? hell no! but the changes serve to tell a specific story and to convey a certain message. also, epic the musical is self aware about its "inaccuracies". and the music just bangs.
is hadestown accurate? no! does it make the change that I always dread, removing the kidnapping from the hades/persephone myth? yeah. but hadestown is barely about them, and it uses greek mythology as a "narrative frame" to tell a certain story. it has a point. it has a message.
what are stories like lore olympus trying to say? what is the messagge of the hundredth persephone/hades retelling? what are we supposed to take from them? "don't listen to your mother she's a bitch"? "mothers are irrational and you should forsake her for a man"? very feminist.
why are we still doing the medusa "feminist" retellings? it's BEEN done. too many times. and they're ALL the same. it's a worse crime than being bad: they are boring.
i'm tired of retellings that are just "what if this very famous story was THE OPPOSITE and the protagonist was an ASSHOLE the whole time and the villain was MISUNDERSTOOD and the real VICTIM" okay but why. why would that be the case. what's the point of the story you want to tell. or do you just want to use shock value.
of course, i dislike retellings that are so different from the myth that they go AGAINST the spirit/message of the original, because in that case what's even the point of retelling the myth? just tell an original story. but i would take stabbed poseidon and capitalist hades any day over the same basic story of medusa being a girlboss or demeter being bad because of... reasons?
tl;dr: stop being unoriginal and tell a good story. or at least an entertaining one. i beg you
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cosmicdandeli0n · 1 day ago
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"It's cuz you're beautiful, you say you're 'numb' inside, but I can't agree."
I stayed up to finish this, appreciate it or I'll cryO(-(
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fairytalkersial · 3 days ago
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OK, but hear me out. What if ?
Achilles: Hello beautiful. How do you feel about coming home with me and taking me in my bed ?
Patroclus: Baby, as much as I would love to, I don't want to die killed by your mother. Especially while doing this.
Achilles: Honey, we don't have to worry about her anymore.
Patroclus, fearing what kind of trouble Achilles got himself into this time: Achilles, be a good boy, and tell me why.
Achilles, bitting his lower lip: Well, you see...
A few hours earlier:
Achilles: So, the three of you are in a beauty context to win a gods damn apple ?
Aphrodite: It's golden.
Athena: It's mostly for honour than because it's golden.
Aphrodite: Talk for yourself.
Athena: I am.
Hera: Not that you mortals understand it. Just choose. It's not that hard.
Achilles: I'll have you know I'm a... You know what, never mind. What do I win in that exactly ?
Athena: If you choose me, I'll give you the best army in the world.
Hera: If you choose me, I'll give you the best marriage.
Aphrodite: If you choose me, I will give you the love of the most beautiful women in the world.
Achilles: Lady, Menelas is like a little brother to me, and I absolutely DO NOT want his wife.
Aphrodite: Who do you want then ?
Achilles: Technically, I already have them. My mother is the problem. She doesn't like them.
Aphrodite: I can fix it easily.
Achilles: Now we are talking !
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blvvdk3ep · 1 year ago
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I love you people going into "useless" fields I love you classics majors I love you cultural studies majors I love you comparative literature majors I love you film studies majors I love you near eastern religions majors I love you Greek, Latin, and Hebrew majors I love you ethnic studies I love you people going into any and all small field that isn't considered lucrative in our rotting capitalist society please never stop keeping the sacred flame of knowledge for the sake of knowledge and understanding humanity and not merely for the sake of money alive
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deliajackson · 3 days ago
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There are a few things that I disagree here:
"Riordan’s telling isn’t more or less valid than anyone else’s. And his version of the story doesn’t invalidate anyone else’s. If anything, Riordan fits perfectly into the millennia long tradition of remixing and adapting old myths into something new. He’s doing the exact same thing as Hesiod, Homer, and countless other forgotten storytellers of yore, who wove fantastic tales about heroes and gods (and often added their own spin). In this way, Riordan is authentically within the ancient tradition. His take isn't wrong—it's just different, and adapted to a modern, young audience."
Riordan is not a writer of Greek Mythology (an epic poem, nor a ancient play). Riordan is a writer of a children book based on a real culture. His version of the story is not as valid as the ones wrote by Sophocles, Euripedes, nor Homer. The tales of Old, are deeply coonected with the ancient philosophy and cultural roots of Greece, not only that, but with the religious practices they were connected.
Of course, you have satires like "The Dialogue of the Gods" that shouldnt be read as myth, or a dramaturgy like Aristophanes. But even Aristophanes is based on the customs and beliefs of ancient Hellas.
So yes. His version is invalid and shouldnt be a source of mythology. This kinda reminds me of Miller apologism for TSOA and Circe.
The same way people can be pissed about not having their cultural properly respected, greek people and people who enjoys the classics have the right to criticize Rick for his choice.
Even Kane Chronicles was a nightmare on itself for what I have seen from the criticism, making Isis be british and the only egytian person be ignorant from the modern world when she lived in modern Cairo.
"So, this is the first major misconception addressed—that there is no canon, no correct version of the myths, and that storytellers were not only allowed to add their own spin, but expected. None of Rick’s changed would have been perceived as abnormal, incorrect, or in any way inappropriate. He is perfectly within the poetic tradition."
As long as we are talking about ancient greek poets, who lived millenia ago, yes, there is no real valid version.
You cant say that Homer is the right version of the Odyssey because you dont like the Apollodoros or Hesiods version of it. Both are part of ancient tales, that many historians and Archeologists worked hard to rescue and study.
On the other hand, you can not say that Riordan/Miller/Jessie Burton/Natalie Heynes between other are as valid as the ancient sources. There is no deeper resource, the entire story is changed to fit an American view of the ancient gods, and were written by american people.
There is no deeper phylophical take on that other than "the gods are bad" or "the gods are only people with too much power."
Is not liked to religious practices
Was written in the XXI century
It is not a part of the greek culture.
It is a fanfiction. That is what it is. You can enjoy it and love it, but still respect that is not a myth and that it isnt valid as such. If everyone could write a story of the greek pantheon and call it as something as valid as any other version of myths and call it a day, "the greek mythology" wouldnt have been the basis of entire religious practices in the first place. The myths have purposes, even if they differed in Ancient times, their purposes remains the same: explain the Cosmos and natural law. The punishment for hybris/hubris and why is that bad. The good life for a human is being part of a society and helping it to envolve. The Black death. The search for glory. Between many other aspects that were important back then.
I am studying that for a few months now, but I believe @katerinaaqu can make a better answer to that.
HOW RICK PORTRAYED THE GREEK GODS AND WHY IT WAS SO IMPORTANT
So people are going to notice that a lot of my complaints aren't just in PJO but extend to media portraying Greek Myths in general. But I want to focus on Percy Jackson and not other media, so I'm going to focus on Percy Jackson and not other media.
Starting off.................
The way Rick portrayed the Greek Gods was important because PJO was the most read book series that heavily centered around Greek Mythology he pretty much destroyed their images at the time.
There's an entire anti Percy Jackson tag as well as an anti PJO tag for you to scroll through to see how Rick Riordan portrayal of the Greek Gods was terrible. Be my guest and treat yourself to it. Search it up.
There are also people like @alatismeni-theitsa, @margaretkart and @katerinaaqu to ask for correct information on Greek Mythology. So be their guest too.
Today, we have PJO fans running around having incorrect perceptions of the gods and flinging hate and abuse at the real Greek Gods while Greeks and Hellenistic Pagans have to suffer through all this bullshit.
The torture is REAL. Just ask them.
I mean, you have people claiming that they are the CHILDREN of VIRGIN GODDESSES.
Artemis, Athena, Hera and Hestia don't have any demigod children.
If you really want to, call yourself their chosen champion. Not their child. It's disrespectful to Greek culture and religion to do otherwise.
Rick Riordan read about and taught Greek Myths in school, so he must have read the actual versions of the myths.
And knowing these, he decided to twist them into his terrible, inferior, crappy versions.
That man literally wrote Hephaestus, a rapist, as a poor guy trying to get a girl, oh, he's so sad and pathetic, and Athena's such a mean bitch for not accepting his advances even if she doesn't want it!
I'm not joking.................and I don't have words for this. I just don't.
Riordan doesn't really have any tact, does he? None at all.
And no, Greek people and Hellenistic Pagans cannot get away from these horrible portrayals, because there are too many Percy Jackson fans clogging up the Greek God tags with their Rick Riordan written PJO versions of the gods, which is kind of terrible for the Hellenistics who just want to be able to read devotional things about their gods and other people who just want to read about real Greek Mythology, not Percy Jackson. And this happens in real life, too. I mean, people using PJO as a substitute for real Greek Mythology.
Pro tip for PJO tumblr users: if you're typing about a god, use the Greek God PJO tag, like PJO Apollo or PJO Aphrodite, not just Apollo or Aphrodite, ok? Thanks for reading this.
There are many common misconceptions about Greek Mythology due to Percy Jackson. So, if you're not sure about something, please search it up on verified academic websites or ask real people-you can do this online too.
Now I am aware that Rick has the creative license to portray Greek Gods however he wants-
but let us as educated people all be aware of the fact that we should not always take portrayals of the Greek Gods in modern media depicting them seriously and if you want to read up on the actual gods, then read the myths and the Odyssey, Iliad etc.
Now, to name another shockingly appalling writing choice-
In the very first book, WW2 is atrociously used as a plot point
Yes, that's right-Rick Riordan, beloved author of a bestselling franchise for children and adults alike, reduces WW2, one of the most bloody and complex conflicts in history with a multitude of a reasons for its existence, to a fight between fictional demigods of the Big Three simply to have a reason for the Big 3 not to have children.
Do you know how serious this is? Do you actually know how bad this is, though?
Millions of people even today are affected by the WW2 due to generational trauma and abusive parents. WW2 killed millions of soldiers and civilians alike, and the Holocaust was so horrible that some people would faint just reading about what happened.
I will not go into the bloody, gory details here, but if you still don't believe this, go search up WW2 and Holocaust torture and treatment of Jews and other minorities as well.
Jews today still have gaping holes in their family trees because of it. And to have Rick Riordan portray it in such a callous way, to make a literal Greek God sire war criminals in modern history, when there were other methods he could have used to intertwine the mythological world and demigods and history.........it makes you wonder what was running through his mind at the time.
There were so many other ways he could have portrayed the prophecy-make it so that Big 3 children were constantly causing natural disasters and fictional wars in the mythological world, not the real world, and constantly dividing the cabins at CHB. Maybe they had their own war parallel to WW2. There were so many ways to do this- and none of them had to do what was ultimately done.
PJO WWII IS THE ULTIMATE INSULT TO THE GREEKS
What makes this even WORSE is that during World War II, the Greeks were in fact part of the ALLIES.
The Allies were fighting against the Axis powers, the latter of which contained Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Japan.
When the Nazis invaded Greece-well, it's never a good thing for a country to be invaded by enemies during a time of war.
At least 250,000 people died during the Axis occupation and its Jewish community was pretty much killed off. And the country's economy and infrastructure were ruined quite horribly.
And generations of Greeks are traumatised because of this, even today. Not just Greeks-thousands of people. Millions of people all over the globe are still traumatized from this war, be it direct experience or generational trauma.
And to make ANCIENT GREEK GODS responsible for WWII is simply, totally and absolutely unforgivable on Rick Riordan's part.
To make the Greeks' enemies the sons of their ancient gods........no. Just no.
And yes, Hitler is a son of Hades in canon. Rick later changed it because of the backlash. He's absolutely disgusting.
WHY THE HELL ARE THE GREEK GODS IN AMERICA?
Now.........the Greek Gods are in the USA!
But..........they're Greek, right, which means that they should be in Greece! So why now are they in the USA?
Well.........here's Rick's explanation for it.
Apparently, the Greek Gods started with the fire of the Western Civilisation and then moved onto other places.
'Flame of the West' crap my ass. Search it up-there's this great article called the Whitening Thief. Read that.
What's meant by Chiron's explanation is that apparently Greece is too bad for Greek Gods now, which is terrible, because that's literally where they originated. And their explanation for leaving it and coming to America is extremely half-baked and just reeks of white American superiority.
@margaretkart
@alatismeni-theitsa
@katerinaaqu
These are all good blogs to disillusion yourself with Percy Jackson and learn about what really happened in Greek Mythology.
And I just want to say-Percy Jackson is an ok start for venturing into Greek Mythology as long as you've read up some basic background beforehand, but-
But-
Do NOT, under ANY circumstances whatsoever, take RICK RIORDAN'S portrayal of the Greek Gods as the REAL Greek Gods.
Never do that. That is the one thing that must not be done.
Hera doesn't just love perfect families. She literally lives in the most dysfunctional family to ever exist. And she loves you if you try. She really does.
Hades would not threaten to eternally torture literal children just because of what their parents did to him. His literal job is to uphold justice in the underworld, and sending a child to Tartarus just because her father angered him and he couldn't punish the father isn't justice now, is it?
Ares loves his children and as for why Rick made him hate them-
Rick has a hate boner against the war god, that I will swear on. Read this post and the explanation for why Rick shouldn't have done it.
And the gods are actively depicted as cruel, neglectful, abusive parents, when in the myths they are quite the opposite.
Real Aphrodite loves her son Aeneas and frequently comes to his aid on the battlefield. She also tells him to not marry a woman (TO GIVE UP LOVE, HER LITERAL DOMAIN) so that he can fulfil his destiny of becoming a king.
Real Ares loves all his children. He tries to avenge his son Cycnus when Heracles kills him with good reason for being a cruel tyrant-and they were even riding chariots together when Heracles came across them. He avenged his daughter even at the cost of being punished by Poseidon and Zeus, neither of whom liked him.
Now, what I want to tell you is that the PJO Greek Gods are Rick's interpretation of them.
An interpretation of a Greek God by a modern author (who isn't Greek, by the way, please take note) is not the same as the real Greek God. Please understand this and accordingly adjust your views.
This also goes for Madeline Miller, Rachel Smythe, etc.
And lastly, one of the most ironic things is that though Richard uses the Greek Gods in his books, he has never ever added a single Greek character in it.
I'm talking about a modern Greek demigod who comes from Greece. Imagine them teaching the other demigods Modern Greek and Greek culture, language and traditions!
It's very ironic that he includes Chinese, African and Native American culture in his works and then turns around and pretend that Greek culture doesn't exist.
The demigods are in Athens, but for how much time before they go back to America? Barely any at all. And nothing learnt about culture while they're there.
(No hate to his already shitty representation. I'm merely making a point that there should have been a Greek character in a book that heavily centers on Greek Gods and their children, even if it's in America.)
RICK DOESN'T USE GREEK CULTURE OR RELIGION AND IN FACT INSULTS GREECE IN HIS WORKS
So, if you've read the title, let me tell you something-
Do you know that Greek Gods are still worshipped?
Some of you do, some of you don't, but let me tell you, they are still worshipped.
And accordingly, you must respect them and their worshippers, just like you would do for Christians. You cannot maliciously ridicule and condemn Hellenistic Pagans and Greek Gods just because they are a minority.
And if you've read the myths and think that the Greek Gods being cruel......
They're not, actually. I mean, yes, you think they're cruel, but most of the myths aren't taken literally by Hellenistic Pagans.
What the Greek Gods do is supposed to be symbolic.
Hades kidnapping Persephone symbolises death ripping children from their grieving parents' arms. It's an explanation for the seasons and it finally represents the fact that daughters could be given away by their fathers with the mother having no say in it whatsoever.
Demeter's grief and her actually being able to do something about her daughter's marriage and Persephone being returned to her is supposed to be a comforting tale for grieving mothers who have lost their daughter.
Artemis' cruelty towards certain people? It represents the cruelty of nature towards humans and what it will do to humans if they provoke it.
Zeus' infidelity and abuse of his power? Well, it represents what kings do. Zeus represented the kings of Ancient Greece, and kings abused their power and had many mistresses besides having a wife.
Many Greek kings also claimed to sons of Zeus or descendants of the gods, so it the idea that Zeus had many affairs with ladies and princesses of royal lineages was conceived.
The link above provides many good reasons for why the Greeks wrote Zeus having many affairs with mortal women, so check it out.
Also, Zeus is symbolic of storms. Storms are volatile and raging, and so was Zeus at times. He was a god of storms and as such symbolised them.
Hera punishing the mistresses and children in a jealous rage to bother Zeus? That's what queens did back in the day since they couldn't directly punish their husbands.
Dionysus being charming and fun but also being mad and wild? Well, he represents breaking away from social norms and going fully wild. Also, wine can make people fun and charming, but at the same time, it can turn people into mad, raging creatures.
The point is, most of what the Greek Gods did was symbolic to their domains. And no, contrary to popular thought, Greeks did not live in fear of their Gods striking them down every moment. In fact, many of them genuinely devotionally loved their gods.
And Greek Gods themselves are very kind and benevolent to their devotees, even today, as long as you don't provoke or seriously insult them. Just ask Hellenistic Pagans and you'll be surprised at the results. I'm serious.
The problem here is that we're trying to moralize divinity.
According to the Greeks, gods weren't humans. They were modelled after humans, but they were above humans and human flaws.
And the Abrahamic gods do terrible things too, but do we mock them? No, we don't, because their worshippers say that they are above humans and human flaws, so similarly, the Greek Gods are above humans and our flaws.
CONCLUSION
And no one cares about the fact that a guy is objectifying and making money off a culture all the while removing its significance and turning it into a joke.
Even though Greeks have a millennia old and rich culture, people are always bastardizing it. Non-Greeks really must stop doing this. It's very culturally disrespectful.
I've also seen grown adults saying that the Greek Gods are American so they're allowed to do what they want with them now, and that's absolutely disgusting. It's cultural appropriation, that's what it is. Do not condone it.
Ah, sorry, not conclusion-let me add one last thing here.
Rick Riordan has a series called Trials of Apollo in which Apollo is cast down to Earth as a human for the third time to defeat Python.
What I want to talk about here is Apollo's human name-Lester Papadopoulos.
Papadopoulos is a common Greek Christian surname that means 'son of a priest'. One of Apollo's domains in prophecy and he has many priests, so maybe this is a reference to that.
But what is most upsetting is that this name is used for comedy.
It's belittled, laughed at and ridiculed for its longevity and hard pronunciation when it is in fact a very normal Greek surname. Even if it's not an American surname, even if it doesn't sound normal and sounds ridiculous to you, it's not ridiculous to others and you should respect it.
Can you imagine how Greek people with that last name read the books and felt bad about their last name? Or felt furious. I know that I would be FURIOUS if my last name was used like that.
And the fact is that Papadopoulos isn't even that hard to pronounce! It's literally just 5 syllables that you can repeat a few times until it doesn't twist your tongue.
And if you can't repeat this simple name, then you need to go back to kindergarten. Hell, go back to preschool even.
And there are people who have the audacity to say that the Greek Gods belong to America and are American. Grown adults, actually, on Twitter, no less. Tweeting it for the whole world to see their absolute foolishness and audacity.
They're pretty tactless, huh?
The Greek Gods were and always will be GREEK. Foreigners are not their rightful descendants-the Greeks are (Greek immigrants included). I mean...........this is bizzarre.
To conclude, (really conclude this time) though it's a series heavily entwined with Greek Gods, the only Greek thing about the series is the Gods. There's no Greek culture, religion or language, and even the Greek Gods are heavily Americanised, which is pretty disappointing. I hope that other authors will do better handling the Greek Gods than Rick Riordan.
(Side note: If you think anything I've said is wrong, tell me. I'll correct it immediately.)
@fandomloverangel
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leosoralyyn · 1 year ago
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Odysseus' last words to Poseidon
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pink-noah · 2 months ago
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Sketch of Poseidon and Charybdis
while I finish coloring other things
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kebriones · 4 months ago
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I saw the most charming little Dionysus at the museum yesterday and I had to draw him ;-;
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eintausendschoen · 3 days ago
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Love how the poses convey their energy so well. 💙⚡️🖤
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I am redesigning them again
Except for Hades I am happy with his design but I didn’t wanna leave him out <3
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sloanslone · 4 months ago
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My FINAL Artemis x Aeolus fa...(My EPIC designs-Y'all really made me do this...)
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(you'll see Artemis's antlers if you get pumba off her head ig 😭, I just didn't wanna draw a dead dog or fox on her....)
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sarafangirlart · 3 days ago
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“Medusa’s stone gaze work on men but not women” sounds insanely terfy actually.
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kurzler · 2 days ago
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hey, what's this about aphrodite/hephaestus divorce and him marrying aglaia? i can't find anything about that online. not doubting you but i've never heard that before and i can't find anyth
hi! so, as most stuff in greek mythology, there is a few contradicting sources about hephaestus' marriage:
-hesiod cites aglaia as the wife of hephaestus in the theogony
-the illiad and the dionysiaca refer to hephaestus' wife as "charis": now, there is debate about this specific name, because charis can simply refer to a member of the charities/graces generically (a group of goddesses which aglaia was part of), so some classicists presume that charis must refer to aglaia; however, in the dionysiaca, aglaia is referred to as "the charis", but charis is spoken of as a separate goddess
-the dionysiaca also alludes to aphrodite and hephaestus separating, and aphrodite is referred to as hephaestus' "ancient wife"
-to further complicate things, in the odyssey aglaia isn't mentioned at all and aphrodite is still referred to as hephaestus' wife, which is weird since the odyssey comes chronologically after the iliad and they're both supposed to be written by homer. greek mythology is weird like that
(edit: i got confused around this part, thanks to commenter @littlesparklight for pointing it out, but when talking in the odyssey about aphrodite and hephaestus, it's actually talking in the past, since it's a bard telling the story of the net, so it doesn't actually contradict the iliad. the odyssey still doesn't mention them separating or aglaia/charis, but it was worth pointing out!)
so, it's commonly accepted that they divorced after the net incident. the charis/aglaia thing is still a bit unclear, but from what i've found most scholars agree that the charis mentioned in the iliad is aglaia, even tho it contradicts the information in the dionysiaca, but honestly mythology has so many contradictions you just have to either accept them or go with the version that is most likely/you like the most. hope i was helpful!
sources:
theogony, around line 945
iliad, book 18, around line 382
dionysiaca, book 29, around line 317
odyssey, book 8, around line 295 (net incident)
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willowgarden15 · 1 month ago
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Mosasaurus inspired by the myth of Cetus and Greek pottery (⁠◕⁠ᴗ⁠◕⁠✿⁠)
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