Thetis

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Thetis

the following article article is about the Greek lesser sea goddess of late myths. Thetis should not be confused with Themis
Themis

Themis is an Greek mythology. She is described as "of good counsel", and was the embodiment of divine order, law, and custom. Themis means "law of nature" rather than human ordinance, literally "that which is put in place", from the verb t?????, t?themi, to put....
, the embodiment of the laws of nature, but see the sea-goddess Tethys
Tethys (mythology)

File:Tethys mosaic 83d40m Phillopolis mid4th century -p2fx.2.jpgIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titan ess and Greek sea gods sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult....
. For other uses, see Thetis (disambiguation)
Thetis (disambiguation)

Thetis is a sea nymph in Greek mythology.Thetis may also refer to* Thetis * Thetis Island, British Columbia* Thetis Lake, British Columbia...
.

Silver-footed Thetis (ancient Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
), disposer or "placer" (the one who places), is encountered in Greek mythology
Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the Ancient Greece concerning their List of Greek mythological figures#Immortals and Greek hero cult, Cosmology#Metaphysical cosmology, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices....
mostly as a sea nymph
Nymph

In Greek mythology, a nymph is any member of a large class of mythological entities in human form. They were typically associated with a particular location or landform....
, one of the fifty Nereids, daughters of the ancient one of the seas with shape-shifting abilities who survives in the historical vestiges of most later Greek myths as Proteus
Proteus

In Greek mythology, Proteus is an early sea-god, one of several deities whom Homer calls the "Old Man of the Sea", whose name suggests the "first", as protogonos is the "primordial" or the "firstborn"....
(whose name suggests the "first", the "primordial" or the "firstborn").

When described as a Nereid in Classical myths, Thetis was the daughter of Nereus
Nereus

Nereus , in Greek Mythology, was the eldest son of Pontus and Gaia , a Titan who fathered the Nereids, with whom Nereus lived in the Aegean Sea....
and Doris
Doris

Doris may refer to:...
(Hesiod
Hesiod

Hesiod was a Greek language oral poet, his date is uncertain but leading scholars agree that Hesiod lived in the latter half of the Eighth-century BCE....
, Theogony), and a granddaughter of Tethys
Tethys (mythology)

File:Tethys mosaic 83d40m Phillopolis mid4th century -p2fx.2.jpgIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titan ess and Greek sea gods sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult....
with whom she sometimes shares characteristics.

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the following article article is about the Greek lesser sea goddess of late myths. Thetis should not be confused with Themis
Themis

Themis is an Greek mythology. She is described as "of good counsel", and was the embodiment of divine order, law, and custom. Themis means "law of nature" rather than human ordinance, literally "that which is put in place", from the verb t?????, t?themi, to put....
, the embodiment of the laws of nature, but see the sea-goddess Tethys
Tethys (mythology)

File:Tethys mosaic 83d40m Phillopolis mid4th century -p2fx.2.jpgIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titan ess and Greek sea gods sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult....
. For other uses, see Thetis (disambiguation)
Thetis (disambiguation)

Thetis is a sea nymph in Greek mythology.Thetis may also refer to* Thetis * Thetis Island, British Columbia* Thetis Lake, British Columbia...
.

Silver-footed Thetis (ancient Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
), disposer or "placer" (the one who places), is encountered in Greek mythology
Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the Ancient Greece concerning their List of Greek mythological figures#Immortals and Greek hero cult, Cosmology#Metaphysical cosmology, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices....
mostly as a sea nymph
Nymph

In Greek mythology, a nymph is any member of a large class of mythological entities in human form. They were typically associated with a particular location or landform....
, one of the fifty Nereids, daughters of the ancient one of the seas with shape-shifting abilities who survives in the historical vestiges of most later Greek myths as Proteus
Proteus

In Greek mythology, Proteus is an early sea-god, one of several deities whom Homer calls the "Old Man of the Sea", whose name suggests the "first", as protogonos is the "primordial" or the "firstborn"....
(whose name suggests the "first", the "primordial" or the "firstborn").

When described as a Nereid in Classical myths, Thetis was the daughter of Nereus
Nereus

Nereus , in Greek Mythology, was the eldest son of Pontus and Gaia , a Titan who fathered the Nereids, with whom Nereus lived in the Aegean Sea....
and Doris
Doris

Doris may refer to:...
(Hesiod
Hesiod

Hesiod was a Greek language oral poet, his date is uncertain but leading scholars agree that Hesiod lived in the latter half of the Eighth-century BCE....
, Theogony), and a granddaughter of Tethys
Tethys (mythology)

File:Tethys mosaic 83d40m Phillopolis mid4th century -p2fx.2.jpgIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titan ess and Greek sea gods sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult....
with whom she sometimes shares characteristics. Often she seems to lead the Nereids as they attend to her tasks. Sometimes she also is identified with Metis
Metis (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Metis was of the Titan generation and, like several primordial figures, an Oceanid, in the sense that M?tis was born of Oceanus and Tethys , of an earlier age than Zeus and his siblings....
.

It is likely, however, that she was one of the earliest of deities worshiped in Archaic Greece, the oral traditions and records of which are lost. Only one written record, a fragment, exists attesting to her worship and an early Alcman
Alcman

Alcman was an Ancient Greek choral lyric poet from Sparta. He is the earliest representative of the Alexandrinian canon of the nine lyric poets....
hymn exists that identifies Thetis as the creator of the universe. Worship of Thetis as the goddess is documented to have persisted in some regions by historical writers such as Pausanias
Pausanias (geographer)

Pausanias was a Roman Greece traveller and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius....
.

Thetis as goddess
While most extant material about Thetis concerns her role as mother of Achilles
Achilles

In Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greeks hero of the Trojan War, the central character and the greatest warrior of Homer's Iliad, which takes for its theme ; the Wrath of Achilles....
and, as such, she is largely a creature of poetic fancy rather than cult worship
Animal sacrifice

Animal sacrifice is the ritual killing of an animal as part of a religion. It is practised by many religions as a means of appeasing a god or gods or changing the course of nature....
in the historical period, there is one notable exception (see Thetis in Laconia below); a few fragmentary hints and references suggest an older layer of the tradition, in which the sea-goddess Thetis played a far more central role in the religious beliefs, practices, and imagination of some of the archaic Greeks. The pre-modern etymology of her name, from tithemi (t???µ?), "to set up, establish," suggests the perception among Classical Greeks of an early political
Polis

A polis -- plural: poleis --is a city, a city-state and also citizenship and body of citizens. When used to describe Classical Athens and its contemporaries, polis is often translated as "city-state."...
role. Walter Burkert
Walter Burkert

Walter Burkert , a scholar of Greek mythology and Cult , is an emeritus professor of classics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, and also has taught in the United Kingdom and the United States....
considers her name a transformed doublet of Tethys
Tethys (mythology)

File:Tethys mosaic 83d40m Phillopolis mid4th century -p2fx.2.jpgIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titan ess and Greek sea gods sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult....
.

In Iliad I, Achilles recalls to his mother her role in defending, and thus legitimizing, the reign of Zeus against an incipient rebellion by three Olympians, each of whom has pre-Olympian roots:
"You alone of all the gods saved Zeus the Darkener of the Skies from an inglorious fate, when some of the other Olympians—Hera
Hera

In the Twelve Olympians of classical Greek Mythology, Hera or Here was the wife and older sister of Zeus. Her chief function was as goddess of women and marriage....
, Poseidon
Poseidon

In Greek mythology, Poseidon was the god of the sea and, as "Earth-Shaker," of earthquakes. The name of the god Nethuns in Etruscan mythology was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon....
, and Pallas Athene—had plotted to throw him into chains... You, goddess, went and saved him from that indignity. You quickly summoned to high Olympus the monster of the hundred arms
Hecatonchires

The Hecatonchires, or Hekatonkheires, were three gargantuan figures of an archaic stage of Greek mythology. According to Hesiod they were children of Gaia and Uranus , simply the issue of Earth and Sky, or of Earth and Sea thus part of the very beginning of things in the submerged prehistory of Greek myth, though they played no part...
whom the gods call Briareus, but mankind Aegaeon, a giant
Gigantes

In Greek mythology, the Gigantes or, commonly, Giants, were a race of giants, children of Gaia or Gaea, who were fertilized by the blood of Uranus_, after being castration by his son Cronus....
more powerful even than his father
Uranus

Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun and the third-largest and fourth most massive planet in the Solar System. It is named after the ancient Greek deity of the sky Uranus the father of Kronos and grandfather of Zeus ....
. He squatted by the Son of Cronos
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
with such a show of force that the blessed gods slunk off in terror, leaving Zeus free" (E.V. Rieu translation). Thus, evidence of major changes in religious concepts may be recorded only in fragments of myths that supersede and later, obscure the originals.

Quintus of Smyrna, recalling this passage, does write that Thetis once released Zeus from chains; but there is no other reference to this rebellion among the Olympians, and some readers, such as M. M. Willcock, have understood the episode as an ad hoc invention of Homer's to support Achilles' request that his mother intervene with Zeus. Laura Slatkin explores the apparent contradiction, in that the immediate presentation of Thetis in the Iliad is as a helpless minor goddess overcome by grief and lamenting to her Nereid sisters, and links the goddess's present and past through her grief. She draws comparisons with Thetis' role in another work of the epic Cycle concerning Troy, the lost Aethiopis, which presents a strikingly similar relationship—that of the divine Dawn, Eos
Eos

Eos is, in Greek mythology, the Titan goddess of the dawn, who rose from her home at the edge of Oceanus, the Ocean that surrounds the world, to herald her brother Helios, the sun....
, with her slain son Memnon
Memnon

Memnon may refer to:* Saint Memnon the Wonderworker ? early Christian saint from Egypt, hermit and hegumen of one of Egyptian monasteries* Memnon and those erroneously named after him in the Graeco-Roman era:...
; she supplements the parallels with images from the repertory of archaic vase-painters, where Eros and Thetis flank the symmetrically opposed heroes with a theme that may have been derived from traditional epic songs.

Thetis does not need to appeal to Zeus for immortality for her son, but snatches him away to the White Island
Snake Island (Black Sea)

Snake Island, also known as Serpent Island , lies in the Black Sea off the coasts of Romania and Ukraine. The island is part of the Kiliya Raion of Odessa Oblast, Ukraine....
Leuke in the Black Sea
Black Sea

The Black Sea is an inland sea sea bounded by southeastern Europe, the Caucasus and the Anatolia and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean Sea and Aegean Seas and various straits....
, an alternate Elysium
Elysium

In Greek mythology, Elysium was a section of the Greek Underworld . The Elysian Fields, or the Elysian Plains, were the final resting place of the souls of the heroic and the virtuous....
where he has transcended death, and where an Achilles cult lingered into historic times.

Thetis and the other deities
Pseudo-Apollodorus' Bibliotheke asserts that Thetis was courted by both Zeus
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
and Poseidon
Poseidon

In Greek mythology, Poseidon was the god of the sea and, as "Earth-Shaker," of earthquakes. The name of the god Nethuns in Etruscan mythology was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon....
, but she was married off to the mortal Peleus
Peleus

In Greek mythology, Pele?s was a Greek hero cult who was already known to Homer. Peleus was the son of Aeacus, king of the island of Aegina, and Ende?s, the oread of Mount Pelion in Thessaly; he became the father of Achilles....
because of their fears about the prophecy by Themis
Themis

Themis is an Greek mythology. She is described as "of good counsel", and was the embodiment of divine order, law, and custom. Themis means "law of nature" rather than human ordinance, literally "that which is put in place", from the verb t?????, t?themi, to put....
(or Prometheus
Prometheus

In Greek mythology, Prometheus is a Titan known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to human beings for their use....
, or Calchas
Calchas

In Greek mythology, Calchas , son of Thestor, was a Argive seer, with a gift for interpreting the flight of birds that he received of Apollo: "as an augur, Calchas had no rival in the camp"....
, according to others) that her son would become greater than his father. Thus, she is revealed as a figure of cosmic capacity, quite capable of unsettling the divine order (Slatkin 1986:12).

When Hephaestus
Hephaestus

Hephaestus was a Greek god whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan . He was the god of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, sculpture, metals, metallurgy, Fire and volcanoes....
was thrown from Olympus, whether cast out by Hera for his lameness or evicted by Zeus
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
for taking Hera's side, the Nereids
Nereids

In Greek mythology, the Nereids are sea nymphs, the fifty daughters of Nereus and Doris . They often accompany Poseidon and are always friendly and helpful towards sailors fighting perilous storms....
Eurynome and Thetis caught him and cared for him on the volcanic isle of Lemnos
Lemnos

Lemnos is an island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea. It is part of the prefecture of Greece of Lesbos Prefecture and has a considerable area, about 477 km?....
, while he labored for them as a smith, "working there in the hollow of the cave, and the stream of Okeanos around us went on forever with its foam and its murmur" (Iliad 18.369).

Thetis is not successful in her role protecting and nurturing a hero (the theme of kourotrophos), but her role in succouring deities is emphatically repeated by Homer, in three Iliad episodes: as well as her rescue of Zeus (1.396ff) and Hephaestus (18.369), Diomedes recalls that when Dionysus was expelled by Lycurgus
Lycurgus

Lycurgus or Lykurgus may refer to:* People:** Lycurgus of Sparta , ruler** Lycurgus of Athens , activist & government administrator...
with the Olympians' aid, he took refuge in the Erythraean Sea
Red Sea

The Red Sea is a salt water inlet of the Indian Ocean between Africa and Asia. The connection to the ocean is in the south through the Bab el Mandeb sound and the Gulf of Aden....
with Thetis in a bed of seaweed (6.123ff). These accounts associate Thetis with "a divine past—uninvolved with human events—with a level of divine invulnerability extraordinary by Olympian standards. Where within the framework of the Iliad the ultimate recourse is to Zeus for protection, here the poem seems to point to an alternative structure of cosmic relations" and the reference relates to the religious concepts that greatly ante-dated the classical period.

Marriage to Peleus and the Trojan War
, c. 490 BC from Vulci, Etruria - Bibliothèque Nationale de France
Bibliothèque nationale de France

The Biblioth?que nationale de France is the National library of France, located in Paris. It is intended to be the repository of all that is published in France....
in Paris]] An essential subordinate motif later occurring in the nature of Thetis, as a Nereid, one that links her with the dawn Titan Eos
Eos

Eos is, in Greek mythology, the Titan goddess of the dawn, who rose from her home at the edge of Oceanus, the Ocean that surrounds the world, to herald her brother Helios, the sun....
and with Aphrodite
Aphrodite

Aphrodite is the classical Greek mythology goddess of love, sex, and beauty. According to Greek oral poet Hesiod, she was born when Uranus was castrated by his son Cronus....
, is her liaison with a mortal lover which occurs with the rise of the Olympian deities. Reportedly most attracted to the goddess, but fearful of losing his hold on the deities, because Zeus
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
had received a prophecy that Thetis's son would become greater than his father, the familiar mytheme
Mytheme

In the study of mythology, a mytheme is the essential kernel of a myth, an irreducible, unchanging element, one that is always found shared with other, related mythemes and reassembled in various ways—"bundled" was Claude L?vi-Strauss's image— or linked in more complicated relationships, like a molecule in a compound....
of the Succession Prophecy. Zeus had dethroned his father to lead the succeeding pantheon, therefore, in order to ensure a mortal father for her eventual offspring, Zeus
Zeus

Zeus in Greek mythology is the king of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the god of the sky father and List of thunder gods. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull , and oak....
and his brother Poseidon
Poseidon

In Greek mythology, Poseidon was the god of the sea and, as "Earth-Shaker," of earthquakes. The name of the god Nethuns in Etruscan mythology was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon....
made arrangements for her marriage to a human, Peleus
Peleus

In Greek mythology, Pele?s was a Greek hero cult who was already known to Homer. Peleus was the son of Aeacus, king of the island of Aegina, and Ende?s, the oread of Mount Pelion in Thessaly; he became the father of Achilles....
, son of Aeacus
Aeacus

Aeacus was a Greek mythology king of the island of Aegina in the Saronic Gulf.He was son of Zeus and Aegina , a daughter of the river-god Asopus....
, but she refused him.

Chiron
Chiron

In Greek mythology, Chiron or Cheiron was held as the superlative centaur among his brethren. Like the satyrs, centaurs were notorious for being overly indulgent drinkers and carousers, given to violence when intoxicated, and generally uncultured delinquents....
, the centaur, who later would be tutor to her son by Peleus, Achilles, advised Peleus to find the sea nymph when she was asleep and bind her tightly to keep her from escaping by changing forms. She did shift shapes, becoming flame, water, a raging lioness, and a serpent This ability was shared with many of the primordial
Primordial

Primordial may refer to:* Primordial , Irish black metal band* Primordial sea * Primordial elements * Primordialism* Primordial dwarfism* Primordials are characters from the role-playing game Exalted by White Wolf, Inc....
deities of Archaic Greece (compare the early sea-god Proteus
Proteus

In Greek mythology, Proteus is an early sea-god, one of several deities whom Homer calls the "Old Man of the Sea", whose name suggests the "first", as protogonos is the "primordial" or the "firstborn"....
), but Peleus held fast. Subdued, she then consented to marry him. Thetis is the mother of Achilles
Achilles

In Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greeks hero of the Trojan War, the central character and the greatest warrior of Homer's Iliad, which takes for its theme ; the Wrath of Achilles....
by Peleus
Peleus

In Greek mythology, Pele?s was a Greek hero cult who was already known to Homer. Peleus was the son of Aeacus, king of the island of Aegina, and Ende?s, the oread of Mount Pelion in Thessaly; he became the father of Achilles....
, who became king of the Myrmidons
Myrmidons

The Myrmidons were an ancient tribe of Greek mythology. They were very brave and skilled warriors as described in Homer's Iliad, and were commanded by Achilles....
.

According to classical mythology, the wedding of Thetis and Peleus was celebrated on Mount Pelion
Pelion

Pelion or Pelium is a mountain at the southeastern part of Thessaly in central Greece, forming a hook-like peninsula between the Pagasetic Gulf and the Aegean Sea....
outside the cave of Chiron and attended by the deities: there they celebrated the marriage with feasting. Apollo played the lyre and the Muses sang, Pindar
Pindar

Pindar , was an Ancient Greek Lyric poetry poet.Of the canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, Pindar is the one whose work is by far the best preserved, and critics in antiquity tended to regard him as the greatest....
claimed. At the wedding Chiron gave Peleus an ashen spear that had been polished by Athene and had a blade forged by Hepphaestus, and Poseidon gave him the immortal horses, Balius and Xanthus
Xanthus

Xanthus may refer to:In Greek mythology:*Xanthus is a son of Phaenops who was killed by Diomedes.*Xanthus is the name of one of Achilles' horses; see Balius and Xanthus....
. Eris
Eris (mythology)

Eris is the Greek mythology goddess of strife, her name being translated into Latin as Discordia. Her Greek opposite is Harmonia , whose Latin counterpart is Concordia ....
, the goddess of discord, had not been invited, however. In spite, she threw a golden apple into the midst of the goddesses that was to be awarded only "to the fairest." (In most interpretations, the award was made during the Judgement of Paris
Judgement of Paris

The Judgement of Paris is a story from Greek mythology, which was one of the events that led up to the Trojan War and to the foundation of Rome....
and eventually occasioned the Trojan War
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
; by others such as Robert Graves
Robert Graves

Robert Ranke Graves was an England poet, translator and novelist. During his long life, he produced more than 140 works. He was the son of the Anglo-Irish writer Alfred Perceval Graves and Amalie von Ranke, a niece of the famous German historian Leopold von Ranke....
, the imagery is considered misinterpreted and it is thought that it should reflect the selection of a king to be sacrificed in a sacred ritual).

In the later classical myths Thetis worked her magic on the baby Achilles by night, burning away his mortality in the hall fire and anointing the child with ambrosia
Ambrosia

In ancient Greek mythology, ambrosia is sometimes the food, sometimes the drink, of the Greek gods, often depicted as conferring ageless immortality upon whoever consumes it....
during the day, Apollonius tells. When Peleus caught her searing the baby, he let out a cry.
"Thetis heard him, and catching up the child threw him screaming to the ground, and she like a breath of wind passed swiftly from the hall as a dream and leapt into the sea, exceeding angry, and thereafter returned never again."

In a variant of the myth, Thetis tried to make Achilles invulnerable by dipping him in the waters of the Styx
Styx (mythology)

In Greek mythology, the "River Styx" was a river which formed the boundary between Earth and the Underworld . It circles Hades nine times. The rivers Styx, Phlegethon, Acheron and Cocytus all converge at the center of Hades on a great swamp....
(the river of Hades
Hades

Hades refers both to the ancient Greek underworld, the abode of Hades, and to the god of the underworld. Hades in Homer referred just to the god; the genitive case , Haidou, was an elision to denote locality: "[the house/dominion] of Hades"....
). However, the heel by which she held him was not touched by the Styx's waters, and failed to be protected. In the story of Achilles in the Trojan War
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
in the Iliad
ILiad

The iLiad is an electronic handheld device, or e-book device, which can be used for document reading and editing. Like the Sony Reader or Amazon Kindle, the iLiad makes use of an electronic paper display....
, Homer
Homer

Homer is traditionally held to be the author of the ancient Greek language epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey, as well as of the Homeric Hymns....
does not mention this weakness of Achilles' heel.

A similar myth of immortalizing a child in fire is connected to Demeter
Demeter

File:Demeter in horse chariot w daughter kore 83d40m wikiC Tempio Y di Selinunte sec VIa.JPGDemeter , in Greek mythology, is the Goddess of cereal and fertility, the pure....
; compare the myth of Meleager
Meleager

In Greek mythology, Meleager was the son of Althaea and Oeneus and, according to some accounts father of Parthenopeus and Polydora. His story has similarities with the Scandinavian Norna-Gests ??ttr....
. Some myths relate that because she had been interrupted by Peleus, Thetis had not made her son physically invulnerable. His heel, which she was about to burn away when her husband stopped her, had not been protected. Alternative interpretations assert that substitutes for the sacred king were sacrificed by fire (or water), putting off their ritual sacrifice for various numbers of years.

Peleus gave the boy to Chiron
Chiron

In Greek mythology, Chiron or Cheiron was held as the superlative centaur among his brethren. Like the satyrs, centaurs were notorious for being overly indulgent drinkers and carousers, given to violence when intoxicated, and generally uncultured delinquents....
to raise. Prophecy said that the son of Thetis would have either a long but dull life, or a glorious but brief life. When the Trojan War broke out, Thetis was anxious and concealed Achilles, disguised as a girl, at the court of Lycomedes
Lycomedes

Lycomedes , in Greek mythology, was the King of Scyros during the Trojan War....
. When Odysseus found that one of the girls at court was not a girl, but Achilles, he dressed as a merchant and set up a table of vanity items and jewellery and called to the group.

Only Achilles picked up the golden sword that lay to one side, and Odysseus quickly revealed him to be male. Seeing that she could no longer prevent her son from realizing his destiny, Thetis then had Hephaestus
Hephaestus

Hephaestus was a Greek god whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan . He was the god of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, sculpture, metals, metallurgy, Fire and volcanoes....
make a shield and armor.

When Achilles was killed by Paris , Thetis came from the sea with the Nereids to mourn him, and she collected his ashes in a golden urn, raised a monument to his memory, and instituted commemorative festivals. According to alternative interpretations suggesting archaic traditions, Paris would have been the succeeding sacred king who was selected next by the three goddesses.

Thetis worship in Laconia and other places

A noted exception to the general observation resulting from the existing historical records, that Thetis was not venerated as a goddess by cult, was in conservative Laconia
Laconia

Laconia , also known as Lacedaemonia, is a prefecture in Greece. Laconia has the legal status of a Prefectures of Greece, with Sparti its administrative capital....
, where Pausanias
Pausanias (geographer)

Pausanias was a Roman Greece traveller and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius....
was informed that there had been priestesses of Thetis in archaic times, when a cult that was centered on a wooden cult image
Cult image

In the practice of religion, a cult image is a man-made object that is venerated for the deity, spirit or daemon that it embodies or represents....
of Thetis (a xoanon
Xoanon

A xoanon was an Archaic period in Greece wooden cult image of Ancient Greece. Classical Greeks associated such cult objects, whether aniconic or effigy, with the legendary Daedalus....
), which preceded the building of the oldest temple; by the intervention of a highly-placed woman, her cult had been re-founded with a temple; and in the second century AD she still was being worshipped with utmost reverence. According to Pausanias:
The Lacedaemonians were making war against the Messenians, who had revolted, and their king Anaxander, having invaded Messenia, took prisoners certain women, and among them Cleo, priestess of Thetis. The wife of Anaxander asked for this Cleo from her husband, and discovering that she had the wooden image of Thetis, she set up the woman Cleo in a temple for the goddess. This Leandris did because of a vision in a dream, but the wooden image of Thetis is guarded in secret.

In one fragmentary hymn by the seventh century Sparta
Sparta

Sparta was a city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the Eurotas River in the southern part of the Peloponnese. From circa 650 BC it rose to become the dominant military power in the region and as such was recognized as the overall leader of the combined Greek forces during the Greco-Persian Wars....
n poet, Alcman
Alcman

Alcman was an Ancient Greek choral lyric poet from Sparta. He is the earliest representative of the Alexandrinian canon of the nine lyric poets....
, Thetis appears as a demiurge
Demiurge

Demiurge in philosophical and religious language is a term for a creator deity, responsible for the Creation myth of the physical universe.In the sense of a divine creative principle as expressed in ergon or energy, the word was first introduced by Plato in Timaeus , 41a ....
, beginning her creation with poros (p????) "path, track" and tekmor (t??µ??) "marker, end-post". Third was skotos (s??t??) "darkness", and then the sun and moon. A close connection has been argued between Thetis and Metis
Metis (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Metis was of the Titan generation and, like several primordial figures, an Oceanid, in the sense that M?tis was born of Oceanus and Tethys , of an earlier age than Zeus and his siblings....
, another shape-shifting
Shapeshifting

Shapeshifting is a common theme in mythology and folklore, as well as in science fiction and fantasy. In its broadest sense, it is a :wikt:metamorphosis of a person or animal....
sea-power later beloved by Zeus but prophesied bound to produce a son greater than his father because of her great strength. This cosmogony is interesting not only because it takes up Near Eastern astronomical and theological speculation, but also because its first principles are the building-blocks of a race-track, reflecting the athletic preoccupations of Spartan society and education.

Herodotus
Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
noted that the Persians sacrificed to "Thetis" at Cape Sepias. By the process of interpretatio graeca
Interpretatio graeca

Interpretatio graeca is a Latin term for the common tendency of ancient Greek writers to equate foreign divinities to members of their own pantheon....
, Herodotus identifies the deity of another culture as the familiar Hellenic "Thetis" a sea-goddess who was being propitiated by the Persians.

Thetis in other works

*Homer
Homer

Homer is traditionally held to be the author of the ancient Greek language epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey, as well as of the Homeric Hymns....
's Iliad
ILiad

The iLiad is an electronic handheld device, or e-book device, which can be used for document reading and editing. Like the Sony Reader or Amazon Kindle, the iLiad makes use of an electronic paper display....
makes many references to Thetis;
Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica IV, 770-879,
Apollodorus
Apollodorus

Apollodorus of Athens son of Asclepiades, was a Greeks scholar and grammarian. He was a pupil of Diogenes of Babylon, Panaetius, and the grammarian Aristarchus of Samothrace....
, The Library
The Library

The Library can refer to the following:* The Bibliotheca , a collection of Greek mythology and legends* "...
3.13.5
In 1981, British actress Maggie Smith
Maggie Smith

Dame Margaret Natalie Smith, Order of the British Empire , better known as Maggie Smith, is a pre-eminent English film, Stage , and television actor who made her stage debut in 1952 and is still performing after 56 years....
portrayed Thetis in the Ray Harryhausen
Ray Harryhausen

Ray Harryhausen is an United States film producer and, most notably, a special effects creator most famous for his brand of stop-motion model animation....
film Clash of the Titans
Clash of the Titans

For the metal concert tour by the same name, see Clash of the Titans Clash of the Titans is a 1981 in film fantasy and mythology film based on the myth of Perseus....
from which she won a Saturn Award
Saturn Award

The Saturn Award is an award presented annually by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films to honor the top works in science fiction, fantasy, and Horror fiction in film, television, and home video....
. In the film she acts as antagonist to the hero Perseus
Perseus

Perseus , the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Mycenae there, was the first of the mythic heroes of Greek mythology whose exploits in defeating various archaic monsters provided the founding myths in the cult of the Twelve Olympians....
for the mistreatment of her son Calibos.
In 2004, veteran actress Julie Christie
Julie Christie

Julie Frances Christie is a British actor. She was a pop icon of the "swinging London" era of the 1960s, and has won the Academy Award, Golden Globe, British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and Screen Actors Guild Awards....
portrayed Thetis in a short scene in the film Troy
Troy (film)

Troy is an epic film released on May 14, 2004, concerning the Trojan War. It is loosely based on Homer's Iliad, but includes material from Virgil's Aeneid and other sources, and frequently diverges from myth....
, in which her son Achilles
Achilles

In Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greeks hero of the Trojan War, the central character and the greatest warrior of Homer's Iliad, which takes for its theme ; the Wrath of Achilles....
, portrayed by Brad Pitt
Brad Pitt

William Bradley "Brad" Pitt is an American actor and film producer. He has been cited as one of the world's most attractive men and his off-screen life is widely reported....
, featured heavily. During her entire scene, she was standing in an ocean pool.

External links

: very full classical references