Greek mythology- theogony question

Theogony is a poetic work by the ancient greek poet and scholar Hesiod describing the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods. It is written in the Epic dialect of Ancient Greece. This composition was done by Hesiod during the year 700 BC (about 2720 years ago). As per the contents of this great composition, there are many characters and every character appears important and has got a purpose in this poetic sketch. Before giving my choice as who is the most favourite it would be better to go in slight details as who are these characters and what was their place in this great poetic work of that time.

In the beginning of the book, Hesiod calls upon the nine sisters called as Muses for getting inspiration to write his work. It was believed that the Muses who live on Mount Helicon had power to motivate the artists and poets for attempting their work with ease and comfort. The interesting part is that each of these nine sisters was responsible for some art form and name wise they were - Calliope for the epic poetry; Clio for the history; Euterpe for the music, song, and lyric poetry; Erato for love poetry; Melpomene for the tragedy; Polyhymnia for the hymns; Terpsichore for the dance; Thalia for the comedy; and Urania for the astronomy.

The next character is Gaia which means Earth. Gaia was the first Goddess who came out of nothingness and she gave virgin birth to the mountains, the sea, and mountain nymphs. After the birth of Gaia, Eros, the primordial god of love and desire was also born which later became personified as Cupid. Then, Gaia gave birth to Uranus who was the last virgin production by Gaia and thereafter they became a couple and gave birth to Cyclopes, hecatoncheires, Kronos, and the Titans. Unfortunately as these children were monstrous in their forms, Uranus hated them and locked them in caves for their lives.

The story becomes interesting when Kronos with the help of mother Gaia dethrones Uranus and takes his place. Uranus was castrated by Kronos and his genitals were thrown into the sea off the coast of Cyprus and Aphrodite, the goddess of love and sexuality was born from that. The wife of Kronos was Rhea. They had six children and youngest one was Zeus. Kronos having dethroned his father was always afraid that his children will one day dethrone him and in that fear he started to eat his own children one by one. Rhea did not like this and hid Zeus away on Mount Ida. She also tricked Kronos to eat a rock in place of the child. Kronos fears came true when Zeus after getting adult confronted him and forced him to throw up the children out from his body and then all the children attacked Kronos and won the fight and then Zeus became the new king of the Gods and ruled along with his wife Hera.

Out of all the above characters, I liked the character of Rhea because she had got some great values in her and she did not like the way her husband treated the children. She was alarmed by seeing the devilish acts of her husband and took the youngest son Zeus in confidence, helped him in getting rid of Kronos. That brought a good time to the universe as Zeus ruled the world at that time without any such problems and conflicts. Rhea was instrumental in bringing calm and serenity in the world of that time.

The "Theogony" of a Greek poet Hesiod is an instructional poem. This poem describes the cosmos and the interconnected genealogies of the Gods of the ancient Greeks.

Hesiod emphasizes genealogy in this poem. He illustrated the ways in which the entire divine is organized based on family relationships. He tries to establish the fact that even Gods, heroes, and monsters will never hesitate to use violence to get their wishes and aims fulfilled.

One of the subjects this poem dealt with is succession. Kronos and Rhea are husband and wife. Kronos, the husband came to know from Earth and Heaven that his own children will defeat him. Hence he starts swallowing their own children as soon as they born. The worried Rhea gave one of her children namely Zeus to earth asking to bring him up by managing her husband. Zeus grew up and matured enough to defeat his father and forced him to spit back all the children he has swallowed.

We have many characters in this poem. Among all these characters I have a special liking for Zeus. He illustrated the need for compromise and collaboration to obtain and maintain power. Even he never hesitated to go against his father who is swallowing his own children. He is different from his father and grandfather. He managed his ways by making use of his allies among the Olympians and Titans and established his way of working. He demonstrated that evils are evils irrespective of who performed them.

Greek mythology has always been so interesting and fascinating and thus also the source of inspiration for many later stories and movies which are presented with slight changes, but origin myths mostly remain the same and I personally feel fascinated with these stories of clash of titans and sometimes resemblance of gods and their powers with Indian gods. Although Zeus seems to be the favourite character for most people because of the way he gained power and maintained it as well for me, I always find his brother posiodan to be a more interesting character as he is more nearer to humans and in the stories seems to be more merciful on humans than anyone else.