Zeus The son of the Titan Cronus and Titaness Rhea, Zeus is the chief of the second generation Greek gods, usually arrayed with thunderbolts and an eagle.
By the time of Homer he came to be the most powerful deity in the Greek pantheon, his main role role being the overseer of cosmic justice. As such, he protects property, receives prayers and sacrifices, and punishes transgressors.
Because he was so big, he ironically had a relative few polis festivals (i.e. city festivals) in his honor. Polis festivals were generally reserved for lesser deities presiding over a particular city, such as Athena or Apollo.
Zeus had numerous offspring with several different goddesses, the most famous being Aphrodite.
He apparently had amorous relations with his young male cup-bearer, Ganymedes.
The mythologer Robert Graves says
The Zeus-Ganymedes myth gained immense popularity in Greece and Rome because it afforded religious justification for grown man’s passionate love for a boy.
The Greek Myths, Combined edition, London: Penguin, 1992, p. 117.
According to NeoPlatonist thought, Zeus isn’t at the top of the all-time divinity charts. Instead, the NeoPlatonists lowered his status from his previous rank of King.
Zeus’ Roman equivalent is Jupiter.
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