Dawn Lacy
9-15-2013
History Paper
E.Bryant
His 101

Polytheism Ancient Greek theology was based on polytheism, the beliefs in many Gods and Goddesses. Breaking the word down, “poly” comes from the Greek word for “many,” and “theism” from the Greek word for “God.” These divine entities tend to distinguish particular functions, and often took on human characteristics. The gods acted like humans, and had human voices. They would interact with humans, sometimes even spawning children with them. Even though the Gods were immortal, nor some of them are not all powerful. Fate is what they had to obey, which overrode all. The number of the deities would expand as the culture’s belief system developed. The Greek Gods/Goddesses directly took on human activities. The divine entities would also take on human form and personality. Man learned to accept or fear the powers of nature, such as the deities. Humans tended to see the divine entities as storms, seasons, the sun, and the moon as personal beings. However the earliest humans believed the main deities were An, Enlil, Enki, and Ninhursaga. In ancient Greece there were twelve deities that sat on top of Mount Olympus: Hermes, Poseidon, Apollo, Artemis, Hephaestus, Ares, Athena, Demeter, Aphrodite, Hestia, Hera, and Zeus, king of the gods. Under them sat Zeus' brother Hades, king of the underworld. Since its miraculous beginning in mainland Greece around 1800-1500 BCE, when Poseidon was the chief God and not Zeus, the deities were worshiped wherever Greeks lived or had a concept of influence. An was the deity of the sky. He was known as the most import force in the universe. The second most important deity was Enlil. Enlil was known as the God of the wind. He could control just about anything with the wind. Enki was God of the earth, and the God of water. Ninhursaga, worshiped as a mother Goddess. She was