Ancient Greek Mythology and Legends

The body of myths which belong to the Greeks, which include their gods as well as heroes and so on, is called the ancient Greek mythology. A lot of researchers actually study Greek mythology so that they can get an insight on the way the ancient Greek politics worked as well as what their religions were.

Mythology comes from two Greek words. The first one is mythos which means a speech act which is ritualized. The second one is logos which basically stands for a convincing story or an ordered argument. So if you look at it from an original sense then you shall find that the mythology is like an attempt which brings sense to stylized narratives which the Greeks would recite at festivals, would whisper at shrines or would talk about at the aristocratic banquets.

There are various primary sources which are available so that people can study ancient Greek mythology. The scope of this type of mythology is humungous. It stretches from the horrid crime scenes of the ancient gods to the scenes of the bloody way of Troy and Thebes, the childhood pranks of the Hermes and also the touching grief of Demeter for Persephone.

This vast sea of Greek mythology consists of gods, heroes, goddesses, heroines, daemons, satyrs, centaurs and nymphs. Although breaking up ancient Greek mythology into different parts can be quite difficult, we can break up the ancient Greek mythology roughly into:

1. An age of the gods
2. Age when gods as well as men and women would mingle with each other freely
3. Age of heroes in which divine activity was a lot limited
When we talk about the age of gods we mean the pantheon of goddesses n gods which the ancient Greeks believed in. like, Aphrodite, who was the goddess of love, Ares the god of war, Hades the god of the dead, Zeus, the king of all gods and so on.

The age of men and gods was the age when the two would live together and co exits. The most popular narrative is that of a rape of a very mortal human woman by Zeus and hence which resulted in an offspring who was a hero. Finally we have the age of the heroes. Now this age can again be broken down into different parts which constitute the events like the Trojan War and the Argonautic expedition.

Ancient Greek Life History / Ancient Greece Facts for Kids

We owe a lot to Ancient Greek Civilization. History of ancient Greece is a fascinating. On this site, we have given information on various ancient Greek life aspects - Arts, Boys and Girls, Architecture, Dancing, Gods, Myths, Medicine, Inventions, Houses, Government, Religions, Wars, Politics, Weapons and ancient Greece Cities.