Poseidon’s
Roman name was Neptune. He was the god of
the sea, earthquakes, and
horses. If you are at all able to put 2
and 2 together, then you would notice that the reason the king of
“merpeople”
is often referred to as King Neptune is because Poseidon’s Roman name
was
Neptune, and he was the god of the sea. He
was a very important god, but chose at his own will not
to live on
Mount Olympus.
Poseidon was a brother
to both Zeus and Hades. These brothers
pretty much divided up everything. Zeus
ended up with the sky, Hades had the
Underworld, and Poseidon had all the
water.
He married Amphitrite, who was a
sea nymph. She was the daughter of
Nereus, A.K.A. the “Old Man of the Sea.” Poseidon
had a three pronged spear, also called a Triton. This
is why in Walt Disney’s “The Little
Mermaid”, Ariel’s father has a Triton, which is a good example of how
Greek
Mythology fits into our lives today. This
special spear was very powerful.
Poseidon was involved in a competition with Athena to become the god or
goddess of Athens. The way this
competition went was that they each gave the Athenians a gift, and they
picked
their favorite gift. The giver of the
favorite gift then became the god or goddess of Athens.
Poseidon gave the Athenians a sea, and Athena gave them an olive tree. They
liked the olive tree better than the sea, so they named Athena the
goddess of
Athens (it even went well with her name: Athena, Athens!).
Poseidon was very angry, so he flooded the
city (talk about a flash flood). But
after he calmed down, he undid the flood.
Poseidon was the father of Ageus, but it was also said that he was the
father to Theseus. For
some random
reason or another, he didn’t like Odysseus. He had a little problem with his emotions,
something I
like to call a
very bad thing since he had so much power. You
see, one reason was the flooding of the city of
Athens, but the
other is because he cursed the wife of King Minos.
Poseidon did this by causing her to fall in love with a
bull that
he just happened to give to the king. The
bull even just happened to have some little
sacrificial plans. Lets just say that that
didn't end too
prettily.
As for random aspects of
Poseidon’s life, he could transform into a horse. If
he was in the mood, he would give other the power to change
into another being.
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