Titan, Traitor, Savior: The True Story of Prometheus

What the limited resources of Shutterstock allowed me to call Prometheus.

This picture before you is Prometheus. Perhaps you don't know his story.

Prometheus was a Titan, or according to Greek mythology, one of the spawn of the first Divine Beings of the Universe. Son of Iapetus and Clymene, he was faced with a choice early on in the timelessness of his early life: Titans or Gods.

War among Gods

To give some background, the two most powerful Titans were Cronus and Rhea ruled the Heavens and the Earth. Cronus had heard however that one of his offspring would one day overthrow him. So he proceeded to eat his children. Most fortunately for YOU, nothing matches my search for "eating babies."

Anyways, long story short, Rhea saved the last child, Zeus, from such treatment and secreted him away to a cave on the Island of Crete where he could grow up without a huge guy attempting to eat him. When Zeus was old enough, he went to war against the Titans and their cronies, the so called Titanomachy. Prometheus choose to side with Zeus, seeing as he was pushed around by some of the Titans and thought life would be better with Zeus.

Hint: It wasn't.

Zeus, to put it bluntly, immediately became so full of it that he initially denied Prometheus his one request: to remake Mankind. According to legend, there were 5 Ages of Man. The first three had been created by the Titans and subsequently destroyed. The fourth was obliterated by the Titanomachy. Prometheus agreed to side with Zeus on the condition he would remake Man again.

Thing was, Zeus wasn't all that keen on remaking Man. He did not want Mankind rivalling the Gods in any aspect. It was for this reason that he denied the privilege of fire to them. Prometheus was eventually granted his wish, but he was displeased with the stupidity and crudeness of his creation. So he just stole fire from the Gods. No big deal, right?


  Wrong.

When Zeus peeked out from the clouds to look at Earth one day, he was divinely enraged by the technological advancements Man had made. Knowing it was Prometheus, he chained the ex-Titan to a mountain believed to be in the Caucasus Range, and condemned him to have his liver torn out every day until eternity by an eagle. The liver regenerated, in case you're wondering.

After many years of the excruciating pain that comes with getting your liver ripped out (not to mention he's laying on a bed of MOUNTAINS), a hero came to save him. But this was no ordinary hero! This was Heracles!

Heracles was thought to be the demigod son of Zeus who would one day overthrow the Gods themselves. Because Heracles was mad at the Gods, he loosed Prometheus's chains. Prometheus was free!

The tale splits here: It is said that Chiron, the wise centaur who taught heroes, died in place of Prometheus so that Zeus might kill SOMEONE for letting Prometheus go. The other tale is that Prometheus hid himself from the Gods, even from his Creations on earth. Though Zeus sought him many years, Prometheus eluded him by sleeping. Zeus could not see him in the world of Dreams, and the God who ruled there, Morpheus, kept Prometheus safe.

It is said that Prometheus would wait until the time of the Gods was over, and that he would return to create Man again in a Sixth Age. A Golden Age.

Sounds a little familiar, doesn't it?