greek and roman mythololgy

themis

Themis is an earth goddess much like her mother, Gaia, and in some stories it is hard to tell the two apart. Some classical depictions of Themis show her holding a sword.

When Themis is disregarded, brings just and wrathful retribution; thus Themis shared the small temple at rhamnous with Nemesis. Themis is not wrathful; when a distraught hera returned to olympus after quarrelling with Zeus, Themis, "of the lovely cheeks," was the first to offer her a cup.

Themis presided over the proper relation between man and woman, the basis of the rightly ordered family (the family was seen as the pillar of the deme). Judges were often referred to as "themistopóloi" (the servants of Themis). Such was also the basis for order upon Olympus. Even addressed her as "Lady Themis".

Themis is one of the twelve Titan children of gaia (Earth) and uranus (Sky). She is the second wife of her nephew zeus, by whom she is the mother of the horae (Seasons), listed as eunomia (Law),dike  (Justice), eirene(Peace), and the moirai (Fates), listed as ,clotho  lachesis and atropos. Similarly to Hesiod's account, the orphic hymm to Themis calls her the daughter of Gaia and Uranus, and the orphic hymm to the seasons  calls her the mother, by Zeus, of the Horae.

Themis built the oracle at delphi and was herself oracular. According to another legend, Themis received the Oracle at Delphi from gaia and later gave it to pheobe, who gave it to her grandson apollo as a birthday gift. According to ephorus, Themis helped Apollo find the oracle, with the intent of helping mankind. Some examples of Themis' visions; Themis warns the gods of an oncoming civil war in thebes  In another tale she warns zeus and poseidon to not marry thetis because her son will be more powerful than his father. According to Ovid, it was Themis rather than Zeus who told deucalion to throw the bones of "his mother" over his shoulder to create a new race of humankind after the deluge. Also according to Ovid, Themis prophesied that a son of Zeus will steal golden apples from the orchard of atlas.

 she is tasked with calling the gods to council on Olympus by Zeus.

Themis was present at delos to witness the birth of apollo, and nursed him with nectar and ambrosia. In his de astronomica hyginus, lists Themis, in addition to the nymph amalthea, as the foster-mother and nurse of the young Zeus. In a fragment of pindar, Themis was brought from the springs of oceanus by the moirai (in this version not her daughters) to olympus, where she became the first wife of Zeus (rather than the second), and by him the mother of the horae.

Themis and Zeus together plotted the start of the Trojan War. when the gods defied the orders of Zeus and started fighting each other after the creation of the trojan horse, Themis stopped them by warning them of Zeus's wrath.

In the "Rhapsodic Theogony", or Rhapsodies, (first century BC/AD) nyx (Night) prophesied that Themis would remain a virgin until Rhea gave birth to a child of cronus.

Themis also played a role in eros, the young god of love, growing up; his mother was worried about her son, Eros, staying a child forever and brought him to Themis. Themis told her to give Eros a brother, as he wasn't growing because of his solitude. Aphrodite then gave birth to another love god, (meaning "counter-love"), and Eros grew whenever he was near him. But every time Anteros was away, Eros shrank back to his previous, small form.

When four Cretan men (aegolius,celeus ,cerberus  and laius) broke into the sacred cavern in crete where Rhea had given birth to Zeus in order to steal some of the honey produced there by the sacred bees, Themis and her daughters the Fates convinced Zeus against killing them inside the holy cave, as they considered it impious for anyone to die in the cave, so instead he turned all four into different birds.