Tethys: Titan Goddess of Fresh Water

The Story of Tethys

Tethys was one of the twelve Titans, a daughter of Uranus and Gaia. She married her brother Oceanus, the great river that flowed around the earth. The Greeks saw her as the goddess of fresh water, who fed the springs and streams that kept the world alive.

Tethys and Oceanus were among the most fruitful couples in Greek myth. Hesiod says they had three thousand river gods as sons and three thousand Oceanid nymphs as daughters. Through them, every river, lake and spring in the world could trace its family back to Tethys.

During the war of the Titans, Rhea left her young daughter Hera with Tethys and Oceanus for safety. Tethys raised her lovingly, and in the Iliad Hera still speaks warmly of her foster parents. Later, when Zeus placed the nymph Callisto in the sky as the Great Bear, Hera asked Tethys and Oceanus never to let the constellation bathe in their waters.

This is why, the Greeks said, the Great Bear never sinks below the horizon as other stars do. In the Iliad, Hera also mentions that Tethys and Oceanus had quarreled and stopped sharing their bed, and she uses a visit to reconcile them as an excuse to borrow Aphrodite's charms. Even in these small details, Tethys appears as a respected elder of the gods.

Tethys had few temples of her own, but she appears in art beside Oceanus, often with small wings on her brow. She is sometimes confused with Thetis, the sea nymph who was the mother of Achilles, but they are different goddesses. For the Greeks, Tethys was the quiet source of the waters that nourished all life.