1122: 2p

Notes on Poseidon

I. Poseidon’s name

A. posis + da must mean something like “husband of earth” or possibly “lord

of earth”

B. but one can go in a large number of ways with that

1. is he “lord of earth”: a sky god, originally?

2. is he “husband of earth”: a different kind of hieros gamos?

3. what does the name have to do with the earthquakes?

C. thus, it’s very hard to nail down exactly where he came from, but it’s easy

to see how it all goes together:

II. Poseidon as Erupting Force

A. It could be because he’s originally a sea god, or he could have become a

sea god for this reason, but either way the thing that links Poseidon’s aspects

together is raw, erupting power

1. The sea (example movie “The Perfect Storm,” directed by

Wolfgang Petersen)

2. Earthquakes

3. horses

4. bulls

5. Monsters of various kinds

B. One odd feature of this theme is that in some myths Poseidon is the

erupting force that needs to be controlled by somebody else, and in others he’s

both the force and the control

1. Sometimes he’s the god of ships and sailors, and other times

opposed to them

2. Sometimes he’s the tamer of horses, and other times the horse

has to be bridled by Athena

3. This is a very important paradox in solving the riddle of his

relation to sexuality:

C. Poseidon and sex

1. In Demodocus’ song about Ares and Aphrodite, Poseidon functions

as a kind of sex policeman: while the other gods are laughing, he wants

the whole thing hushed up

a) There’s a wonderful example of the same dynamic in Disney’s

“The Little Mermaid,” when King Triton destroys the statue of Ariel’s

boyfriend

2. A more deadly version of the same theme appears at the end of

Euripides’ tragedy Hippolytus, when Hippolytus is killed by a bull sent

by Poseidon because his father Theseus has cursed Hippolytus. Theseus

is under the false impression that Hippolytus raped Theseus’ wife

(Hippolytus’ step-mom), Phaedra