nd consumed the pregnant Metis. He later developed a headache, and here the divergence among the myths merges. Athene was by all accounts Zeuss favorite child, and in many ways she was the most powerful god on Mount Olympus. Athene had many facets. She was her fathers child in bravery, protecting heroes in battle and just causes in war. But she was her mothers child in her just, compassionate behavior. She is the patron of the city of Athens, her gift of the olive tree defeating Poseidons gift in their conquest for the city. Athene is a virgin goddess, but unlike Artemis, she is equally compassionate towards men and women, and her favorite mortal was a man, Odysseus, whose cunning appealed to her. In one story Athene, unlike the other gods, acknowledges her mistakes. She accidentally killed her dearest friend, the mortal Palas, when she was new to the world, misjudging her own strength. From then on she placed his name before hers, making Pallas Athene her proper name, and her friend and terrible act a part of her forever.Circe was an enchantress encountered by Odysseus in Book X of The Odyssey. She amuses herself by turning the reconnaissance messengers, sent by the tactical Odysseus into pigs. Hermes saves Odysseus himself from succumbing to this fate by apprising him of the situation, giving him both, a magic flower to resist Circes magic and the warning not to go to her bed without first exacting a binding promise to ensure his safety. The now benevolent sorceress thus entertains Odysseus for a year. When Odysseus decides that he feels homesick again, Circe sends him to the realm of the dead to question the seer, Teiresias, telling him that he is fated to wander many strange paths before he can return to Ithaca.Demeter, goddess of the harvest, was Zeuss sister. She was responsible for bringing crops to fruition, wild and cultivated. If she did not give her blessing to the earth, famine and starvation would follow. Her daughter, Pers...
