88 MYTHOLOGY AND RELIGIOUS RITES. 
found them to be excellent allies but turbulent subjects, and was compelled 
to remand them to their confinement. Zeus liberated them a second time, 
and by their aid constrained Cronos to restore his devoured children, 
together with the stone Abadyr (afterwards preserved and known at Delphi 
as the sacred stone), and even sought to wrest from him the universal 
sovereignty. The Titans at this point assisted their brother Cronos, but 
Zeus, with the assistance of the Cyclopes and Hecatoncheiri, whom he 
liberated from Tartaros, conquered and hurled the faithless Titans once more 
to the infernal regions ( pl. 18, jig. 2). During this contest the gods were 
stationed on mount Olympus, while the Titans occupied the opposite moun 
tain Othrys. ORs 
Another war followed the accession of Zeus. The giants rose against him 
and his race, and sought to depose him from his authority. They piled 
mountain upon mountain in order to scale Olympos, hurled vast rocks at 
the gods, and shook the earth with their shouts of battle. The strife con- 
tinued long and fierce, but Zeus showered upon them the thunderbolts 
forged by the Cyclopes, and at last plunged them into the abyss below. 
Geea, exasperated at the defeat of her children, now brought forth Zyphon, 
a monstrous giant, to contend with the gods. Fire flashed from his mouth 
and eyes, serpents hissed from his hands, and a number of the gods in dis- 
may took flight. Zeus finally overcame him and placed him in the lower 
world, where, uniting with Hchidna, he became the sire of the three-headed 
dogs, Arthrus and Cerberus, the Lernean Hydra, the Chimera, and 
several other monsters. 
This terminated the war of the gods, of whom Zeus now became the 
sovereign. His family succeeded that of Cronos, to whom he assigned the 
government of H'lysion, situated upon the furthest ocean, where he repre- 
sents antiquity, and is the ruler of the uninterrupted golden age. 
Before entering upon a specific discussion of the new dynasty, it may be 
proper to devote a brief space to some of the personages already mentioned, 
as we shall not have occasion to refer to them again. 
Gea, the primeval mother of the original line of gods, after their subju- 
gation, did not wholly disappear from the rank of mythical beings. 
Temples were erected, and honors paid to her as the Great Goddess and 
Child-nourisher. She was appealed to in oaths, and as goddess of the earth 
was blended with other deities of the new system. 
From the wound inflicted by Cronos upon his father Uranos, drops of 
blood fell into the sea; and out of these sprang the Giants, the Lrinnyes, 
the Humenides, and the Delian nymphs. 
The Giants, of whom we shall speak more at large hereafter, were 
monsters of enormous size and almost invincible strength. Their appear- 
ance was rendered frightful by their long hair (which fell in disorder over 
their cheeks), and their dragon’s feet and tails; and in their battle with the 
gods they were subdued more by ingenuity than by power. 
The Lrinnyes ( pl. 23, fig. 14), called Alecto, Megwra, and Tisiphone, were 
the avengers of murder, perjury, and capital offences; in other words they 
executed the decrees of emesis, the impersonation of divine wrath. The 
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