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Water god in an ancient Roman mosaic. Zeugma Mosaic Museum, Gaziantep, Turkey. A water deity is a deity in mythology associated with water or various bodies of water.Water deities are common in mythology and were usually more important among civilizations in which the sea or ocean, or a great river was more important.
In Greek mythology, Proteus (/ ˈ p r oʊ t i ə s, ˈ p r oʊ t. j uː s / PROH-tee-əs, PROHT-yooss; [1] Ancient Greek: Πρωτεύς, romanized: Prōteús) is an early prophetic sea god or god of rivers and oceanic bodies of water, one of several deities whom Homer calls the "Old Man of the Sea" (hálios gérôn). [2]
With the sea goddess Thalassa (whose own name simply means "sea" but is derived from a Pre-Greek root), he fathered all sea life. [ 2 ] [ 6 ] [ 7 ] [ 8 ] In a Roman sculpture of the 2nd century AD, Pontus, rising from seaweed, grasps a rudder with his right hand and leans on the prow of a ship.
The river gods were depicted in one of three forms: a man-headed bull, a bull-headed man with the body of a serpent-like fish from the waist down, or as a reclining man with an arm resting upon an amphora jug pouring water. [citation needed] Notable river gods include:
Nereus (Νηρέας), the old man of the sea, and the god of the sea's rich bounty of fish; Nereids (Νηρηΐδες). Sea nymphs, the 50 daughters of Nereus and the Oceanid Doris. Arethusa (Αρετούσα), a daughter of Nereus who was transformed into a fountain; Dynamene (Δυναμένη), associated with the might and power of great ...
The primacy of water gods is reminiscent of, and may even have been influenced by, ancient Near Eastern mythology - where Tiamat (salt water) and Apsu (fresh water) are the first gods of the Enuma Elish, and where the Spirit of God is said to have "hovered over the waters" in Genesis. Pontus is the primordial deity of the sea.
Triton (/ ˈ t r aɪ t ɒ n /; Ancient Greek: Τρίτων, romanized: Trítōn) is a Greek god of the sea, the son of Poseidon and Amphitrite. Triton lived with his parents in a golden palace on the bottom of the sea. Later he is often depicted as having a conch shell he would blow like a trumpet. [citation needed]
'sea-nourished') [13] with Thetis. [14] In some sense, the sea-nymphs are doublets. Pindar, in his sixth Olympian Ode, recognized Poseidon's role as "great god of the sea, husband of Amphitrite, goddess of the golden spindle." For later poets, Amphitrite became simply a metaphor for the sea: Euripides, in Cyclops (702) and Ovid, Metamorphoses ...