title: Speed (1994 film)

text: In preparing the shooting script, one unnamed author had revised Yost's script in a manner that Yost had called "terrible". Yost spent three days "reconfiguring" this draft. Paul Attanasio was also brought in as a script doctor. Jan de Bont brought in Joss Whedon a week before principal photography started to work on the script. According to Yost: "Joss Whedon wrote 98.9 percent of the dialogue. We were very much in sync, it's just that I didn't write the dialogue as well as he did." One of Whedon's contributions was reworking Traven's character once Keanu Reeves was cast. Reeves did not like how the Jack Traven character came across in Yost's original screenplay. He felt that there were "situations set up for one-liners and I felt it was forced—"Die Hard" mixed with some kind of screwball comedy." With Reeves' input, Whedon changed Traven from being "a maverick hotshot" to "the polite guy trying not to get anybody killed," and removed the character's glib dialogue and made him more earnest.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Yost also gave Whedon credit for the "Pop quiz, hotshot" line. Another of Whedon's contributions was changing the character of Doug Stephens (Alan Ruck) from a lawyer ("a bad guy and he died", according to the writer) to a tourist, "just a nice, totally out-of-his-depth guy". Whedon worked predominantly on the dialogue, but also created a few significant plot points, like the killing of Harry Temple. Yost had originally planned for Temple to be the villain of the story, as he felt that having an off-screen antagonist would not be interesting. However, Yost recognized that there was a lot of work in the script to establish Temple as this villain. When Dennis Hopper was cast as Howard Payne, Yost recognized that Hopper's Payne readily worked as a villain, allowing them to rewrite Temple to be non-complicit in the bomb situation.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Jeff Speakman was originally attached to star in "Speed" when the project was under Paramount's management, but was dropped from the project when it was sold to 20th Century Fox. Stephen Baldwin, the first choice for the role of Jack Traven, declined the offer because he felt the character (as written in the earlier version of the script) was too much like the John McClane character from "Die Hard". According to Yost, they had also considered Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, Wesley Snipes, and Woody Harrelson. Director Jan de Bont ultimately cast Keanu Reeves as Jack Traven after seeing him in "Point Break". He felt that the actor was "vulnerable on the screen. He's not threatening to men because he's not that bulky, and he looks great to women". Reeves had dealt with the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) before on "Point Break", and said he noted their strong concern for human life, which he incorporated into Traven. The director did not want Traven to have long hair and wanted the character "to look strong and in control of himself". To that end, Reeves shaved his head almost completely. The director remembers, "everyone at the studio was scared shitless when they first saw it. There was only like a millimeter. What you see in the movie is actually grown in". Reeves also spent two months at Gold's Gym in Los Angeles to get in shape for the role.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: For the character of Annie, Yost said that they initially wrote the character as African American and as a paramedic as to justify how she would be able to handle driving a speeding bus through traffic. The role was offered to Halle Berry but she declined the part. Later, the character had then been changed to a driver's education teacher, and made the character more of a comic-relief sidekick to Jack, with Ellen DeGeneres in mind for the part. Instead, Annie became both Jack's sidekick and later love interest, leading to the casting of Sandra Bullock. Sandra Bullock came to read for "Speed" with Reeves to make sure there was the right chemistry between the two actors. She recalls that they had to do "all these really physical scenes together, rolling around on the floor and stuff." Meryl Streep and Kim Basinger were also offered the role of Annie but both declined. Anne Heche was offered the opportunity to consider the role.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Principal photography began on September 7, 1993, and completed on December 23, 1993, in Los Angeles. De Bont used an 80-foot model of a 50-story elevator shaft for the opening sequence. While "Speed" was in production, actor and Reeves's close friend River Phoenix died. Immediately after Phoenix died, de Bont changed the shooting schedule to work around Reeves and decided to give him scenes that were easier to do. "It got to him emotionally. He became very quiet, and it took him quite a while to work it out by himself and calm down. It scared the hell out of him", de Bont recalls. Initially, Reeves was nervous about the film's many action sequences but as the shooting progressed, he became more involved. He wanted to do the stunt in which Traven jumps from a Jaguar onto the bus himself, and rehearsed it in secret after de Bont disapproved. On the day of the sequence, Reeves did the stunt himself, terrifying de Bont in the process.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Eleven GM New Look buses (TDH-5303) and three Grumman 870 buses were used in the film's production. Two of them were blown up, one was used for the high-speed scenes, one had the front cut off for inside shots, and one was used solely for the "under bus" shots. Another bus was used for the bus jump scene, which was done in one take. The buses were painted in livery and colors approximating those of the Big Blue Bus serving Santa Monica, although the transit agency (Santa Monica Intercity Lines) and route (33 Downtown) were fictionalized for the film. One of the buses used for filming was sold at auction for in 2018.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Many of the film's freeway scenes were filmed on California's Interstate 105 and Interstate 110 at the stack interchange known today as the Judge Harry Pregerson Interchange, which was not officially open at the time of filming. While scouting this location, De Bont noticed big sections of road missing and told screenwriter Graham Yost to add the bus jump over the unfinished freeway to the script. In the scene in which the bus must jump across a gap in an uncompleted elevated freeway-to-freeway ramp while still under construction, a ramp was used to give the bus the necessary lift off so that it could jump the full fifty feet. The bus used in the jump was empty except for the driver, who wore a shock-absorbing harness that suspended him mid-air above the seat, so he could handle the jolt on landing, and avoid spinal injury (as was the case for many stuntmen in previous years that were handling similar stunts). The highway section the bus jumped over is the directional ramp from I-105 WB to I-110 NB (not the HOV ramp from I-110 SB to I-105 WB as commonly believed), and as the flyover was already constructed, a gap was added in the editing process using computer-generated imagery with the help of Sony Pictures Imageworks. A 2009 episode of "MythBusters" attempted to recreate the bus jump as proposed, including the various tricks that they knew were used by the filmmakers such as the ramp, and proved that the jump, as in the film, would never have been possible.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: On a commentary track on the region 1 DVD, De Bont reports that the bus jump stunt did not go as planned. To do the jump, the bus had everything possible removed to make it lighter. On the first try the stunt driver missed the ramp and crashed the bus, making it unusable. This was not reported to the studio at the time. A second bus was prepared and two days later a second attempt was successful. But, again, things did not go as intended. Advised that the bus would only go about 20 feet, the director placed one of his multiple cameras in a position that was supposed to capture the bus landing. However, the bus traveled much farther airborne than anyone had thought possible. It crashed down on top of the camera and destroyed it. Luckily, another camera placed about 90 feet from the jump ramp recorded the event.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Filming of the final scenes occurred at Mojave Airport, which doubled for Los Angeles International Airport. The shots of the LACMTA Metro Red Line through the construction zone were shot using an 1/8 scale model of the Metro Red Line, except for the jump when it derailed.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: The MD520N helicopter used throughout the film, registration N599DB, Serial LN024, was sold to the Calgary Police Service in 1995, where it was in use until 2006; it was then sold to a private owner.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: "Speed" was released on June 10, 1994, in 2,138 theaters in the United States and Canada and debuted at the number one position, grossing $14.5 million on its opening weekend. It set opening records for Fox in Brazil with a gross of $669,725 and in South Africa with a gross of $267,140. The film stayed in the number 1 spot before being taken by "Wolf". When "The Lion King" debuted on its third weekend, "Speed" continued to remain in second place. It spent eight consecutive weeks at number one in Australia and ten in Japan. It grossed $121.3 million in the United States and Canada and $229.2 million internationally for a worldwide total of $350.5 million, well above its $30–37 million production budget.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: "Speed" received rave reviews from critics. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 94% based on 70 reviews, with an average rating of 8.00/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "A terrific popcorn thriller, "Speed" is taut, tense, and energetic, with outstanding performances from Keanu Reeves, Dennis Hopper, and Sandra Bullock." On Metacritic the film has a weighted average score of 78 out of 100, based on 17 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Roger Ebert of "The Chicago Sun-Times" gave the film four out of four stars and wrote, "Films like "Speed" belong to the genre I call Bruised Forearm Movies, because you're always grabbing the arm of the person sitting next to you. Done wrong, they seem like tired replays of old chase cliches. Done well, they're fun. Done as well as "Speed", they generate a kind of manic exhilaration". Ebert also praised Hopper as "certainly the creepiest villain in the movies right now" and lauded Reeves's transition into a believable action star, after his earlier roles as "dreamy, sensitive characters". In his review for "Rolling Stone" magazine, Peter Travers wrote, "Action flicks are usually written off as a debased genre, unless, of course, they work. And "Speed" works like a charm. It's a reminder of how much movie escapism can still stir us when it's dished out with this kind of dazzle". In her review for "The New York Times", Janet Maslin wrote, "Mr. Hopper finds nice new ways to convey crazy menace with each new role. Certainly, he's the most colorful figure in a film that wastes no time on character development or personality". "Entertainment Weekly" gave the film an "A" rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, "It's a pleasure to be in the hands of an action filmmaker who respects the audience. De Bont's craftsmanship is so supple that even the triple ending feels justified, like the cataclysmic final stage of a Sega death match". "Time" magazine's Richard Schickel wrote, "The movie has two virtues essential to good pop thrillers. First, it plugs uncomplicatedly into lurking anxieties—in this case the ones we brush aside when we daily surrender ourselves to mass transit in a world where the loonies are everywhere". Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino named the film one of the twenty best films he had seen from 1992 to 2009.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: "Entertainment Weekly" magazine's Owen Gleiberman ranked "Speed" as 1994's eighth best film. The magazine also ranked the film eighth on their "The Best Rock-'em, Sock-'em Movies of the Past 25 Years" list. "Speed" also ranks 451 on "Empire" magazine's 2008 list of "The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time".


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: Mark Kermode of the BBC recalled having named "Speed" his film of the month working at Radio 1 at the time of release, and stated in 2017, having re-watched the film for the first time in many years, that it had stood the test of time and was a masterpiece.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: A soundtrack album featuring "songs from and inspired by" the film was released on June 28, 1994, with the following tracks. The soundtrack was commercially successful in Japan, being certified gold by the RIAJ in 2002.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: In addition to the soundtrack release, a separate album featuring 40 minutes of Mark Mancina's score from the film was released on August 30, 1994 by 20th Century Fox Film Scores. The CD track order does not follow the chronological order of the film's events.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: La-La Land Records and Fox Music released a limited expanded version of Mark Mancina's score on February 28, 2012. The newly remastered release features 69:25 of music spread over 32 tracks (in chronological order). In addition, it includes the song "Speed" by Billy Idol.


title: Speed (1994 film)

text: In 1997, a sequel, "Speed 2: Cruise Control", was released. Sandra Bullock agreed to star again as Annie, for financial backing for another project, but Keanu Reeves declined the offer to return as Jack. As a result, Jason Patric was written into the story as Alex Shaw, Annie's new boyfriend, with her and Jack having broken up due to her worry about Jack's dangerous lifestyle. Willem Dafoe starred as the villain John Geiger, and Glenn Plummer (who played Reeves's character's carjacking victim) also cameos as the same character, this time driving a boat that Alex takes control of. The film is considered one of the worst sequels of all time, scoring only 4% (based on 71 reviews) on Rotten Tomatoes.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf is a protagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's novels "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings". He is a wizard, one of the "Istari" order, and the leader of the Fellowship of the Ring. Tolkien took the name "Gandalf" from the Old Norse "Catalogue of Dwarves" ("Dvergatal") in the "Völuspá".


title: Gandalf

text: As a wizard and the bearer of one of the Three Rings, Gandalf has great power, but works mostly by encouraging and persuading. He sets out as Gandalf the Grey, possessing great knowledge and travelling continually. Gandalf is focused on the mission to counter the Dark Lord Sauron by destroying the One Ring. He is associated with fire; his ring of power is Narya, the Ring of Fire. As such, he delights in fireworks to entertain the hobbits of the Shire, while in great need he uses fire as a weapon. As one of the Maiar, he is an immortal spirit from Valinor, but his physical body can be killed.


title: Gandalf

text: In "The Hobbit", Gandalf assists the 13 dwarves and the hobbit Bilbo Baggins with their quest to retake the Lonely Mountain from Smaug the dragon, but leaves them to urge the White Council to expel Sauron from his fortress of Dol Guldur. In the course of the quest, Bilbo finds a magical ring. The expulsion succeeds, but in "The Lord of the Rings", Gandalf reveals that Sauron's retreat was only a feint, as he soon reappeared in Mordor. Gandalf further explains that, after years of investigation, he is sure that Bilbo's ring is the One Ring that Sauron needs to dominate the whole of Middle-earth. The Council of Elrond creates the Fellowship of the Ring, with Gandalf as its leader, to defeat Sauron by destroying the Ring. He takes them south through the Misty Mountains, but is killed fighting a Balrog, an evil spirit-being, in the underground realm of Moria. After he dies, he is sent back from Valinor to Middle-earth to complete his mission as Gandalf the White. He reappears in dazzling light to three of the Fellowship and helps to counter the enemy in Rohan, then in Gondor, and finally at the Black Gate of Mordor, in each case largely by offering guidance. When victory is complete, he crowns Aragorn as King before leaving Middle-earth for ever to return to Valinor.


title: Gandalf

text: Tolkien once described Gandalf as an angel incarnate; later, both he and other scholars have likened Gandalf to the Norse god Odin in his "Wanderer" guise. Others have described Gandalf as a guide-figure who assists the protagonists, comparable to the Cumaean Sibyl who assisted Aeneas in Virgil's "The Aeneid", or to Virgil himself in Dante's "Inferno". Scholars have likened his return in white to the transfiguration of Christ; he is further described as a prophet, representing one element of Christ's threefold office of prophet, priest, and king, where the other two roles are taken by Frodo and Aragorn.


title: Gandalf

text: The Gandalf character has been featured in radio, television, stage, video game, music, and film adaptations, including Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated film. His best-known portrayal is by Ian McKellen in Peter Jackson's 2001–2003 "The Lord of the Rings" film series, where the actor based his acclaimed performance on Tolkien himself. McKellen reprised the role in Jackson's 2012–2014 film series "The Hobbit".


title: Gandalf

text: Tolkien derived the name "Gandalf" from "Gandálfr", a dwarf in the Völuspá's "Dvergatal", a list of dwarf-names. In Old Norse, the name means "staff-elf". This is reflected in his name "Tharkûn", which is "said to mean 'Staff-man'" in Khuzdul, one of Tolkien's invented languages.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf is given several names and nicknames in Tolkien's writings. Faramir calls him the Grey Pilgrim, and reports Gandalf as saying, "Many are my names in many countries. "Mithrandir" among the Elves, Tharkûn to the Dwarves, Olórin I was in my youth in the West that is forgotten, in the South Incánus, in the North "Gandalf"; to the East I go not." In an early draft of "The Hobbit", he is called "Bladorthin", while the name Gandalf is used by the dwarf who later became Thorin Oakenshield.


title: Gandalf

text: Each Wizard is distinguished by the colour of his cloak. For most of his manifestation as a wizard, Gandalf's cloak is grey, hence the names Gandalf "the Grey" and Greyhame, from Old English hame, "cover, skin". "Mithrandir" is a name in Sindarin meaning "the Grey Pilgrim" or "the Grey Wanderer". Midway through "The Lord of the Rings", Gandalf becomes the head of the order of Wizards, and is renamed Gandalf the White. This change in status (and clothing) introduces another name for the wizard: the White Rider. However, characters who speak Elvish still refer to him as "Mithrandir". At times in "The Lord of the Rings", other characters address Gandalf by insulting nicknames: Stormcrow, "Láthspell" ("Ill-news" in Old English), and "Grey Fool".


title: Gandalf

text: Tolkien describes Gandalf as the last of the wizards to appear in Middle-earth, one who "seemed the least, less tall than the others, and in looks more aged, grey-haired and grey-clad, and leaning on a staff". Yet the Elf Círdan who met him on arrival nevertheless considered him "the greatest spirit and the wisest" and gave him the Elven Ring of Power called Narya, the Ring of Fire, containing a "red" stone for his aid and comfort. Tolkien explicitly links Gandalf to the element fire later in the same essay:


title: Gandalf

text: In Valinor, Gandalf was called "Olórin". He was one of the Maiar of Valinor, specifically, one of the people of the Vala Manwë; he was said to be the wisest of the Maiar. He was closely associated with two other Valar: Irmo, in whose gardens he lived, and Nienna, the patron of mercy, who gave him tutelage. When the Valar decided to send the order of the Wizards (Istari) across the Great Sea to Middle-earth to counsel and assist all those who opposed Sauron, Olórin was proposed by Manwë. Olórin initially begged to be excused, declaring he was too weak and that he feared Sauron, but Manwë replied that that was all the more reason for him to go.


title: Gandalf

text: As one of the Maiar, Gandalf was not a mortal Man but an angelic being who had taken human form. As one of those spirits, Olórin was in service to the Creator (Eru Ilúvatar) and the Creator's 'Secret Fire'. Along with the other Maiar who entered into Middle-earth as the five Wizards, he took on the specific form of an old man as a sign of his humility. The role of the wizards was to advise and counsel but never to attempt to match Sauron's strength with their own. It might be, too, that the kings and lords of Middle-earth would be more receptive to the advice of a humble old man than a more glorious form giving them direct commands.


title: Gandalf

text: The wizards arrived in Middle-earth separately, early in the Third Age; Gandalf was the last, landing in the Havens of Mithlond. He seemed the oldest and least in stature, but Círdan the Shipwright felt that he was the greatest on their first meeting in the Havens, and gave him Narya, the Ring of Fire. Saruman, the chief Wizard, learned of the gift and resented it. Gandalf hid the ring well, and it was not widely known until he left with the other ring-bearers at the end of the Third Age that he, and not Círdan, was the holder of the third of the Elven-rings.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf's relationship with Saruman, the head of their Order, was strained. The Wizards were commanded to aid Men, Elves, and Dwarves, but only through counsel; they were forbidden to use force to dominate them, though Saruman increasingly disregarded this.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf suspected early on that an evil presence, the Necromancer of Dol Guldur, was not a Nazgûl but Sauron himself. He went to Dol Guldur to discover the truth, but the Necromancer withdrew before him, only to return with greater force, and the White Council was formed in response. Galadriel had hoped Gandalf would lead the council, but he refused, declining to be bound by any but the Valar who had sent him. Saruman was chosen instead, as the most knowledgeable about Sauron's work in the Second Age.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf returned to Dol Guldur "at great peril" and learned that the Necromancer was indeed Sauron. The following year a White Council was held, and Gandalf urged that Sauron be driven out. Saruman, however, reassured the Council that Sauron's evident effort to find the One Ring would fail, as the Ring would long since have been carried by the river Anduin to the Sea; and the matter was allowed to rest. But Saruman began actively seeking the Ring near the Gladden Fields where Isildur had been killed.


title: Gandalf

text: "The Quest of Erebor" in "Unfinished Tales" elaborates upon the story behind "The Hobbit". It tells of a chance meeting between Gandalf and Thorin Oakenshield, a Dwarf-king in exile, in the "Prancing Pony" inn at Bree. Gandalf had for some time foreseen the coming war with Sauron, and knew that the North was especially vulnerable. If Rivendell were to be attacked, the dragon Smaug could cause great devastation. He persuaded Thorin that he could help him regain his lost territory of Erebor from Smaug, and so the quest was born.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf meets with Bilbo in the opening of "The Hobbit". He arranges for a tea party, to which he invites the thirteen dwarves, and thus arranges the travelling group central to the narrative. Gandalf contributes the map and key to Erebor to assist the quest. On this quest Gandalf acquires the sword, "Glamdring", from the trolls' treasure hoard. Elrond informs them that the sword was made in Gondolin, a city long ago destroyed, where Elrond's father lived as a child.


title: Gandalf

text: After escaping from the Misty Mountains pursued by goblins and wargs, the party is carried to safety by the Great Eagles. Gandalf then persuades Beorn to house and provision the company for the trip through Mirkwood. Gandalf leaves the company before they enter Mirkwood, saying that he had pressing business to attend to.


title: Gandalf

text: He turns up again before the walls of Erebor disguised as an old man, revealing himself when it seems the Men of Esgaroth and the Mirkwood Elves will fight Thorin and the dwarves over Smaug's treasure. The Battle of Five Armies ensues when hosts of goblins and wargs attack all three parties. After the battle, Gandalf accompanies Bilbo back to the Shire, revealing at Rivendell what his pressing business had been: Gandalf had once again urged the council to evict Sauron, since quite evidently Sauron did not require the One Ring to continue to attract evil to Mirkwood. Then the Council "put[s] forth its power" and drives Sauron from Dol Guldur. Sauron had anticipated this, and had feigned a withdrawal, only to reappear in Mordor.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf spent the years between "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings" travelling Middle-earth in search of information on Sauron's resurgence and Bilbo Baggins's mysterious ring, spurred particularly by Bilbo's initial misleading story of how he had obtained it as a "present" from Gollum. During this period, he befriended Aragorn and became suspicious of Saruman. He spent as much time as he could in the Shire, strengthening his friendship with Bilbo and Frodo, Bilbo's orphaned cousin and adopted heir.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf returns to the Shire for Bilbo's "eleventy-first" (111th) birthday party, bringing many fireworks for the occasion. After Bilbo, as a prank on his guests, puts on the ring and disappears, Gandalf strongly encourages his old friend to leave the ring to Frodo, as they had planned. Bilbo becomes hostile and accuses Gandalf of trying to steal the ring. Alarmed, Gandalf impresses on Bilbo the foolishness of this accusation. Coming to his senses, Bilbo admits that the ring has been troubling him, and leaves it behind for Frodo as he departs for Rivendell.


title: Gandalf

text: Over the next 17 years, Gandalf travels extensively, searching for answers on the ring. He finds some answers in Isildur's scroll, in the archives of Minas Tirith. He also wants to question Gollum, who had borne the ring for many years. Gandalf searches long and hard for Gollum, often assisted by Aragorn. Aragorn eventually succeeds in capturing Gollum. Gandalf questions Gollum, threatening him with fire when he proves unwilling to speak. Gandalf learns that Sauron has forced Gollum under torture in his fortress, Barad-dûr, to tell what he knows of the ring. This reinforces Gandalf's growing suspicion that Bilbo's ring is the One Ring.


title: Gandalf

text: Returning to the Shire, Gandalf confirms his suspicion by throwing the Ring into Frodo's hearth-fire and reading the writing that appears on the Ring's surface. He tells Frodo the history of the Ring, and urges him to take it to Rivendell, saying that he would be in grave danger if he stayed in the Shire. Gandalf says he will attempt to return for Frodo's 50th birthday party, to accompany him on the road; and that meanwhile Frodo should arrange to leave quietly, as the servants of Sauron will be searching for him.


title: Gandalf

text: Outside the Shire, Gandalf encounters the wizard Radagast the Brown, who brings the news that the Nazgûl have ridden out of Mordor—and a request from Saruman that Gandalf come to Isengard. Gandalf leaves a letter to Frodo (urging his immediate departure) with Barliman Butterbur at the Prancing Pony, and heads towards Isengard. There Saruman reveals his true intentions, urging Gandalf to help him obtain the Ring for his own use. Gandalf refuses, and Saruman imprisons him at the top of his tower. Eventually Gandalf is rescued by Gwaihir the Eagle.


title: Gandalf

text: Gwaihir sets Gandalf down in Rohan, where Gandalf appeals to King Théoden for a horse. Théoden, under the evil influence of Gríma Wormtongue, Saruman's spy and servant, tells Gandalf to take any horse he pleases, but to leave quickly. It is then that Gandalf meets the great horse Shadowfax who will be his mount and companion. Gandalf rides hard for the Shire, but does not reach it until after Frodo has set out. Knowing that Frodo and his companions will be heading for Rivendell, Gandalf makes his own way there. He learns at Bree that the Hobbits have fallen in with Aragorn. He faces the Nazgûl at Weathertop but escapes after an all-night battle, drawing four of them northward. Frodo, Aragorn and company face the remaining five on Weathertop a few nights later. Gandalf reaches Rivendell just before Frodo's arrival.


title: Gandalf

text: In Rivendell, Gandalf helps Elrond drive off the Nazgûl pursuing Frodo, and plays a leading role in the Council of Elrond as the only person who knows the full history of the Ring. He reveals that Saruman has betrayed them and is in league with Sauron. When it is decided that the Ring has to be destroyed, Gandalf volunteers to accompany Frodo—now the Ring-bearer—in his quest. He persuades Elrond to let Frodo's cousins Merry and Pippin join the Fellowship.


title: Gandalf

text: Taking charge of the Fellowship (comprising nine representatives of the free peoples of Middle-earth, "set against the Nine Riders"), Gandalf and Aragorn lead the Hobbits and their companions south. After an unsuccessful attempt to cross Mount Caradhras in winter, they cross under the mountains through the Mines of Moria under the Misty Mountains, though only Gimli the Dwarf is enthusiastic about that route. In Moria, they discover that the dwarf colony established there by Balin has been annihilated by orcs. The Fellowship fights with the orcs and trolls of Moria and escapes them.


title: Gandalf

text: At the Bridge of Khazad-dûm, they encounter "Durin's Bane", a fearsome Balrog from ancient times. Gandalf faces the Balrog to enable the others to escape. After a brief exchange of blows, Gandalf breaks the bridge beneath the Balrog with his staff. As the Balrog falls, it wraps its whip around Gandalf's legs, dragging him over the edge. Gandalf falls into the abyss, crying "Fly, you fools!".


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf and the Balrog fall into a deep lake in Moria's underworld. Gandalf pursues the Balrog through the tunnels for eight days until they climb to the peak of Zirakzigil. Here they fight for two days and nights. The Balrog is defeated and cast down onto the mountainside. Gandalf too dies, and his body lies on the peak while his spirit travels "out of thought and time".


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf is "sent back" as Gandalf the White, and returns to life on the mountain top. Gwaihir carries him to Lothlórien, where he is healed of his injuries and re-clothed in white robes by Galadriel. He travels to Fangorn Forest, where he encounters Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas (who are tracking Merry and Pippin). They mistake him for Saruman, but he stops their attacks and reveals himself.


title: Gandalf

text: They travel to Rohan, where Gandalf finds that king Théoden has been further weakened by Wormtongue's influence. He breaks Wormtongue's hold over Théoden, and convinces the king to join in the fight against Sauron. Gandalf sets off to gather warriors of the Westfold to assist Théoden in the coming battle with Saruman. Gandalf arrives just in time to defeat Saruman's army in the battle of Helm's Deep. Gandalf and the King ride to Isengard, which has just been destroyed by Treebeard and his Ents, who are accompanied by Merry and Pippin. Gandalf breaks Saruman's staff and expels him from the White Council and the Order of Wizards; Gandalf takes Saruman's place as head of both. Wormtongue makes an attempt to kill Gandalf or Saruman with the "palantír" of Orthanc, but misses both. Pippin retrieves the "palantír", but Gandalf quickly takes it, passing it to Aragorn. After the group leaves Isengard, Pippin takes the palantír from a sleeping Gandalf, looks into it, and comes face to face with Sauron himself. Gandalf takes the chastened Pippin with him to Minas Tirith to keep the young hobbit out of further trouble.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf arrives in time to help to arrange the defences of Minas Tirith. His presence is resented by Denethor, the Steward of Gondor; but when his son Faramir is gravely wounded in battle, Denethor sinks into despair and madness. Together with Prince Imrahil, Gandalf leads the defenders during the siege of the city. When the forces of Mordor break the main gate, Gandalf, alone on Shadowfax, confronts the Lord of the Nazgûl. At that moment the Rohirrim arrive, compelling the Nazgûl to withdraw to fight. Gandalf is required to save Faramir from Denethor, who seeks in desperation to burn himself and his son on a funeral pyre.


title: Gandalf

text: Aragorn and Gandalf lead the final campaign against Sauron's forces at the Black Gate, in an effort to distract the Dark Lord's attention from Frodo and Sam; they are at that moment scaling Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring. In a parley before the battle, Gandalf and the other leaders of the West meet the nameless lieutenant of Mordor, who shows them Frodo's "mithril" shirt and other items from the Hobbits' equipment. Gandalf rejects Mordor's terms of surrender, and the forces of the West face the full might of Sauron's armies, until the Ring is destroyed in Mount Doom. Gandalf leads the Eagles to rescue Frodo and Sam from the erupting mountain.


title: Gandalf

text: After the war, Gandalf crowns Aragorn as King Elessar, and helps him find a sapling of the White Tree of Gondor. He accompanies the Hobbits back to the borders of the Shire, before leaving to visit Tom Bombadil.


title: Gandalf

text: Two years later, Gandalf departs Middle-earth for ever. He boards the Ringbearers' ship in the Grey Havens and sets sail to return across the sea to the Undying Lands; with him are his friends Frodo, Bilbo, Galadriel, and Elrond, and his horse Shadowfax.


title: Gandalf

text: Tolkien's biographer Humphrey Carpenter relates that Tolkien owned a postcard entitled "Der Berggeist" ("the mountain spirit"), which he labelled "the origin of Gandalf". It shows a white-bearded man in a large hat and cloak seated among boulders in a mountain forest. Carpenter said that Tolkien recalled buying the postcard during his holiday in Switzerland in 1911. Manfred Zimmerman, however, discovered that the painting was by the German artist Josef Madlener and dates from the mid-1920s. Carpenter acknowledged that Tolkien was probably mistaken about the origin of the postcard. An additional influence may have been Väinämöinen, an old and wise demigod and the central character in Finnish folklore and the national epic "Kalevala" by Elias Lönnrot.


title: Gandalf

text: Throughout the early drafts, and through to the first edition of "The Hobbit", Bladorthin/Gandalf is described as being a "little old man", distinct from a dwarf, but not of the full human stature that would later be described in "The Lord of the Rings". Even in "The Lord of the Rings", Gandalf was not tall; shorter, for example, than Elrond or the other wizards.


title: Gandalf

text: When writing "The Hobbit" in the early 1930s Tolkien gave the name "Gandalf" to the leader of the Dwarves, the character later called Thorin Oakenshield. The name is taken from the same source as all the other Dwarf names (save Balin) in "The Hobbit": the "" in the "Völuspá". The Old Norse name ' incorporates the words ' meaning "wand", "staff" or (especially in compounds) "magic" and "" "elf". The name "Gandalf" is found in at least one more place in Norse myth, in the semi-historical Heimskringla, which briefly describes Gandalf Alfgeirsson, a legendary Norse king from eastern Norway and rival of Halfdan the Black. Gandalf is also the name of a Norse sea-king in Henrik Ibsen's second play, "The Burial Mound". The name "Gandolf" occurs as a character in William Morris' 1896 fantasy novel "The Well at the World's End", along with the horse "Silverfax", adapted by Tolkien as Gandalf's horse "Shadowfax". Morris' book, inspired by Norse myth, is set in a pseudo-medieval landscape; it deeply influenced Tolkien. The wizard that became Gandalf was originally named "Bladorthin".


title: Gandalf

text: Tolkien came to regret his "ad hoc" use of Old Norse names, referring to a "rabble of eddaic-named dwarves, ... invented in an idle hour" in 1937. But the decision to use Old Norse names came to have far-reaching consequences in the composition of "The Lord of the Rings"; in 1942, Tolkien decided that the work was to be a purported translation from the fictional language of Westron, and in the English translation Old Norse names were taken to represent names in the language of Dale. "Gandalf", in this setting, is thus a representation in English (anglicised from Old Norse) of the name the Dwarves of Erebor had given to Olórin in the language they used "externally" in their daily affairs, while "Tharkûn" is the (untranslated) name, presumably of the same meaning, that the Dwarves gave him in their native Khuzdul language.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf's role and importance was substantially increased in the conception of "The Lord of the Rings", and in a letter of 1954, Tolkien refers to Gandalf as an "angel incarnate". In the same letter Tolkien states he was given the form of an old man in order to limit his powers on Earth. Both in 1965 and 1971 Tolkien again refers to Gandalf as an angelic being.


title: Gandalf

text: In a 1946 letter, Tolkien stated that he thought of Gandalf as an "Odinic wanderer". Other commentators have similarly compared Gandalf to the Norse god Odin in his "Wanderer" guise—an old man with one eye, a long white beard, a wide brimmed hat, and a staff, or likened him to Merlin of Arthurian legend or the Jungian archetype of the "wise old man".


title: Gandalf

text: The Tolkien scholar Charles W. Nelson described Gandalf as a "guide who .. assists a major character on a journey or quest .. to unusual and distant places". He noted that in both "The Fellowship of the Ring" and "The Hobbit", Tolkien presents Gandalf in these terms. Immediately after the Council of Elrond, Gandalf tells the Fellowship:


title: Gandalf

text: Nelson gives as examples of the guide figure the Cumaean Sibyl who assisted Aeneas on his journey through the underworld in Virgil's tale "The Aeneid", and then Virgil himself in Dante's "Inferno", directing, encouraging, and physically assisting Dante as he travels through hell. In English literature, Nelson notes, Thomas Malory's "Le Morte d'Arthur" has the wizard Merlin teaching and directing Arthur to begin his journeys. Given these precedents, Nelson remarks, it was unsurprising that Tolkien should make use of a guide figure, endowing him, like these predecessors, with power, wisdom, experience, and practical knowledge, and "aware[ness] of [his] own limitations and [his] ranking in the order of the great". Other characters who act as wise and good guides include Tom Bombadil, Elrond, Aragorn, Galadriel—who he calls perhaps the most powerful of the guide figures—and briefly also Faramir.


title: Gandalf

text: Nelson writes that there is equally historical precedent for wicked guides, such as Edmund Spenser's "evil palmers" in "The Faerie Queene", and suggests that Gollum functions as an evil guide, contrasted with Gandalf, in "Lord of the Rings". He notes that both Gollum and Gandalf are servants of The One, Eru Ilúvatar, in the struggle against the forces of darkness, and "ironically" all of them, good and bad, are necessary to the success of the quest. He comments, too, that despite Gandalf's evident power, and the moment when he faces the Lord of the Nazgûl, he stays in the role of guide throughout, "never directly confront[ing] his enemies with his raw power."


title: Gandalf

text: The critic Anne C. Petty, writing about "Allegory" in the "J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia", discusses Gandalf's death and reappearance in Christian terms. She cites Michael W. Maher, S.J.: "who could not think of Gandalf's descent into the pits of Moria and his return clothed in white as a death-resurrection motif?" She at once notes, however, that "such a narrow [allegorical] interpretation" limits the reader's imagination by demanding a single meaning for each character and event. Other scholars and theologians have likened Gandalf's return as a "gleaming white" figure to the transfiguration of Christ.


title: Gandalf

text: The philosopher Peter Kreeft, like Tolkien a Roman Catholic, observes that there is no one complete, concrete, visible Christ figure in "The Lord of the Rings" comparable to Aslan in C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia series. However, Kreeft and Jean Chausse have identified reflections of the figure of Jesus Christ in three protagonists of "The Lord of the Rings": Gandalf, Frodo and Aragorn. While Chausse found "facets of the personality of Jesus" in them, Kreeft wrote that "they exemplify the Old Testament threefold Messianic symbolism of prophet (Gandalf), priest (Frodo), and king (Aragorn)."


title: Gandalf

text: In the BBC Radio dramatisations, Gandalf has been voiced by Norman Shelley in "The Lord of the Rings" (1955–1956), Heron Carvic in "The Hobbit" (1968), Bernard Mayes in "The Lord of the Rings" (1979), and Sir Michael Hordern in "The Lord of the Rings" (1981).


title: Gandalf

text: John Huston voiced Gandalf in the animated films "The Hobbit" (1977) and "The Return of the King" (1980) produced by Rankin/Bass. William Squire voiced Gandalf in the animated film "The Lord of the Rings" (1978) directed by Ralph Bakshi. Ivan I. Krasko played Gandalf in the Soviet film adaptation "The Hobbit" (1985). Gandalf was portrayed by Vesa Vierikko in the Finnish television miniseries "Hobitit" (1993).


title: Gandalf

text: Ian McKellen portrayed Gandalf in "The Lord of the Rings" film series (2001–2003), directed by Peter Jackson, after Sean Connery and Patrick Stewart both turned down the role. According to Jackson, McKellen based his performance as Gandalf on Tolkien himself:


title: Gandalf

text: McKellen received widespread acclaim for his portrayal of Gandalf, particularly in "", for which he received a Screen Actors Guild Award and an Academy Award nomination, both for best supporting actor. "Empire" named Gandalf, as portrayed by McKellen, the 30th greatest film character of all time. He reprised the role in "The Hobbit" film series (2012–2014), claiming that he enjoyed playing Gandalf the Grey more than Gandalf the White. He voiced Gandalf for several video games based on the films, including "", "", and "".


title: Gandalf

text: Charles Picard portrayed Gandalf in the 1999 stage production of "The Two Towers" at Chicago's Lifeline Theatre. Brent Carver portrayed Gandalf in the 2006 musical production "The Lord of the Rings", which opened in Toronto.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf appears in "The Lego Movie", voiced by Todd Hanson. Gandalf is a main character in the video game "Lego Dimensions" and is voiced by Tom Kane.


title: Gandalf

text: Gandalf has his own movement in Johan de Meij's Symphony No. 1 "The Lord of the Rings", which was written for concert band and premiered in 1988.


title: Helios

text: In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Helios (; ; Homeric Greek: ) is the god and personification of the Sun (Solar deity). His name is also Latinized as Helius, and he is often given the epithets Hyperion ("the one above") and Phaethon ("the shining"). Helios is often depicted in art with a radiant crown and driving a horse-drawn chariot through the sky. He was a guardian of oaths and also the god of sight. Though Helios was a relatively minor deity in Classical Greece, his worship grew more prominent in late antiquity thanks to his identification with several major solar divinities of the Roman period, particularly Apollo and Sol. The Roman Emperor Julian made Helios the central divinity of his short-lived revival of traditional Roman religious practices in the 4th century AD.


title: Helios

text: Helios figures prominently in several works of Greek mythology, poetry, and literature, in which he is often described as the son of the Titans Hyperion and Theia and brother of the goddesses Selene (the Moon) and Eos (the Dawn). Helios' most notable role in Greek mythology is the story of his mortal son Phaethon who asked his father for a favour; Helios agreed, but then Phaethon asked for the privilege to drive his four-horse fiery chariot across the skies for a single day. Although Helios warned his son again and again against this choice, explaining to him the dangers of such a journey that no other god but him was capable to bring about, Phaethon was hard to deter, and thus Helios was forced to hand him the reins. As expected, the ride was disastrous and Zeus struck the youth with one of his lightning bolts to stop him from burning or freezing the earth beyond salvation. Other than this myth, Helios occasionally appears in myths of other characters, witnessing oaths or interacting with other gods and mortals.


title: Helios

text: In the Homeric epics, his most notable role is the one he plays in the "Odyssey", where Odysseus' men despite his warnings impiously kill and eat his sacred cattle the god kept at Thrinacia, his sacred island. Once informed of their misdeed, Helios in wrath asks Zeus to punish those who wronged him, and Zeus agreeing strikes their ship with a thunderbolt, killing everyone, except for Odysseus himself, the only one who had not harmed the god's cattle, and was allowed to live. After that, Helios troubles Odysseus no more in his journey.


title: Helios

text: Due to his position as the sun, he was believed to be an all-seeing witness, and thus was often invoked in oaths. He also played a significant part in ancient magic and spells. In art he is usually depicted as a beardless youth in a chiton holding a whip and driving his quadriga, accompanied by various other celestial gods such as Selene, Eos, or the stars. In ancient times he was worshipped in several places of ancient Greece, though his major cult centers were the island of Rhodes, of which he was patron god, Corinth and the greater Corinthia region. The Colossus of Rhodes, a gigantic statue of the god, adorned the port of Rhodes until it was destroyed in an earthquake, thereupon it was not built again.


title: Helios

text: The Greek gender view of the world was also present in their language. Ancient Greek had three genders (masculine, feminine and neuter), so when an object or a concept was personified as a deity, it inherited the gender of the relevant noun; "helios" is a masculine noun, so the god embodying it is also by necessity male. The Greek ( , , , ) (from earlier /hāwelios/) is the inherited word for the Sun from Proto-Indo-European "*" which is cognate with Latin "sol", Sanskrit "surya", Old English "swegl", Old Norse sól, Welsh "haul", Avestan "hvar", etc. The Doric and Aeolic form of the name is , "Hálios". In Homeric Greek his name is spelled , "Ēélios", with the Doric spelling of that being , "Aélios". In Cretan it was ("Abélios") or ("Awélios"). The female offspring of Helios were called Heliades, the male Heliadae.


title: Helios

text: The author of the "Suda" lexicon tried to etymologically connect "" to the word , "aollízesthai", "coming together" during the daytime, or perhaps from , "aleaínein", "warming". Plato in his dialogue "Cratylus" suggested several etymologies for the word, proposing among others a connection, via the Doric form of the word "halios", to the words , "halízein", meaning collecting men when he rises, or from the phrase , "aeí heileín", "ever turning" because he always turns the earth in his course:


title: Helios

text: Doric Greek retained Proto-Greek long *ā as α, while Attic changed it in most cases, including in this word, to η.


title: Helios

text: "Cratylus" and the etymologies Plato gives are contradicted by modern scholarship. From "helios" comes the modern English prefix "helio-", meaning "pertaining to the Sun", used in compounds word such as "heliocentrism", "aphelion", "heliotropium", "heliophobia" (fear of the sun) and "heliolatry" ("sun-worship").


title: Helios

text: Helios most likely is Proto-Indo-European in origin. Walter Burkert wrote that "... Helios, the sun god, and Eos-Aurora, the goddess of the dawn, are of impeccable Indo-European lineage both in etymology and in their status as gods" and might have played a role in PIE poetry. The imagery surrounding a chariot-driving solar deity is likely Indo-European in origin. Greek solar imagery begins with the gods Helios and Eos, who are brother and sister, and who become in the day-and-night- cycle the day ("hemera") and the evening ("hespera"), as she accompanies him in his journey across the skies. At night, he pastures his steeds and travels east in a golden boat. In them evident is the Indo-European grouping of a sun god and his sister, and the equine pair.


title: Helios

text: The name Helen is thought to share the same etymology as Helios and may express an early alternate personification of the sun among Hellenic peoples. The Proto-Indo-European sun goddess's name "*Seh₂ul" has been reconstructed based on several solar mythological figures, like Helios and Helen, the Germanic Sól, the Roman Sol, and others, all of which are considered derivatives of this proto-sun goddess. In PIE mythology, the Sun, a female figure, was seen as a pair with the Moon, a male figure, which in Greek mythology is recognized in the female deity Selene, usually united in marriage. Martin L. West proposed the reconstruction of a PIE suffix -"nā", so that Helena's name would roughly translate to "mistress of sunlight", connecting to "hḗlios" and denoting the goddess controlling the natural element. Helen might have originally been considered to be a daughter of the Sun, as she hatched from an egg and was given tree worship, features associated with the PIE Sun Maiden; in surviving Greek tradition however Helen is never said to be Helios' daughter, instead being the daughter of Zeus, except in one late and extremely disreputable source, Ptolemaeus Chennus.


title: Helios

text: Although the Mycenaean Greek word has been reconstructed as "*hāwélios", no unambiguous attestations of the word and the god for the sun have been discovered so far in Linear B tablets. It has been proposed that in the Mycenaean pantheon existed a female sun goddess, ancestor/predecessor to Helios and closely related to Helen of Troy. While Helen was not a goddess in the homeric epics, she was worshipped as one in Laconia and in Rhodes, where Helios was also a major deity; those cults had not risen out of the epic myth, rather they had been so from the start.


title: Helios

text: It has been suggested that the Phoenicians brought over the cult of their patron god Baal among others (such as Astarte) to Corinth, who was then continued to be worshipped under the native name/god Helios, similarly to how Astarte was worshipped as Aphrodite, and the Phoenician Melqart was adopted as the sea-god Melicertes/Palaemon, who also had a significant cult in the isthmus of Corinth.


title: Helios

text: Helios' journey on a chariot during the day and travel with a boat in the ocean at night is likely a reflection of the Egyptian sun god Ra sailing across the skies in a barque and through the body of the sky goddess Nut to be reborn at dawn each morning anew; both gods were known as the (all-seeing in Helios's case) Eye of the Heaven in their respective pantheons.


title: Helios

text: Helios is the son of Hyperion and Theia, or Euryphaessa, or Aethra, or Basileia, the only brother of the goddesses Eos and Selene. If the order of mention of the three siblings is meant to be taken as their birth order, then out of the four authors that give him and his sisters a birth order, two make him the oldest child, one the middle, and the other the youngest. Helios was not among the regular and more prominent deities, rather he was a more shadowy member of the Olympian circle, though in spite of him being a relatively marginal god, he was one of the most ancient ones, and one that the other gods did not want to meddle with. From his lineage, Helios might thus be described as a second generation Titan, but the ancient Greeks were fairly vague on the matter. Homer in the "Odyssey" calls him "Helios Hyperion" (literally "the Sun up above"), with Hyperion used in a patronymic sense to Helios. In the "Odyssey", "Theogony" and the "Homeric Hymn to Demeter", Helios is once in each work called ("Hyperionídēs", "the son of Hyperion") and this example is followed by many later poets (like Pindar), who distinguish between Helios and Hyperion; in later literature the two gods are distinctly father and son. In literature, it is not uncommon for authors to use "Hyperion's bright son" instead of his proper name when referring to the Sun. He is associated with harmony and order, both in the sense of society and the literal movement of the celestial bodies; in this regard, he resembles Apollo a lot, a god he was very often identified with.


title: Helios

text: Helios is usually depicted as a handsome young man crowned with the shining aureole of the Sun who drove the chariot of the Sun across the sky each day to Earth-circling Oceanus and through the world-ocean returned to the East at night. Beyond his Homeric Hymn, not many texts describe his physical appearance; Euripides describes him as "" (khrysо̄pós) meaning "golden-eyed/faced" or "beaming like gold", Mesomedes of Crete writes that he has golden hair, and Apollonius Rhodius that he has light-emitting, golden eyes. According to Augustan poet Ovid, he dressed in tyrian purple robes and sat on a throne of bright emeralds. In ancient artefacts (such as coins, vases, or reliefs) he is presented as a beautiful youth with wavy hair, a strong god in the bloom of youth, with a crown of rays upon his head. His solar crown traditionally had twelve rays, symbolising the twelve months of the year. He was usually represented clothed, his face somewhat full. In the "Homeric Hymn to Helios", Helios is said to drive the golden chariot drawn by steeds; and Pindar speaks of Helios's "fire-darting steeds". Still later, the horses were given fire related names: Pyrois ("The Fiery One"), Aeos ("he of the dawn"), Aethon ("Blazing"), and Phlegon ("Burning"). In a Mithraic invocation, Helios's appearance is given as thus:


title: Helios

text: A god is then summoned. He is described as "a youth, fair to behold, with fiery hair, clothed in a white tunic and a scarlet cloak and wearing a fiery crown." He is named as "Helios, lord of heaven and earth, god of gods."


title: Helios

text: As mentioned above, the imagery surrounding a chariot-driving solar deity is likely Indo-European in origin and is common to both early Greek and Near Eastern religions. The earliest artistic representations of the "chariot god" come from the Parthian period (3rd century) in Persia where there is evidence of rituals being performed for the sun god by Magi, indicating an assimilation of the worship of Helios and Mithras.


title: Helios

text: Helios is seen as both a personification of the Sun and the fundamental creative power behind it and as a result is often worshiped as a god of life and creation. Homer described Helios as a god "who gives joy to mortals" and other ancient texts give him the epithet "gracious" (""), given that he is the source of life and regeneration and associated with the creation of the world. The comic playwright Aristophanes in "Nephelae" describes Helios as "the horse-guider, who fills the plain of the earth with exceeding bright beams, a mighty deity among gods and mortals." One passage recorded in the Greek Magical Papyri says of Helios, "the earth flourished when you shone forth and made the plants fruitful when you laughed and brought to life the living creatures when you permitted." He is said to have helped create animals out of primeval mud.


title: Helios

text: Helios was envisioned as a god driving his chariot from east to west each day, pulled by four white horses. In the ancient world people were not too troubled over how his chariot flew through the sky, as they did not envision the Earth as a spherical object, so Helios would not be travelling around a globe in an orbit; rather he crossed the sky from east to west each morning in a linear direction. The chariot and his horses are mentioned by neither Homer nor Hesiod, the earliest work in which they are attested being the "Homeric Hymn to Helios". Although the chariot is usually said to be the work of Hephaestus, Hyginus states that it was Helios himself who built it. In one Greek vase painting, Helios appears riding across the sea in the cup of the Delphic tripod which appears to be a solar reference. His chariot is described as golden or pink in colour. The Horae, goddesses of the seasons, are part of his retinue and help him yoke his chariot. His sister Eos is said to have not only opened the gates for Helios, but would often accompany him as well in his daily swing across the skies. Every day he rose from the Ocean, the great earth-encircling river, carried by his horses:


title: Helios

text: In Homer, he is said to go under the earth at sunset, but it is not clear whether that means he travels through Tartarus. Athenaeus in his "Deipnosophistae" relates that, at the hour of sunset, Helios climbs into a great cup of solid gold in which he passes from the Hesperides in the farthest west to the land of the Ethiops, with whom he passes the dark hours. According to Athenaeus, Mimnermus said that in the night Helios travels eastwards with the use of a bed (also created by Hephaestus) in which he sleeps, rather than a cup, and writes that "Helios gained a portion of toil for all his days", as there is no rest for either him or his horses. Just like his chariot and horses, the cup is attested in neither Hesiod nor Homer, first appearing in the "Titanomachy", an 8th-century BC epic poem attributed to Eumelus of Corinth. Tragedian Aeschylus in his lost play "Prometheus Unbound" (a sequel to "Prometheus Bound") describes the sunset as such:


title: Helios

text: In the extreme east and west lived people who tended to his horses in their stalls, people for whom summer and heat were perpetual and ripeful. The sun god is described as being "tireless in his journeys" as he repeats the same process day after day for an eternity. Palladas sarcastically wrote that "The Sun to men is the god of light, but if he too were insolent to them in his shining, they would not desire even light."


title: Helios

text: On several instances in mythology the normal solar schedule is disrupted; he was ordered not to rise for three days during the conception of Heracles, and made the winter days longer in order to look upon Leucothoe, Athena's birth was a sight so impressive that Helios halted his steeds and stayed still in the sky for a long while, as heaven and earth both trembling at the newborn goddess' sight. In the "Iliad" Hera who supports the Greeks, makes him set earlier than usual against his will during battle, and later still during the same war, after his sister Eos's son Memnon was killed, she made him downcast, causing his light to fade, so she could be able to freely steal her son's body undetected by the armies, as he consoled his sister in her grief over Memnon's death. It was said that summer days are longer due to Helios often stopping his chariot mid-air to watch from above nymphs dancing during the summer, and sometimes he is late to rise because he lingers with his consort. If the other gods wish so, Helios can be hastened on his daily course when they wish it to be night.


title: Helios

text: When Zeus desired to sleep with Alcmene, he made one night last threefold, hiding the light of the Sun, by ordering Helios not to rise for those three days. Satirical author Lucian of Samosata dramatized this myth in one of his "Dialogues of the Gods", where the messenger of the gods Hermes goes to Helios on Zeus' orders to tell him not to rise for three days so Zeus can spend much time with Alcmene and sire Heracles. Although Helios reluctantly agrees and wishes best luck, he complains about this decision of the king of gods, finding the reason too weak for humanity to be deprived of sunlight and stay in the dark for so long, and negatively compares Zeus to his father, claiming Cronus never abandoned his marital bed and Rhea for the love of some mortal woman. From the union of Zeus and Alcmene, Heracles was born.


title: Helios

text: While Heracles was travelling to Erytheia to retrieve the cattle of Geryon for his tenth labour, he crossed the Libyan desert and was so frustrated at the heat that he shot an arrow at Helios, the Sun. Almost immediately, Heracles realized his mistake and apologized profusely (Pherecydes wrote that Heracles stretched his arrow at him menacingly, but Helios ordered him to stop, and Heracles in fear desisted); In turn and equally courteous, Helios granted Heracles the golden cup which he used to sail across the sea every night, from the west to the east because he found Heracles' actions immensely bold. In the versions delivered by Apollodorus and Pherecydes, Heracles was only "about to" shoot Helios, but according to Panyassis, he "did" shoot and wounded the god. Heracles used this golden cup to reach Erytheia, and after he had taken Geryon's cattle, returned it back to its owner. A late sixth century or early fifth century BC lekythos depicts Heracles offering a sacrifice on one side, and Helios rising on the other, suggesting that Heracles is sacrificing to the god seeking help from him in order to reach the three-bodied Geryon. On the vase, Helios is rising in his chariot between Eos and Nyx (the Night), represented as swirls of mist, while Heracles is roasting the sacrificial meat next to a lurking dog, identified as Cerberus, guiding the entrance to the Underworld; from this one can infer that the vase depicts the place in the Ocean where the earth, the sky and the sea meet, as the light of Helios is juxtaposed with the darkness of the Underworld, separated by a barrier of mist.


title: Helios

text: When the brothers Thyestes and Atreus fought over which would get to rule Mycenae, following the death of the previous king, Eurystheus, Atreus suggested that whoever possessed of a splendid golden ram would be declared king. Unbeknownst to Atreus, his unfaithful wife Aerope had given Thyestes the ram, and thus Thyestes became king. Zeus sent Hermes to Atreus, telling Atreus to get Thyestes to agree that should the Sun rise in the west and set in the east, the kingship would be given to Atreus. Thyestes agreed, and Helios indeed rose where he usually set, and set where he usually rose, not standing the unfairness of Thyestes' actions. The Mycenaeans then bowed to the man who had accomplished such a achievement and reversed the course of the Sun. According to Plato, Helios at first used to rise in the west and set in the east, and only changed that after the incident of the golden ram, as did the other celestial bodies which followed suit.


title: Helios

text: Solar eclipses were phaenomena of fear as well as wonder in Ancient Greece, and were seen as the Sun abandoning humanity. According to a fragment of Archilochus, it is Zeus who blocks Helios and makes him disappear from the sky; "Zeus the Olympian veiled the light to make it night at midday even as sun was shining: so dread fear has overtaken men" he writes and in one of his paeans, the lyric poet Pindar describes a solar eclipse as the Sun's light being hidden from the world, a bad omen of destruction and doom:


title: Helios

text: Plutarch in his "Moralia" writes that it is "through love of the sun that the moon herself makes her circuit, and has her meetings with him to receive from him all fertility". Aristophanes describes a solar eclipse in his play "Nephelae" that was observed in Athens in 425 BC.


title: Helios

text: Some lists, cited by Hyginus, of the names of horses that pulled Helios' chariot, are as follows. Scholarship acknowledges that, despite differences between the lists, the names of the horses always seem to refer to fire, flame, light and other luminous qualities.


title: Helios

text: Hyginus writes that according to Homer, the horses' names are Abraxas and Therbeeo; but Homer makes no mention of horses or chariot.


title: Helios

text: Alexander of Aetolia, cited in Athenaeus, related that the magical herb grew on the island Thrinacia, which was sacred to Helios, and served as a remedy against fatigue for the sun god's horses. Aeschrion of Samos informed that it was known as the "dog's-tooth" and was believed to have been sown by Cronus.


title: Helios

text: According to Pindar, when the gods divided the earth among them, Helios was absent, and thus he got no lot of land. He complained to Zeus about it, who offered to do the division of portions again, but Helios refused the offer, for he had seen a new land emerging from the deep of the sea; a rich, productive land for humans and good for cattle too. Helios asked for this island to be given to him, and Zeus agreed to it, with Lachesis (one of the three Fates) raising her hands to confirm the oath. Alternatively in another tradition, it was Helios himself who made the island rise from the sea when he caused the water which had overflowed it to disappear. He named it Rhodes, after his lover Rhode (the daughter of Poseidon and Aphrodite or Amphitrite), and it became the god's sacred island, where he was honoured above all other gods. With Rhode Helios sired seven sons, known as the Heliadae ("sons of the Sun"), who became the first rulers of the island, as well as one daughter, Electryone. Three of their grandsons founded the cities Ialysos, Camiros and Lindos on the island, named after themselves; thus Rhodes came to belong to him and his line, with the autochthonous peoples of Rhodes claiming descend from the Heliadae.


title: Helios

text: Once Athena was born from Zeus' head, Helios enjoined his children and the rest of the Rhodians to immediately build an altar for the goddess quickly, in order to win her favour (and apparently he disclosed the same to the Atticans too); they did as he told them, however they forgot to bring fire with them to properly do the sacrifice. Zeus, however, sent a golden cloud and rained gold on them, and Athena still graced them with unmatched skill in every art. For this reason, Athena was worshipped in Rhodes with flameless sacrifices; the victim would be slain on the altar of burn offering, but the fire was not set on the altar.


title: Helios

text: The most well known story about Helios is the one involving his son Phaethon. Phaethon was Helios' son by Clymene, or alternatively Rhode or Prote. In one version of the story, Phaethon is Helios' grandson, rather than son, through his father Clymenus. In Euripides' lost play "Phaethon", Phaethon is the product of an illicit liaison between his mother Clymene (who's married to Merops, king of Aethiopia) and Helios, though she claimed that her lawful husband was the husband of her children. Clymene reveals the truth to her son, and urges her son to travel east to get confirmation from his father after she informs him that Helios promised to grant their child any wish when he slept with her. In a surviving fragment from the play, Helios accompanies his son in his ill-fated journey in the skies, trying to give him instructions on how to drive the chariot while he rides on a spare horse named Sirius, as someone, perhaps a paedagogus informs Clymene of Phaethon's fate, who is probably accompanied by slave women:


title: Helios

text: If this messenger did witness the flight himself, it is possible there was also a passage where he described Helios taking control over the bolting horses in the same manner as Lucretius described. Phaethon inevitably dies; a fragment near the end of the play has Clymene order the slave girls hide Phaethon's still-smouldering body from Merops, and laments Helios' role in her son's death, saying he destroyed him and her both. Near the end of the play it seems that Merops, having found out about Clymene's affair and Phaethon's true parentage, tries to kill her; her eventual fate is unclear, but it has been suggested she is saved by some deus ex machina. A number of deities have been proposed for the identity of this possible deus ex machina, with Helios among them.


title: Helios

text: In Ovid's account, Zeus' son Epaphus mocks Phaethon's claim that he is the son of the sun god; his mother Clymene tells Phaethon to go to Helios himself, to ask for confirmation of his paternity, and the boy travels east to meet his father. Helios, living in a palace far away and attended by several other gods, warmly receives his son, and promises him on the river Styx any gift that he might ask as a proof of paternity; Phaethon asks for the privilege to drive Helios' chariot for a single day, causing his father to immediately regret his gift. Although Helios warns his son of how dangerous and disastrous this would be, and keeps begging Phaethon to rethink his wish, he is nevertheless unable to change Phaethon's mind or revoke his promise. Phaethon takes the reins in his father's horror, and drives the chariot with catastrophic results; the earth burns when he travels too low, and freezes when he takes the chariot too high. Zeus, in order to save the world, strikes Phaethon with a lightning, killing him. Helios, in his sorrow and deprived of all light out of grief, refuses to resume his job, but he returns to his task and duty at the appeal of the other gods, as well as Zeus' threats. He then takes his anger out on his four horses, whipping them in fury for causing his son's death.


title: Helios

text: Nonnus of Panopolis presented a slightly different version of the myth, narrated by Hermes; according to him, Helios met and fell in love with Clymene, the daughter of the Ocean, and the two soon got married with her father's blessing; Merops does not factor at all, and their son Phaethon is born within marriage. When he grows up, fascinated with his father's job, he asks him to drive his chariot for a single day. Helios does his best to dissuade him, arguing that sons are not necessarily fit to step into their fathers' shoes, bringing up as example that none of Zeus' sons wields lightning bolts like he does. But under pressure of Phaethon and Clymene's begging both, he eventually gives in, and gives his son the reins and instructions for the road. As per all other versions of the myth, Phaethon's ride is catastrophic and ends in his death.


title: Helios

text: At any point, Helios recovered the reins in time, thus saving the earth and keeping it from burning to a cinder due to the flames from the chariot. Another consistent detail across versions are that Phaethon's sisters the Heliades mourn him by the Eridanus and are turned into black poplar trees, who shed tears of amber. According to Quintus Smyrnaeus, it was Helios who turned them into trees, for their honour to Phaethon. The part concerning the Heliades might have been a mythical device to account for the origin of amber; it is probably of no coincidence that the Greek word for amber, "elektron" (), resembles "elektor" (), an epithet of Helios. The poplar tree was considered sacred to Helios, due to the sun-like brilliance its shining leaves have.


title: Helios

text: The aftermath of this episode was satirized by Lucian; in one of his dialogues, Zeus angrily berates Helios for lenting his chariot to his inexperienced son, who burned the earth with it as Helios makes excuses for himself and his child; Zeus returns the damaged chariot to its owner and threatens Helios to zap him with one of his lightning bolts should he ever do such thing again.


title: Helios

text: Relating to this is a fable from Aesop, in which Helios announces his intention to get married, causing the frogs to protest intensively. When Zeus, disturbed by all that noise, asks them to explain their stance, they reply that the Sun already burns their ponds on his own just fine; if he gets married and begets even more sons, it will sure doom them.


title: Helios

text: Helios saw and stood witness to everything that happened underneath him where his light shone. When Hades abducted Persephone, Helios, who was characterized with the epithet Helios Panoptes ("the all-seeing Sun"), was the only one to witness it, while Hecate only heard Persephone's screams as she was snatched away. Persephone's mother Demeter, looked far and wide in search of her daughter, and at the suggestion of Hecate, came to him, and asked him to respect her as a goddess and tell her if he had seen anything. Helios, sympathizing with her grief, told her in detail that it was Hades who, with Zeus' permission, had taken an unwilling and screaming Persephone to the Underworld to be his wife and queen, and that Zeus had not only permitted the marriage but also consented to the abduction.


title: Helios

text: In the "Homeric Hymn to Demeter" he asks Demeter to sooth her pain, as Hades is not an unworthy son-in-law or bridegroom for her, being her own brother and king of the Underworld besides, living with those he was chosen by lot to rule over, before he yokes his winged horses and chariot and ascends in the sky as the day breaks. In Ovid's "Fasti", Demeter asks the stars first about Persephone's whereabouts, and it is Helice (the constellation Ursa Major) who advises her to go ask Helios, for the night knew nothing of those events. Demeter is not slow to approach him, and Helios then tells her not to waste time, and seek out for "the queen of the third world", the bride of Zeus's brother.


title: Helios

text: Helios and Hecate informing Demeter of Persephone's abduction seems to be based on a common theme found in many parts of the world where the Sun and the Moon are questioned concerning events that happen below based on their perceived ability to bear witness to everything that take place on earth, and is one of the earliest examples of Hecate's connection to the moon and Helios.


title: Helios

text: In another myth, Aphrodite was married to Hephaestus, but she cheated on him with his brother Ares, god of war. In Book Eight of the "Odyssey", the blind singer Demodocus describes how the illicit lovers committed adultery, until one day Helios caught them in the act, and immediately informed Aphrodite's husband Hephaestus. Upon learning that, Hephaestus forged a net so thin it could hardly be seen, in order to ensnare them. He then announced that he was leaving for Lemnos. Upon hearing that, Ares went to Aphrodite and the two lovers coupled. Once again Helios informed Hephaestus, who came into the room and trapped them in the net. He then called the other gods to witness the humiliating sight.


title: Helios

text: Much later versions add a young man to the story, a warrior named Alectryon, tasked by Ares to stand guard should anyone approach. But Alectryon fell asleep, allowing Helios to discover the two lovers and inform Hephaestus. In his anger, Ares turned Alectryon into a rooster, a bird that to this day crows at dawn, to announce the arrival of the Sun. According to Pausanias, the rooster is Helios' sacred animal, always crowing when he is about to rise. For this, Aphrodite hated Helios and his race for all time. In some versions, she cursed his daughter Pasiphaë to fall in love with the Cretan Bull as revenge against him. Pasiphaë's daughter Phaedra's passion for her step-son Hippolytus was also said to have been inflicted on her by Aphrodite for this same reason.


title: Helios

text: For Helios' tale-telling, Aphrodite would have her revenge on him. She made him fall for a mortal princess named Leucothoe, forgetting his previous lover the Oceanid nymph Clytie for her sake. "And he that betrayed her stolen love was equally betrayed by love. What now avail, O son of Hyperion, thy beauty and brightness and radiant beams? For thou, who dost inflame all lands with thy fires, art thyself inflamed by a strange fire. Thou who shouldst behold all things, dost gaze on Leucothoe alone, and on one maiden dost thou fix those eyes which belong to the whole world. Anon too early dost thou rise in the eastern sky, and anon too late dost thou sink beneath the waves, and through thy long lingering over her dost prolong the short wintry hours. Sometimes thy beams fail utterly, thy heart's darkness passing to thy rays, and darkened thou dost terrify the hearts of men. Nor is it that the moon has come 'twixt thee and earth that thou art dark; 'tis that love of thine alone that makes thy face so wan. Thou delightest in her alone.", writes Ovid. Helios would watch her from above, even making the winter days longer so he could have more time looking at her. Taking the form of her mother Eurynome, Helios entered their palace with no problem and came into the girl's room where he dismissed her servants so he would be left alone with her, using the excuse of wanting to entrust a secret to his "daughter". There he took his real form, revealing himself to the girl.


title: Helios

text: However, Clytie, still in love with him, informed Leucothoe's father Orchamus of this affair, and he buried Leucothoe alive in the earth. Helios came too late to rescue her, his grief over her death compared to the one he had over Phaethon's fiery end, and could not revive her, so instead he poured nectar into the earth, and turned the dead Leucothoe into a frankincense tree, so that she could still breathe air (after a fashion) instead of rotting beneath the soil. Clytie had hoped that this would get Helios back to her, but he wanted nothing to do with her, angered as he was about the role she played in his love's death, and went on his way. Clytie stripped herself naked, accepting no food or drink, and sat on a rock for nine days, pining after him; he never looked back at her. Eventually she turned into a purple, sun-gazing flower, the heliotrope, which follows Helios' movement in the sky, still in love with him; her form much changed, her love unchanged. Edith Hamilton notes that this case is unique in Greek mythology, as rather than the usual, a god being in love with an unwilling maiden, it is instead the maiden who is in love with an unwilling god. This myth, it has been theorized, might have been used to explain the use of frankincense aromatic resin in Helios' worship, similar to the story of Daphne for the use of laurel. Leucothoe being buried alive as punishment by a male guardian, which is not too unlike Antigone's own fate, may also indicate an ancient tradition involving human sacrifice in a vegetation cult. At first the stories of Leucothoe and Clytie might had been two distinct myths concerning Helios that were later combined along with a third story, that of Helios discovering Ares and Aphrodite's affair and then informing Hephaestus, into a single tale either by Ovid himself or his source.


title: Helios

text: Clytie's herb has been identified with the purple heliotropium, however people from the Middle Ages onwards have supplanted it with the yellow sunflower in retellings, commentaries and artwork, even though in the story Ovid describes it as "purple", or "like a violet". Moreover, sunflowers are native to North America, not Greece or Italy, so it is unlikely ancient writers would have been familiar with it.


title: Helios

text: In Sophocles' play "Ajax", Ajax the Great, minutes before committing suicide, calls upon Helios to stop his golden reins when he reaches Ajax' native land of Salamis and inform his aging father Telamon and his mother of their son's fate and death, and salutes him one last time before he kills himself.


title: Helios

text: Helios sided with the other gods in several battles; during what appears to have been the Titanomachy, Zeus sacrificed a bull to him, Gaia, and Uranus, and in accordance they revealed to him the will of the gods in the affair, the omens indicating the victory of the gods and a defection to them of the enemy. Surviving fragments from the lost poem "Titanomachy", traditionally attributed to Eumelus of Corinth (8th century BC), imply scenes where Helios is the only one among the Titans to have abstained from attacking the Olympian gods, and they, after the war was over, in recognition of the help he offered, gave him a place in the sky and awarded him with a chariot, drawn by two male and two female horses, to drive during the day and a vessel in which he would sail the ocean at night.


title: Helios

text: He also took part in the Giant wars; it was said by Pseudo-Apollodorus that during the battle of the Giants against the gods, the giant Alcyoneus stole Helios' cattle from Erytheia where the god kept them, or alternatively, that it was Alcyoneus' very theft of the cattle that started the war. Because the earth goddess Gaia, mother and ally of the Giants, learned of the prophecy that the giants would perish at the hand of a mortal, she sought to find a magical herb that would protect them and render them practically indestructible; thus Zeus ordered Helios, as well as his sisters Selene (Moon) and Eos (Dawn) not to shine, and harvested all of the plant for himself, denying Gaia the opportunity to make the Giants immortal, while Athena summoned the mortal Heracles to fight by their side.


title: Helios

text: At some point during the battle of gods and giants in Phlegra, where the battle took place, Helios took up an exhausted from the fight Hephaestus on his chariot (in gratitude, Hephaestus forged four ever-flowing fountains and fire-breathing bulls for Helios' son Aeëtes). After the war was won and over, one of the giants, Picolous, fled the battle against Zeus; he went to Aeaea, the island where Helios' daughter, the sorceress Circe, lived. He attempted to chase Circe away from the island, only to be killed by Helios, who defended his daughter. From the blood of the slain giant that dripped on the earth a new plant was sprang, the herb moly, named thus from the battle ("malos" in Ancient Greek):


title: Helios

text: The plant "moly" of which Homer speaks; this plant had, it is said, grown from the blood of the giant killed in the isle of Circe; it has a white flower; the ally of Circe who killed the giant was Helios; the combat was hard ("mâlos") from which the name of this plant.


title: Helios

text: The flower had a black root, for the colour of the blood of the slain Giant, and a white flower, either for the white Sun that killed him, or for the fact that Circe grew pale of terror. This is the very same plant, a plant only immortals can uproot from the ground, that Odysseus would later use on Hermes' suggestion to save his companions from Circe's magic, after she transformed them all into swines. Helios is depicted in the Pergamon Altar, waging war against Giants next to his sisters Eos and Selene and his mother Theia in the southern frieze. He is riding his four-horse chariot against a Giant, while another lays dead under the hooves of his steeds, wearing a long chiton, holding a torch on his right hand and the reins in his left. His participation in the Gigantomachy (wearing a cuirass) is also depicted on a fragmentary vase by the Pronomos Painter, and perhaps in an attic column krater. Additionally, a rein guide for a chariot depicts Helios and a goddess with a crescent and veil over her head, thought to be Selene, standing on a gate tower and repelling the attacks of snake-legged Giants.


title: Helios

text: Despite that, he sometimes clashed with other gods; just like the Athenians had a story about how Athena and Poseidon fought over the patronage of the city of Athens, the Corinthians had a similar story about Corinth. Helios and Poseidon, representing fire versus water, clashed as to who would get to have the city. The Hecatoncheir Briareos, an elder god, was tasked to settle the dispute between the two gods; he awarded the Acrocorinth to Helios, while Poseidon was given the isthmus of Corinth.


title: Helios

text: Aelian wrote that Nerites was the son of the sea god Nereus and the Oceanid Doris. In the version where Nerites became the lover of Poseidon, it is said that Helios turned him into a shellfish, for reasons unknown to Aelian's sources, who theorized that perhaps Helios was somehow offended. At first Aelian writes that Helios was resentful of the boy's speed, but when trying to explain why he changed his form, he suggests that perhaps Poseidon and Helios were rivals in love, and the sun god wished the youth would run among the constellations, rather than be with the sea monsters.


title: Helios

text: In an Aesop fable, Helios and the north wind god Boreas argued about which one between them was the strongest god. They agreed that whoever was able to make a passing traveller remove his cloak would be declared the winner. Boreas was the one to try his luck first; but no matter how hard he blew, he could not remove the man's cloak, instead making him wrap his cloak around him even tighter. Helios shone bright then, and the traveller, overcome with the heat, removed his cloak, giving him the victory. The moral is that persuasion is better than force. Athenaeus of Naucratis records in his "Deipnosophistae" that Greek author Hieronymus of Rhodes, in his "Historical Notes", quoted an anecdote about playwrights Sophocles and Euripides that referenced the fable of the two gods' contest; it related how Sophocles made love to a boy outside the city's gates who then proceeded to steal Sophocles' cloak, and leave behind his own boyish one. Euripides then joked that he had had that same boy too, and it had not cost him anything. Sophocles then replied to him that "It was the Sun, and not a boy, whose heat stripped me naked; as for you, Euripides, when you were kissing someone else's wife the North Wind screwed "you". You are unwise, you who sow in another's field, to accuse Eros of being a snatch-thief."


title: Helios

text: Relating to his nature as the Sun, as well as his parentage, as the son of Theia, the goddess of sight (ancient Greeks believed that eyes emitted light allowing humans to see), Helios was presented as a god who could restore and also deprive of people's light as it was regarded that his light that made the faculty of sight and enabled visible things to be seen. According to Pindar, the solar eye was the "forefather" of all mortal eyes, and mortals owed both sight and blindness to Helios. After Orion was blinded by King Oenopion for attacking his daughter Merope, he was given a guide, Cedalion, from the god Hephaestus to guide him. Orion with Cedalion on his shoulders travelled to the east, where he met Helios. Helios then healed Orion's eyes, restoring his eyesight.


title: Helios

text: Meanwhile, in Phineus's story, his blinding, as reported in Apollonius Rhodius's "Argonautica", was Zeus' punishment for Phineus revealing the future to mankind. For this reason he was also tormented by the Harpies, who stole or defiled whatever food he had at hand. According, however, to one of the alternative versions, it was Helios who had deprived Phineus of his sight; Phineus, when asked by Zeus if he preferred to die or lose sight as punishment for having his sons killed by their stepmother, Phineus chose the latter, saying he would rather never see the Sun than die, and consequently the offended Helios blinded him and sent the Harpies against him. Pseudo-Oppian wrote that Helios' wrath was due to some obscure victory of the prophet; after Calais and Zetes slew the Harpies tormenting Phineus, Helios then turned him into a mole, a blind creature. In yet another version, he blinded Phineus at the request of his son Aeëtes, who asked him to do so because Phineus had offered his assistance to Aeëtes' enemies.


title: Helios

text: In another tale, in order to escape from Crete and its king Minos, the Athenian inventor Daedalus and his young son Icarus fashioned themselves wings made of birds' feathers glued together with wax and flew away. According to scholia on Euripides, Icarus, being young and rashful, thought himself greater than Helios, forgetting his wings were only held together by wax. Angered, Helios hurled his blazing rays at him, melting the wax and plunging Icarus into the sea to drown. Later, it was Helios who decreed that said sea would be named after the unfortunate youth, the Icarian Sea.


title: Helios

text: Arge was a huntress who, while hunting down a particularly fast stag, claimed that fast as the Sun as it was, she would eventually catch up to it. Helios, offended by the girl's words, changed her shape into that of a doe.


title: Helios

text: In his sacred island of Thrinacia, Helios kept his sacred flocks and herds of sheep and cattle. He owned seven herds of cows and many sheep as well; each flock numbered fifty beasts in it, totaling 350 cows and 350 sheep—the number of days of the year in the early Ancient Greek calendar; the seven herds correspond to the week, containing seven days. The cows did not breed (thus not increasing in number) or die (thus not decreasing in number). In the "Homeric Hymn 4 to Hermes", after Hermes has been brought before Zeus by an angry Apollo for stealing Apollo's sacred cows, the young god excuses himself for his actions and says to his father that "I reverence Helios greatly and the other gods", not unaware of Helios' special connection to cows. Augeas, who in some versions is his son, safe-kept a herd of twelve bulls sacred to the god. Moreover, it was said that Augeas' enormous herd of cattle, as he owned more beasts than any other rich man or king could ever acquire in life, was a gift to him by his father; he made him the greatest master of flocks, and all he cattle to thrive and prosper unceasingly, with no end. Another place of their dwelling was named Erytheia, from where the Giant Alcyoneus stole them during the Gigantomachy, and it is mentioned he kept a herd of thick-fleeced sheep at Taenarum, which was also a well known entrance to the Underworld, located on the tip of the Mani peninsula, between the gulfs of Messenia and Laconia.


title: Helios

text: Apollonia in Illyria was another place where he kept a flock of his sheep; a man named Peithenius had been put in charge of them, but the sheep were devoured by wolves. The other Apolloniates, thinking he had been neglectful, gouged out Peithenius' eyes. Angered over the man's treatment, Helios made the earth grow barren and ceased to bear fruit; the earth grew fruitful again only after the Apolloniates had propitiated Peithenius by craft, and by two suburbs and a house he picked out, pleasing the god. This story, more or less the same, albeit in a more detailed manner, is also attested by Greek historian Herodotus, who calls the man Evenius and records the story as a real historical event of the recent past, and not a mythological tale, but the anecdote attests to the divine introduction of prophecy, rather than a real biographical event. Herodotus adds that Evenius meant to buy new sheep to replace the ones he had lost, but was discovered, that the Apolloniates consulted the Oracle of Delphi, and were told that the god was angry at them because it was divine will for the sheep to be devoured. The Apolloniates asked Evenius what he wished in form of reparations, without mentioning the oracle, so Evenius asked for a moderate compensation.


title: Helios

text: During Odysseus' journey to get back home, he arrived at the island of Circe, who warned him not to touch Helios' sacred cows once he reached Thrinacia, the sun god's sacred island, where the cattle was kept, or the god would keep them from returning home:


title: Helios

text: Though Odysseus warns his men, when supplies run short they impiously kill and eat some of the cattle of the Sun. The guardians of the island, Helios' daughters Phaethusa and Lampetia, tell their father about this. Helios then appeals to Zeus telling him to dispose of Odysseus' men, or he will go in the Underworld and shine among the dead instead, rejecting the crewmen's compensation of a new temple in Ithaca, and preferring a death-for-death one. Zeus promises Helios that he will deal with it, and destroys the ship with his lightning bolt, killing all the men except for Odysseus.


title: Helios

text: This episode is symbolic; the cattle of the Sun are attended to by his daughters "Bright" and "Shining", born to him by "Younger", all epithets related to the Sun. By convention, Hades is the place where Helios with his light cannot reach; dying meant no longer seeing the sunlight, as being alive was to live under it, so Helios' descent to the Underworld would destabilize the balance between the dead and the living. Relating to the number of cows found on the Sun's island, Eustathius wrote that each cow stood for a day in the year, thus the companions devouring the oxen of the Sun symbolizing them wasting ("eating up") their own days and life. H. J. Rose disagreed with the interpretation, writing that 350 is a sacred Oriental number that reached Greece and had nothing to do with the Sun.


title: Helios

text: Aristotle, who also connected the number of cattle to the number to days, suggested that the reason Helios did not see the companions stealing his cattle could be explained a number of ways, such as he sees everything but not at once, or that Lampetia being the messenger is symbolic for light being messenger of sight, or that her account is similar to oath-swearing on his name.


title: Helios

text: Although the proem of the "Odyssey" names Helios as the primary agent of retribution for the sacrilege, having "taken away the day of return" of the comrades, his role is actually limited; he resorts to threaten Zeus, and it is he who destroys the ship and the men (although in other myths, Helios is perfectly capable of exacting revenge on his own, without a middleman); by all means, Zeus should be considered the one responsible, and the attribution of their demise solely to Helios even seems biased. However it could be due to that Zeus is not the one acting out of personal animosity (Helios is), rather he is asked and inclined to serve justice.


title: Helios

text: Helios is featured in several of Lucian's works beyond his "Dialogues of the Gods". In another work of Lucian's, "Icaromenippus", Selene the Moon complains to the titular character about philosophers wanting to stir up strife and sour feelings between her and her brother with their theories about them—namely, that the moon steals her spurious light from the sun (compare the "Phocylidea", where it is stated that she is not envious that his rays are much stronger than her own), or calling the sun a red-hot lump. Later he is seen feasting with the other gods on Olympus, and prompting Menippus to wonder how can night fall on the Heavens while he is there. In "A True Story", the Sun is an inhabited place, ruled by a king named Phaethon, referencing Helios's mythological son. The inhabitants of the Sun are at war with those of the Moon, ruled by King Endymion (Selene's lover), over colonization of the Morning Star (Aphrodite's planet).


title: Helios

text: Diodorus Siculus recorded an unorthodox version of the myth, in which Basileia, who had succeeded her father Uranus to his royal thrown, married her brother Hyperion, and had two children, a son Helios and a daughter Selene, both admired for their beauty and their chastity. Because Basileia's other brothers envied these offspring, and feared that Hyperion would try to seize power for himself, conspired against him; they put Hyperion to the sword and drowned Helios in the river Eridanus, while Selene took her own life. After the massacre, Helios appeared in a dream to his grieving mother and assured her and their murderers would be punished, and that he and his sister would now be transformed into immortal, divine natures; what was known as Mene would now be called Selene, and the "holy fire" in the heavens would bear his own name.


title: Helios

text: It was said that due to her burning passion for the mortal Endymion, his sister Selene would often abandon the night sky to be with him; during those nights that she was too preoccupied, she would give her moon chariot to Helios to drive it; although unfamiliar at first, in time he learnt to drive it like his own.


title: Helios

text: Claudian wrote that in his infancy, Helios (along with Selene–their sister Eos is not mentioned with them) was nursed by his aunt the water goddess Tethys, back in the old days when his light was not as strong and his rays had not grown yet.


title: Helios

text: Pausanias writes that the people of Titane in Sicyon held that Titan was a brother of Helios, the first inhabitant of Titane after whom the town was named; Titan however was generally identified as Helios himself, instead of being a separate figure. Pausanias rationalizes this by suggesting that Titan was probably just a man who observed the seasons of the year when the sun ripens seeds and fruits, and was said to be Helios's brother (who otherwise is characterized as an only son) for this reason.


title: Helios

text: In Sophocles's play "Oedipus at Colonus", Oedipus curses Creon, wishing that of all the gods may Helios, witnessing all that has happened, grant him an old age as wretched as his own.


title: Helios

text: In "Imagines" by Philostratus, Palaestra asks him to help her with her tanning, to redden her skin with his heat.


title: Helios

text: According to sixth century BC lyric poet Stesichorus, with Helios in his palace lives his mother Theia.


title: Helios

text: In the myth of the dragon Python's slaying by Apollo, the slain serpent's corpse is said to have rotten in the strength of the "shining Hyperion," as the god himself promises.


title: Helios

text: Aelian wrote that the wolf is a beloved animal to Helios; the wolf is also Apollo's sacred animal, and the god was often known as Apollo Lyceus, "wolf Apollo".


title: Helios

text: The god Helios is the head of a large family, and the places that venerated him the most would also typically claim both mythological and genealogical descent from him; the Cretans traced the ancestry of their king Idomeneus to Helios through his daughter Pasiphaë. Though Helios had several love affairs, they were far less numerous than those of other gods, especially Zeus, since, unsurprisingly, in a warm climate it would be more likely for the rain god rather than the sun god to be seen as the fertility god.