- Looks after
- Mother of rivers and the Oceanids
Tethys
Τηθύς
Tethys is the Titaness of fresh water, the wife of Oceanus and the mother of the rivers.
Tethys is one of the twelve children of Uranus and Gaia. With her brother Oceanus she is the mother of the river gods and of the Oceanids, the water nymphs.
In the Iliad, Hera says that she went to visit Oceanus and Tethys, who had raised her when Zeus was waging war against Cronus, and that the couple were estranged. Tethys therefore appears as a foster-mother in Homer.
She had no real cult and almost no myths of her own. She should not be confused with Thetis, the sea nymph who is the mother of Achilles, though the names are very similar in Greek.
In later art and language
A moon of Saturn is named Tethys, and an ancient ocean between Gondwana and Laurasia, the Tethys Ocean, is named after her.
The ancient evidence for Tethys is limited, so this page is short on purpose.
Ancient sources
- Hesiod, Theogony 337-370
- Homer, Iliad 14.200-210