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In Greek Mythology , Prometheus (, "forethought") is a Titan known for his wily intelligence, who stole Fire from Zeus and gave it to Mortals for their use. His myth has been treated by a number of ancient sources, in which Prometheus is credited with (or blamed for) playing a pivotal role in the early history of humankind. HESIOD The Prometheus myth first appears in the would shoot the eagle and free Prometheus from his chains. {Link without Title} Hesiod revisits the story of Prometheus in the '' for humankind's expulsion long ago from a nearly divine existence. {Link without Title} AESCHYLUS Perhaps the most famous treatment of the Prometheus myth can be found in the Greek Tragedy '' Prometheus Bound '' -- traditionally (but uncertainly) attributed to the 5th-century BC Greek tragedian Aeschylus . The drama is likely the first play of the otherwise non-extant '' Prometheia '' trilogy. At the center of the drama are Prometheus' theft of fire and his subsequent punishment by Zeus ; in this, Aeschylus' dependence on the Hesiodic source material is clear. The ''Prometheus Bound'' also includes, however, a number of changes to the received tradition. Some of these changes are rather minor. For instance, rather than being the son of Iapetus and Clymene -- and hence, Zeus' cousin -- Prometheus becomes the son of Gaea -- and Zeus' uncle. Also, the chorus makes a passing reference (561) to Promeheus' wife Hesione , whereas a fragment from Hesiod's '' Catalogue Of Women '' calls her by the name of Pronoea. {Link without Title} Other innovations are more substantial. Before his theft of fire, Prometheus played a decisive role in the ''. It is apparently not until Prometheus reveals this secret of Zeus' potential downfall that the two reconcile in the final play, '' Prometheus The Fire-Bringer ''. ''Prometheus Bound'' also includes two mythic innovations of omission. The first is the absence of Pandora 's story in connection with Prometheus' own. Instead, Aeschylus includes this one oblique allusion to Pandora and her jar that contained Hope (252): " caused blind hopes to live in the hearts of men." Second, Aeschylus makes no mention of the sacrifice-trick played against Zeus in the ''Theogony''. [http://www.theoi.com/Text/AeschylusPrometheus.html Most of these innovations are reflective of the play's thematic reversal of the Hesiodic Myth. In Hesiod, the story of Prometheus (and, by extension, of Pandora) serves to reinforce the Theodicy of Zeus: he is a wise and just ruler of the universe, while Prometheus is to blame for humanity's unenviable existence. In ''Prometheus Bound'', this dynamic is transposed: Prometheus becomes the benefactor of humanity, while every character in the drama (except for Hermes, a virtual stand-in for Zeus) decries the Olympian as a cruel, vicious tyrant. LATER AUTHORS Over a dozen later Greek and Roman authors would retell and further embellish the Prometheus myth into the 4th century AD. The most significant detail added to the myth -- found in, e.g., Sappho , Plato , Aesop and Ovid -- was the central role of Prometheus in the creation of the human race. According to these sources, Prometheus fashioned humans out of clay. In his dialogue Protagoras , Plato asserts that the gods created humans and all the other animals, but it was left to Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus to give defining attributes to each. As no physical traits were left when the pair came to humans, Prometheus decided to give them fire and other civilizing arts. {Link without Title} Although perhaps made explicit in the ''Prometheia'', later authors such as Hyginus , Apollodorus , and Quintus Of Smyrna ) would confirm that Prometheus warned Zeus not to marry the sea nymph Thetis . She is consequently married off to the mortal Peleus , and bears him a son greater than the father -- Achilles , Greek hero of the Trojan War . Apollodorus moreover clarifies for us a cryptic statement (1026-29) made by Hermes in ''Prometheus Bound'', identifying the centaur Cheiron as the one who would take on Prometheus' suffering and die in his place. {Link without Title} Reflecting a myth attested in Greek vase paintings from the Classical period, Apollodorus places the Titan (armed with an axe) at the birth of Athena , thus explaining how the goddess sprang forth from the forehead of Zeus. {Link without Title} Other minor details attached to the myth, such as: the origin of the eagle that ate the Titan's liver (found in Apollodorus and Hyginus); myths surrounding the life of Prometheus' son, Deucalion (found in Ovid and Apollonius Of Rhodes ); and Prometheus' marginal role in the myth of Jason And The Argonauts (found in Apollonius of Rhodes and Valerius Flaccus ). {Link without Title} PROMETHEUS IN OTHER ARTS Prometheus' torment by the eagle and his rescue by Heracles were popular subjects in vase paintings of the 6th-4th c. BC. He also sometimes appears in depictions of Athena's birth from Zeus' forehead. There was a relief sculpture of Prometheus with Pandora on the base of Athena's cult statue in the Athenian Parthenon of the 5th century BC. Prometheus appears on the so-called Telephus Frieze from the Pergamon Altar , built in the 2nd century BC. , (1868).]] , (1817). ]] .]] WORSHIP Prometheus had a small shrine in the Kerameikos , or potter's quarter, of Athens , not far from the Academy . The Academy had its own altar dedicated to Prometheus. According to the 2nd-century AD Greek traveler Pausanias , this site was central to a torch race dedicated to Prometheus. Pausanias also wrote that the Greek cities of Argos and Opous both claimed to be Prometheus' final resting place, each erecting a tomb in his honor. Finally, Pausanias attested that in the Greek city of Panopeus there was a cult statue claimed by some to depict Prometheus, for having created the human race there. {Link without Title} PROMETHEAN MYTH IN MODERN CULTURE of Prometheus in front of the GE Building at the Rockefeller Center ( New York City , New York , USA ).]] The Cloned horse Prometea , and Prometheus , a Moon of Saturn , are named after this Titan, as is the Asteroid 1809 Prometheus . The story of Prometheus has inspired many authors through the ages, and the Romantics saw Prometheus as a prototype of the natural Daemon or Genius . The name of the sixty-first element, Promethium , is derived from Prometheus. Mary Shelley 's 1818 novel Frankenstein is subtitled "The Modern Prometheus". This is a reference to the novel's themes of the over-reaching of modern man into dangerous areas of knowledge. Percy Bysshe Shelley's "Prometheus Unbound" rewrites the lost play of Aeschylus so that Prometheus does not submit to Zeus (Shelley's Jupiter), but supplants him instead in a triumph of the human heart and intellect over tyrannical religion. Lord Byron's poem "Prometheus" also portrays the titan as unrepentent. For the Romantics, Prometheus was the rebel who resisted all forms of institutional tyranny epitomized by Zeus -- church, monarch, and patriarch. They drew comparisons between Prometheus and the spirit of the French Revolution, Christ, Milton's Satan, and the divinely inspired poet or artist. NOTES
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