Thetis

There is also an asteroid 17 Thetis.

In Greek mythology, silver-footed Thetis is a sea nymph, one of the fifty Nereids, daughters of "the ancient one of the seas," Nereus, and Doris (Hesiod, Theogony), a grand-daughter of Tethys.

When Hephaestus was thrown from Olympus, cast out by Hera for his lameness, the Nereids Eurynome and Thetis caught him and cared for him on the volcanic isle of Lemnos, while he labored for them as a smith, "working there in the hollow of the cave, and the stream of Okeanos around us went on forever with its foam and its murmur (Iliad'' 18.369).

When Dionysus was expelled by Lycurgus with the Olympians' aid, he took refuge in the Erythraean Sea with Thetis in a bed of seaweed.

Thetis is the mother of Achilles by Peleus, king of the Myrmidons. Poseidon and Zeus were both interested in her, but a prophecy of Themis revealed that her son would be greater than his father, and so they made arrangements for her marriage to a mortal man. Peleus, son of AEacus, courted her, but she refused him. Chiron, the wise centaur, who would later be tutor to Peleus' son Achilles, advised Peleus to find the sea nymph when she was asleep and bind her tightly to keep her from escaping by changing form, becoming flame and then a raging lion (compare the sea-god Proteus). But Peleus held fast. She then consented to marry him, though without love or interest.

The wedding of Thetis and Peleus was celebrated on Mount Pelion and attended by all the deities: there the gods celebrated the marriage with feasting. Apollo played the lyre, and the Muses sang, Pindar claimed. At the wedding Chiron gave Peleus an ashen spear, and Poseidon gave him the immortal horses, Balius and Xanthus. However, Eris, the goddess of discord, had not been invited. In spite, she threw a golden apple into the midst of the goddesses that was to be awarded only to the fairest. (See the Judgment of Paris).

Thetis worked her magic on the baby Achilles by night, burning away his mortality in the hall fire and anointing the child with ambrosia during the day, Apollonius tells. When Peleus caught her searing the baby, he let out a cry.

"Thetis heard him, and catching up the child threw him screaming to the ground, and she like a breath of wind passed swiftly from the hall as a dream and leapt into the sea, exceeding angry, and thereafter returned never again." (A similar myth of immortalizing a child in fire is connected to Demeter.)

In a variant of the myth, Thetis tried to make Achilles invulnerable by dipping him in the waters of the Styx (the river of Hades). However, the heel by which she held him was not protected by the Styx's waters. In the story of Achilles in the Trojan War in the Iliad, Homer does not mention this weakness of Achilles' heel.

Peleus gave the boy to Chiron to raise.

Prophecy said that her son would have either a long but dull life or a glorious but brief life. When the Trojan War broke out, Thetis was anxious and concealed him in the court of Lycomedes, disguised as a girl. He went with the rest of the Greeks anyway. Thetis then had Hephaestus make a shield and armor but then refused to pay him the favors she promised for the armor.

When Achilles was killed by Paris, Thetis came from the sea with the Nereids to mourn him, and she collected his ashes in a golden urn and raised a monument to his memory and instituted commemorative festivals.

Thetis was one of the gods behind the Oracle at Delphi, which she received from Gaia and gave to Phoebe.

References

Homer's Iliad makes many references to Thetis; Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica IV, 770-879, Apollodorus, The Library, 3.13.5

External link

Thetis: very full classical references
Peleus and Thetis