Editing Oceanus (section)

===Primeval father?===

[[File:ZeugmaMuseum3.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|left|Mosaic depicting Oceanus and Tethys, [[Zeugma Mosaic Museum]], [[Gaziantep]]]]

Passages in a section of the  ''[[Iliad]]'' called the [[Deception of Zeus]], suggest the possibility that [[Homer]] knew a tradition in which Oceanus and Tethys (rather than Uranus and Gaia, as in Hesiod) were the primeval parents of the gods.<ref>Fowler 2013, pp. [https://books.google.com/books?id=scd8AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA8 8], [https://books.google.com/books?id=scd8AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA11 11]; Hard, [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA36 pp. 36–37], [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA40 p. 40]; West 1997, p. 147; Gantz, p. 11; Burkert 1995, [https://books.google.com/books?id=cIiUL7dWqNIC&pg=PA91 pp. 91–92]; West 1983, pp. 119&ndash;120.</ref> Twice Homer has [[Hera]] describe the pair as "Oceanus, from whom the gods are sprung, and mother Tethys".<ref>[[Homer]], ''[[Iliad]]'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0012.tlg001.perseus-eng1:14.193-14.241 14.201], [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0134%3Abook%3D14%3Acard%3D270 302] [= 201].</ref> According to [[M. L. West]], these lines suggests a myth in which Oceanus and Tethys are the "first parents of the whole race of gods."<ref>West 1997, p. 147.</ref> However, as [[Timothy Gantz]] points out, "mother" could simply refer to the fact that Tethys was Hera's foster mother for a time, as Hera tells us in the lines immediately following, while the reference to Oceanus as the genesis of the gods "might be simply a formulaic epithet indicating the numberless rivers and springs descended from Okeanos" (compare with ''Iliad'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0134%3Abook%3D21%3Acard%3D161 21.195–197]).<ref>Gantz, p. 11.</ref> But, in a later ''Iliad'' passage, [[Hypnos]] also describes Oceanus as "''genesis'' for all", which, according to Gantz, is hard to understand as meaning other than that, for Homer, Oceanus was the father of the Titans.<ref>Gantz, p. 11; [[Homer]], ''[[Iliad]]'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0012.tlg001.perseus-eng1:14.242-14.269 14.245].</ref>

[[Plato]], in his ''[[Timaeus (dialogue)|Timaeus]]'', provides a genealogy (probably [[Orphism|Orphic]]) which perhaps reflected an attempt to reconcile this apparent divergence between Homer and Hesiod, in which Uranus and Gaia are the parents of Oceanus and Tethys, and Oceanus and Tethys are the parents of Cronus and Rhea and the other Titans, as well as [[Phorcys]].<ref>Gantz, pp. 11–12; West 1983, pp. 117&ndash;118;  Fowler 2013, [https://books.google.com/books?id=scd8AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA11 p. 11]; [[Plato]], ''[[Timaeus (dialogue)|Timaeus]]'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text;jsessionid=4DAC0911EDDE8F410A4FED46380ED2C0?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0180%3Atext%3DTim.%3Asection%3D40d 40d–e].</ref> In his  ''[[Cratylus (dialogue)|Cratylus]]'', Plato quotes [[Orpheus]] as saying that Oceanus and Tethys were "the first to marry", possibly also reflecting an Orphic theogony in which Oceanus and Tethys, rather than Uranus and Gaia, were the primeval parents.<ref>West 1983, pp. 118&ndash;120; Fowler 2013, [https://books.google.com/books?id=scd8AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA11 p. 11]; [[Plato]], ''[[Cratylus (dialogue)|Cratylus]]'' [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg005.perseus-eng1:402b 402b] [= Orphic [https://archive.org/stream/orphicorumfragme00orphuoft#page/86/mode/2up fr. 15 Kern].</ref> Plato's apparent inclusion of Phorcys as a Titan (being the brother of Cronus and Rhea), and the mythographer [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]]'s inclusion of [[Dione (Titaness)|Dione]], the mother of [[Aphrodite]] by Zeus, as a thirteenth Titan,<ref>[[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]], [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0548.tlg001.perseus-eng1:1.1.3 1.1.3], [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0548.tlg001.perseus-eng1:1.3 1.3.1].</ref> suggests an Orphic tradition in which the Titan offspring of Oceanus and Tethys consisted of Hesiod's twelve Titans, with Phorcys and Dione taking the place of Oceanus and Tethys.<ref>Gantz, p. 743.</ref>

According to [[Epimenides]], the first two beings, [[Nyx|Night]] and Aer, produced [[Tartarus]], who in turn produced two Titans (possibly Oceanus and Tethys) from whom came the [[world egg]].<ref>Fowler 2013, [https://books.google.com/books?id=scd8AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA7 pp. 7&ndash;8].</ref>