Titans - who are they and what place did they occupy in Greek mythology?
Much in the modern world is built on the models given by philosophers, scientists and poets of ancient Greece. The culture of the Hellenes excited the minds of artists and writers for many years after the gods who turned into people stopped roaming the roads of Greece. Despite the popularity of Greek mythology, not all of its characters are equally well known. The Titans, for example, did not receive as much fame as the Olympian gods.
Who are the Titans?
In ancient Greek mythology, it is customary to distinguish three generations of gods.
- The gods of the first generation are progenitors who do not have personification, the embodiment of such comprehensive concepts as earth, night, love.
- The gods of the second generation are called titans. To understand who is which titan in the minds of the ancient Greeks, you need to understand that they are an intermediate link between completely personified Olympians and the embodiment of truly global concepts. The closest assessment would be “the personification of elemental forces.”
- The gods of the third generation are the Olympians. The closest and most understandable to people, interacting with them directly.
Who are the Titans in Greek mythology?
The second generation of the gods of ancient Hellas is an intermediate one, taking away power from their parents, but ceding it to their children. In both cases, the initiator of the revolution was the companion of the supreme god of the generation.
Gaia, the wife of Uranus, was angry with her husband because he imprisoned her children, the hundred-armed giants Hecatoncheires. Only Cronus (Kronos), the youngest and most cruel of the titans, responded to his mother’s entreaties to overthrow his father; in order to gain supreme dominion he had to castrate Uranus’s sickle.
Interestingly, after seizing power, Cronus again imprisoned the Hecatoncheires.
Fearing a repeat of the situation, the titan tried to hedge his bets by swallowing the children born to his wife, Rhea. At some point, the Titanide got tired of her husband’s cruelty, and she saved her youngest son, Zeus.
Sheltered from her cruel father, the young god survived, managed to save his brothers and sisters, win the war and become the ruler of Olympus.
Although the reign of Kronos is called the golden age in myths, titanium in mythology is the personification of chaotic, ruthless forces, and the transition to the wise and humane Olympian gods is a completely logical consequence of the development and humanization of the culture of the ancient Greeks.
Titans - mythology
Not all the titans of ancient Greece were overthrown during the war, some of them took the side of the Olympians, so in some cases, the titan is the god of Olympus. Here are some of them:
- Metis raised young Zeus in Crete;
- Themis, who became the goddess of correct behavior (later justice) on Olympus;
- Prometheus and Epimetheus, brothers who played an important role in the war of the gods and the Titans.
After Zeus grew up and freed his brothers and sisters from the womb of Kronos with the help of poisoned nectar, he found it possible to challenge his cruel parent. This battle lasted for ten years, where neither side had an advantage. Finally, the hecatoncheires, freed by Zeus, intervened in the duel between the titans and the gods; their help turned out to be decisive, the Olympians won and overthrew into Tartarus all the titans who did not agree with the power of the new gods.
These events aroused the interest of many ancient Greek poets, but the only work that has been completely preserved to this day is Hesiod’s Theogony. Modern scientists suggest that the war of the gods and the titans reflected the struggle between the religions of the indigenous population of the Balkan Peninsula and the Hellenes who invaded their territory.
Titans and Titanides
Researchers identify twelve elder titans, six male and six female. Titans:
- Cronus, who later personified time;
- Ocean;
- Krios;
- Kay, symbolizing the celestial axis;
- Iapetus, according to some assumptions, the ancestor of the Aryans;
- Hyperion is the sun god.
Titanides:
- Themis;
- Rhea;
- Tethys, the female embodiment of the sea;
- Theia, goddess of the moon;
- Mnemosyne, memory;
- Phoebe.
Now it is difficult to say exactly what titanium or titanide looks like according to the ideas of the ancient Greeks. In the images that have reached us, they are presented either anthropomorphically, like the Olympians, or in the form of monsters, only vaguely similar to people.
In any case, their characters were also humanized, like the characters of the third generation of gods. According to the ideas of the ancient Greeks, the Titans and Titanides more than once entered into marriages with each other and with other representatives of Greek mythology.
Children from such marriages, born before the Titanomachy, are considered junior titans.
Titans and Atlanteans
In ancient Greek myths, all losers are punished, no matter who they are - titans, first-generation gods or mere mortals. Zeus punished one of the titans, Atlas, by forcing him to support the vault of heaven. Later, he helped Hercules get the apples of the Hesperides, thereby completing the 12th labor. Atlas was considered the inventor of astronomy and natural philosophy. Perhaps that is why the mysterious, enlightened, never found Atlantis was named after him.
Source: https://womanadvice.ru/titany-kto-takie-i-kakoe-mesto-zanimali-v-grecheskoy-mifologii
New stainless titanium and tantalum alloy for the chemical industry
Chemical production, with its wide range of aggressive substances of both organic and inorganic origin, involved in technological production processes, places special demands on the choice of equipment material and production communications.
Here, first of all, we are talking about the corrosion properties of the material from which the production equipment is made. This is especially true for devices that come into direct contact with aggressive substances - acids, alkalis, salts and others.
Stainless steel under the influence of aggressive substances and its grade for the chemical industry
An example is a decomposition reactor in the production of titanium dioxide using the sulfuric acid method. The main raw material, called ilmenite ore, decomposes in the reactor under the influence of sulfuric acid and proceeds further into the production thread. We will not dwell in detail on further chemical processes for the production of titanium dioxide, but will only dwell on the effect of sulfuric acid on all kinds of devices and communications due to corrosion.
And it is a mistake to think that a material such as stainless steel is not susceptible to corrosion when exposed to sulfuric acid or especially chlorine. It turns out that stainless steel is far from uniform in its composition, and depending on the purpose, it exists in the form of different grades.
At the moment there is no stainless metal that would provide 100% protection against acids. Simply put, the destruction of the structure of stainless metal under the influence of acids is a matter of time.
And the task of science here is to extend this very time of protection.
Anti-corrosion titanium and tantalum alloy
Is there a more effective alternative to stainless steel today? It turns out that for a long time they have been trying to “combine” chemical elements such as titanium and tantalum into a single alloy that is several times more corrosion resistant.
Tantalum was not chosen by chance, since it, along with platinum, is the most resistant to corrosion along with zirconium, niobium and molybdenum. The whole problem of obtaining the alloy until now has been the huge difference in the melting temperature of titanium and tantalum.
Below we present the physical and chemical properties of the elements titanium and tantalum.
As you can see, their tantalum melting point is approximately one and a half times that of titanium. During the melting process of these elements, tantalum, while still solid, settles in the molten liquid titanium.
Finally, a solution was found by scientists from the Institute of Nuclear Physics. G.I. Budker using the ELV-6 electron accelerator. Titanium will serve as the main material for the construction of the future reactor, based on its raw material sufficiency for production needs within Russia.
Then, using a high-energy electron beam from EVL-6, it was possible to evenly apply powdered titanium and tantalum onto it. In already molten liquid titanium, an electron beam with an energy of 1.4 MeV made it possible to melt tantalum evenly throughout the applied volume of the layer.
Simply put, the effect of melting tantalum in titanium can be compared to dissolved table salt in a glass of water. The result is a material that exceeds the corrosion resistance life of stainless steel by 10 times, while its price increases only by 3 times. The economic benefits are obvious here. The only thing left to do is to put the production of the new alloy on stream for use in chemical production.
Source: https://www.sciencedebate2008.com/novyy-nerzhaveyushchiy-splav-titana-i-tantala-dlya-khimicheskoy-promyshlennosti/
Who are the Titans
"Titan" is a term for members of a powerful race in Greek mythology. The Titans ruled the world before the Olympians. They were immortal and possessed incredible power , being well versed in old religious rituals and magic. They are also known as the elder gods. The Titans lived on Mount Othrys.
Generations
There were two generations of Titans, the first of which was mainly associated with the term "titans". They were the children of Gaia and Uranus, namely six men and six women, including Corsus, Cronus, Crius, Hyperion, Iapetus, Oceanus, Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Rhea, Theia, Themis and Tethys.
The siblings came to power by overthrowing their father from the throne . While they ruled Greece, some had intercourse with each other and gave birth to another generation of titans.
Origin
According to Greek mythology , there was only Chaos and emptiness in the entire universe. But Gaia followed Chaos along with Eros. She subsequently gave birth to Uranus. The gods continued to communicate with each other, giving birth to others, including Erebus, Nike and Oceanus. Eventually Gaia and Uranus united with each other and the twelve Titans were born.
Titanomachy
In Greek mythology, the Titanomachy was a well-known war between the Titans and the Olympian gods (led by Zeus) that lasted ten years. The result is easy to guess, since Olympian gods such as Zeus are among the most powerful and recognizable in all of mythology.
When the Titans reigned over the Earth, Uranus was the ruler . But he was far from being considered kind. The Titan was upset with his wife and sent several of his children, the Cyclopes and the Hecatonchires, to Tartarus.
Eventually, Geia's emotions reached their limit, and she built a giant sickle, which she used to order her children to castrate their father and overthrow him from the throne. Kronos agreed to help and plan the attack with his mother.
The plan worked, and when the blood of Uranus fell to the earth, three generations of children were born from it, including Melia, Erina and the Giants. Some of the blood fell into the sea, and the goddess Aphrodite emerged from it.
Kronos seized the throne, but Uranus told him that his own sons would attack him and dethrone him. Kronos then turned into a paranoid god like his father and threw his brothers back to Tartarus.
He also swallowed his children to prevent the prophecy. Cronus's wife, Rhea, deceived her husband and saved one of the children, Zeus. The latter was safe while growing up. When he became old and strong enough, Zeus tricked his father into drinking a special mixture that made him vomit the children he had once swallowed. Zeus gathered them together and convinced them of the need to overthrow their father.
This was the beginning of the Titanomachy. Hecantocheires and Cyclopes joined the battle. The first of them threw stones at the Titans, while the Cyclopes created lightning for Zeus.
The Olympians won the war. All the Titans, except Prometheus and Themis, were imprisoned in Tartarus . Zeus and his two brothers, Hades and Poseidon, divided the universe between themselves. Zeus became the king of the sky, Poseidon watched over the seas, while Hades became the ruler of the Underworld. All this symbolizes the beginning of a new era in Greek mythology.
Some Famous Titans
Cron. Kronos was the leader and youngest of the Titans, who was eventually overthrown by his sons just as he overthrew his father from the throne. Some myths say that Kronos was imprisoned forever in Tartarus along with his brothers and sisters, while others claim that he was sent to rule the Elysian fields after a gigantic war.
Rhea. Rhea was the mother of the Olympian branch of gods and goddesses in Greek texts. Meanwhile, she never lived with her children.
Themis. Themis is known as the embodiment of law, customs and divine order. She was often described by her followers as the Titans' "good lawyer". Themis's name translates to "law of nature" and she has always been involved in organizing events between gods and humans.
Ocean .The ocean was associated with waters. He was usually depicted as a strong, muscular man with a long beard and horns. Due to its connection with the seas, the lower part of its body is usually a snake.
Theia . This person ruled the sun and could be found in several myths, some of which date back to classical antiquity.
Kors and Phoebe . Corsus is consistently mentioned as one of the Titans, but he does not show active involvement in any myths or aspects of Greek religion. He was known as the titan of wisdom. Cause copulated with his sister Phoebe, and Leto and Asteria were born to them.
The first became the mother of the gods Artemis and Apollo. Phoebe was often associated with the moon , and was for a time an oracle.
Source: https://todayfin.ru/kto-takie-titany/