The aegis ( ; grc, αἰγίς ''aigís''), as stated in the '' Iliad'', is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a

shield A shield is a piece of personal armour held in the hand, which may or may not be strapped to the wrist or forearm. Shields are used to intercept specific attacks, whether from close-ranged weaponry or projectiles such as arrows, by means of a ...

and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. There may be a connection with a deity named Aex or Aix, a daughter of

Helios In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Helios (; grc, , , Sun; Homeric Greek: ) is the deity, god and personification of the Sun (Solar deity). His name is also Latinized as Helius, and he is often given the epithets Hyper ...

and a nurse of Zeus or alternatively a mistress of Zeus ( Hyginus, ''Astronomica'' 2. 13). The modern concept of doing something "under someone's ''aegis'' means doing something under the protection of a powerful, knowledgeable, or benevolent source. The word ''aegis'' is identified with protection by a strong force with its roots in Greek mythology and adopted by the Romans; there are parallels in

Norse mythology Norse, Nordic, or Scandinavian mythology is the body of myths belonging to the North Germanic peoples, stemming from Old Norse religion and continuing after the Christianization of Scandinavia, and into the Nordic folklore of the modern period ...

and in Egyptian mythology as well, where the Greek word ''aegis'' is applied by extension.

Etymology

The Greek ''aigis'', has many meanings including: # "violent windstorm", from the verb ''aïssō'' ( word stem ''aïg-'') = "I rush or move violently". Akin to ''kataigis'', "thunderstorm". # The shield of a deity as described above. # "goatskin coat", from treating the word as meaning "something grammatically feminine pertaining to goat": Greek ''aix'' (

stem Stem or STEM may refer to: Plant structures * Plant stem, a plant's aboveground axis, made of vascular tissue, off which leaves and flowers hang * Stipe (botany), a stalk to support some other structure * Stipe (mycology), the stem of a mushro ...

''aig-'') = "goat", + suffix ''-is'' (stem ''-id-''). The original meaning may have been the first, and ''Zeus Aigiokhos'' = "Zeus who holds the aegis" may have originally meant "Sky/Heaven, who holds the thunderstorm". The transition to the meaning "shield" or "goatskin" may have come by

folk etymology Folk etymology (also known as popular etymology, analogical reformation, reanalysis, morphological reanalysis or etymological reinterpretation) is a change in a word or phrase resulting from the replacement of an unfamiliar form by a more famili ...

among a people familiar with draping an animal skin over the left arm as a shield.

In Greek mythology

The aegis of Athena is referred to in several places in the ''Iliad''. "It produced a sound as from

myriad A myriad (from Ancient Greek grc, μυριάς, translit=myrias, label=none) is technically the number 10,000 (ten thousand); in that sense, the term is used in English almost exclusively for literal translations from Greek, Latin or Sinospher ...

roaring dragons (''Iliad'', 4.17) and was borne by Athena in battle ... and among them went bright-eyed Athene, holding the precious aegis which is ageless and immortal: a hundred tassels of pure gold hang fluttering from it, tight-woven each of them, and each the worth of a hundred oxen." Virgil imagines the Cyclopes in Hephaestus' forge, who "busily burnished the aegis Athena wears in her angry moods—a fearsome thing with a surface of gold like scaly snake-skin, and the linked serpents and the Gorgon herself upon the goddess's breast—a severed head rolling its eyes", furnished with golden tassels and bearing the '' Gorgoneion'' ( Medusa's head) in the central boss. Some of the

Attic An attic (sometimes referred to as a '' loft'') is a space found directly below the pitched roof of a house or other building; an attic may also be called a ''sky parlor'' or a garret. Because attics fill the space between the ceiling of the ...

vase-painters retained an archaic tradition that the tassels had originally been serpents in their representations of the aegis. When the Olympian deities overtook the older deities of Greece and she was born of

Metis Metis or Métis may refer to: Ethnic groups * Métis, recognized Indigenous communities in Canada and America whose distinct culture and language emerged after early intermarriage between First Nations peoples and early European settlers, primar ...

(inside Zeus who had swallowed the goddess) and "re-born" through the head of Zeus fully clothed, Athena already wore her typical garments. When the Olympian shakes the aegis,

Mount Ida In Greek mythology, two sacred mountains are called Mount Ida, the "Mountain of the Goddess": Mount Ida in Crete, and Mount Ida in the ancient Troad region of western Anatolia (in modern-day Turkey), which was also known as the '' Phrygian Ida'' ...

is wrapped in clouds, the thunder rolls and men are struck down with fear. "Aegis-bearing Zeus", as he is in the ''Iliad'', sometimes lends the fearsome aegis to Athena. In the ''Iliad'' when Zeus sends

Apollo Apollo, grc, Ἀπόλλωνος, Apóllōnos, label=genitive , ; , grc-dor, Ἀπέλλων, Apéllōn, ; grc, Ἀπείλων, Apeílōn, label=Arcadocypriot Greek, ; grc-aeo, Ἄπλουν, Áploun, la, Apollō, la, Apollinis, label= ...

to revive the wounded

Hector In Greek mythology, Hector (; grc, Ἕκτωρ, Hektōr, label=none, ) is a character in Homer's Iliad. He was a Trojan prince and the greatest warrior for Troy during the Trojan War. Hector led the Trojans and their allies in the defense o ...

, Apollo, holding the aegis, charges the Achaeans, pushing them back to their ships drawn up on the shore. According to

Edith Hamilton Edith Hamilton (August 12, 1867 – May 31, 1963) was an American educator and internationally known author who was one of the most renowned classicists of her era in the United States. A graduate of Bryn Mawr College, she also studied in German ...

's ''Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes'', the Aegis is the

breastplate A breastplate or chestplate is a device worn over the torso to protect it from injury, as an item of religious significance, or as an item of status. A breastplate is sometimes worn by mythological beings as a distinctive item of clothing. It is ...

of Zeus, and was "awful to behold". However, Zeus is normally portrayed in classical sculpture holding a thunderbolt or lightning, bearing neither a shield nor a breastplate.

In classical poetry and art

Classical Greece Classical Greece was a period of around 200 years (the 5th and 4th centuries BC) in Ancient Greece,The "Classical Age" is "the modern designation of the period from about 500 B.C. to the death of Alexander the Great in 323 B.C." (Thomas R. Martin ...

interpreted the Homeric aegis usually as a cover of some kind borne by Athena. It was supposed by

Euripides Euripides (; grc, Εὐριπίδης, Eurīpídēs, ; ) was a tragedian of classical Athens. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. Some ancient scholars ...

(''Ion'', 995) that the aegis borne by Athena was the skin of the slain Gorgon, yet the usual understanding is that the ''Gorgoneion'' was ''added'' to the aegis, a

votive offering A votive offering or votive deposit is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for religious purposes. Such items are a feature of modern and ancient societies and are generall ...

from a grateful

Perseus In Greek mythology, Perseus (Help:IPA/English, /ˈpɜːrsiəs, -sjuːs/; Greek language, Greek: Περσεύς, Romanization of Greek, translit. Perseús) is the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Perseid dynasty. He was, alongside Cadmus ...

. In a similar interpretation, Aex, a daughter of

, represented as a great fire-breathing

chthonic The word chthonic (), or chthonian, is derived from the Ancient Greek word ''χθών, "khthon"'', meaning earth or soil. It translates more directly from χθόνιος or "in, under, or beneath the earth" which can be differentiated from Γῆ ...

serpent similar to the

Chimera Chimera, Chimaera, or Chimaira (Greek for " she-goat") originally referred to: * Chimera (mythology), a fire-breathing monster of Ancient Lycia said to combine parts from multiple animals * Mount Chimaera, a fire-spewing region of Lycia or Cilicia ...

, was slain and flayed by Athena, who afterwards wore its skin, the aegis, as a

cuirass A cuirass (; french: cuirasse, la, coriaceus) is a piece of armour that covers the torso, formed of one or more pieces of metal or other rigid material. The word probably originates from the original material, leather, from the French '' cui ...

(

Diodorus Siculus Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history '' Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which ...

iii. 70), or as a

chlamys The chlamys (Ancient Greek: χλαμύς : chlamýs, genitive: χλαμύδος : chlamydos) was a type of an ancient Greek cloak.

. The Douris cup shows that the aegis was represented exactly as the skin of the great serpent, with its scales clearly delineated.

John Tzetzes John Tzetzes ( grc-gre, Ἰωάννης Τζέτζης, Iōánnēs Tzétzēs; c. 1110, Constantinople – 1180, Constantinople) was a Byzantine poet and grammarian who is known to have lived at Constantinople in the 12th century. He was able to pr ...

says that aegis was the skin of the monstrous giant

Pallas Pallas may refer to: Astronomy * 2 Pallas asteroid ** Pallas family, a group of asteroids that includes 2 Pallas * Pallas (crater), a crater on Earth's moon Mythology * Pallas (Giant), a son of Uranus and Gaia, killed and flayed by Athena * Pal ...

whom Athena overcame and whose name she attached to her own. In a late rendering by

Gaius Julius Hyginus Gaius Julius Hyginus (; 64 BC – AD 17) was a Latin author, a pupil of the scholar Alexander Polyhistor, and a freedman of Caesar Augustus. He was elected superintendent of the Palatine library by Augustus according to Suetonius' ''De Gramma ...

(''Poetical Astronomy'' ii. 13), Zeus is said to have used the skin of a pet goat owned by his nurse Amalthea (''aigis'' "goat-skin") which suckled him in

Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cypru ...

, as a shield when he went forth to do battle against the

Titan Titan most often refers to: * Titan (moon), the largest moon of Saturn * Titans, a race of deities in Greek mythology Titan or Titans may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Fictional entities Fictional locations * Titan in fiction, fiction ...

s. The aegis appears in works of art sometimes as an animal's skin thrown over Athena's shoulders and arms, occasionally with a border of snakes, usually also bearing the Gorgon head, the ''gorgoneion''. In some pottery it appears as a tasselled cover over Athena's dress. It is sometimes represented on the statues of

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...

emperors, heroes, and warriors, and on cameos and vases. A vestige of that appears in a portrait of

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to ...

in a fresco from Pompeii dated to the first century BC, which shows the image of the head of a woman on his armor that resembles the Gorgon.

Origins

Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria ( Italy). He is known for ...

thought he had identified the source of the aegis in

ancient Libya The Latin name ''Libya'' (from Greek Λιβύη: ''Libyē'', which came from Berber: '' Libu'') referred to North Africa during the Iron Age and Classical Antiquity. Berbers occupied the area for thousands of years before the recording of his ...

, which was always a distant territory of ancient magic for the Greeks. "Athene's garments and aegis were borrowed by the Greeks from the Libyan women, who are dressed in exactly the same way, except that their leather garments are fringed with thongs, not serpents." Robert Graves in ''

The Greek Myths ''The Greek Myths'' (1955) is a mythography, a compendium of Greek mythology, with comments and analyses, by the poet and writer Robert Graves. Many editions of the book separate it into two volumes. Abridged editions of the work contain only t ...

'' (1955) asserts that the aegis in its Libyan sense had been a shamanic pouch containing various ritual objects, bearing the device of a monstrous serpent-haired visage with tusk-like teeth and a protruding tongue which was meant to frighten away the uninitiated. In this context, Graves identifies the aegis as clearly belonging first to Athena. One current interpretation is that the

Hittite Hittite may refer to: * Hittites, ancient Anatolian people ** Hittite language, the earliest-attested Indo-European language ** Hittite grammar ** Hittite phonology ** Hittite cuneiform ** Hittite inscriptions ** Hittite laws ** Hittite religion * ...

sacral hieratic hunting bag (''kursas''), a rough and shaggy goatskin that has been firmly established in literary texts and iconography by H.G. Güterbock, was a source of the aegis.

References

External links

{{Wiktionary
Theoi Project: "Aigis"''Die Aigis: Zu Typologie und Ikonographie eines Mythischen Gegenstandes''
a Doctoral dissertation on the Ægis (Westfälischen Wilhelms-Universität,

Münster Münster (; nds, Mönster) is an independent city (''Kreisfreie Stadt'') in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also a state d ...

1991) by Sigrid Vierck. Comparative mythology Concepts in ancient Greek aesthetics Concepts in ancient Greek metaphysics Greek mythology Greek shields Interpersonal relationships Medusa Mythography Mythological clothing Mythological shields Symbols of Athena Virtue