Maia (;

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...

: Μαῖα; also spelled Maie, ; la, Maia), in ancient Greek religion and

mythology Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narra ...

, is one of the

Pleiades The Pleiades (), also known as The Seven Sisters, Messier 45 and other names by different cultures, is an asterism and an open star cluster containing middle-aged, hot B-type stars in the north-west of the constellation Taurus. At a distance ...

and the mother of

Hermes Hermes (; grc-gre, wikt:Ἑρμῆς, Ἑρμῆς) is an Olympian deity in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology. Hermes is considered the herald of the gods. He is also considered the protector of human heralds, travelle ...

, one of the major Greek gods, by

Zeus Zeus or , , ; grc, Δῐός, ''Diós'', label= genitive Boeotian Aeolic and Laconian grc-dor, Δεύς, Deús ; grc, Δέος, ''Déos'', label= genitive el, Δίας, ''Días'' () is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek reli ...

, the king of Olympus.

Family

Maia is the daughter of

Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth. Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geograp ...

and Pleione the Oceanid,

Hesiod Hesiod (; grc-gre, Ἡσίοδος ''Hēsíodos'') was an ancient Greek poet generally thought to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer. He is generally regarded by western authors as 'the first written poet ...

, ''

Theogony The ''Theogony'' (, , , i.e. "the genealogy or birth of the gods") is a poem by Hesiod (8th–7th century BC) describing the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods, composed . It is written in the Epic dialect of Ancient Greek and contain ...

'' 938 and is the oldest of the seven Pleiades. Apollodorus
3.10.1
/ref> They were born on Mount Cyllene in

Arcadia Arcadia may refer to: Places Australia * Arcadia, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney * Arcadia, Queensland * Arcadia, Victoria Greece * Arcadia (region), a region in the central Peloponnese * Arcadia (regional unit), a modern administrative un ...

, and are sometimes called mountain

nymphs A nymph ( grc, νύμφη, nýmphē, el, script=Latn, nímfi, label=Modern Greek; , ) in ancient Greek folklore is a minor female nature deity. Different from Greek goddesses, nymphs are generally regarded as personifications of nature, are ...

, ''

oreads In Greek mythology, an Oread (; grc, Ὀρειάς, Oreiás, stem grc, Ὀρειάδ-, Oreiád-, label=none, la, Oreas/Oread-, from grc, ὄρος, , mountain, label=none; french: Oréade) or Orestiad (; grc, Ὀρεστιάδες, Orest ...

'';

Simonides of Ceos Simonides of Ceos (; grc-gre, Σιμωνίδης ὁ Κεῖος; c. 556–468 BC) was a Greek lyric poet, born in Ioulis on Ceos. The scholars of Hellenistic Alexandria included him in the canonical list of the nine lyric poets estee ...

sang of "mountain Maia" ''(Maiados oureias)'' "of the lovely black eyes." Because they were daughters of Atlas, they were also called the Atlantides.

Mythology

Birth of Hermes

According to the Homeric hymn, Homeric ''Hymn to Hermes'', Zeus, in the dead of night, secretly made love to Maia, who avoided the company of the gods, in a cave of Cyllene. She became pregnant with

. After giving birth to the baby, Maia wrapped him in blankets and went to sleep. The rapidly maturing infant Hermes crawled away to Thessaly, where by nightfall of his first day he stole some of his half-brother Apollo (god), Apollo's cattle and invented the lyre from a tortoise shell. Maia refused to believe Apollo when he claimed that Hermes was the thief, and Zeus then sided with Apollo. Finally, Apollo exchanged the cattle for the lyre, which became one of his identifying attributes. Although the ''Homeric Hymn'' has Maia as Hermes' caretaker and guardian, in Sophocles's now lost satyr play ''Ichneutae'', Maia entrusted the infant Hermes to Cyllene (nymph), Cyllene (the local mountain goddess) to nurse and raise, and thus it is her that the satyrs and Apollo confront when looking for the god's missing cattle.

As nurturer

Maia also raised the infant Arcas, the child of Callisto (mythology), Callisto with Zeus. Wronged by the love affair, Zeus' wife Hera in a jealous rage had transformed Callisto into a bear. Arcas is the eponym of

, where Maia was born. The story of Callisto and Arcas, like that of the Pleiades, is an ''aition'' for a stellar formation, the constellations Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, the Great and Little Bear. Her name is related to μαῖα (''maia''), an honorific term for older women related to μήτηρ (''mētēr'') 'mother', also meaning "midwife" in Greek.

Roman Maia

In Religion in ancient Rome, ancient Roman religion and Roman mythology, myth, Maia embodied the concept of growth, as her name was thought to be related to the comparative adjective ''maius, maior'' "larger, greater". Originally, she may have been a homonym independent of the Greek Maia, whose myths she absorbed through the Hellenization of Latin literature and Culture of ancient Rome, culture. In an archaic Roman prayer, Maia appears as an attribute of Vulcan (mythology), Vulcan, in an Glossary of ancient Roman religion#invocatio, invocational list of male deities paired with female abstractions representing some aspect of their functionality. She was explicitly identified with Earth (''Terra (mythology), Terra'', the interpretatio graeca, Roman counterpart of Gaia) and the Good Goddess (''Bona Dea'') in at least one tradition. Her identity became theologically intertwined also with the goddesses Faunus, Fauna, Ops, Juno (mythology), Juno, Cardea, Carna, and the Magna Mater ("Great Goddess", referring to the Roman form of Cybele but also a cult title for Maia), as discussed at some length by the late antiquity, late antiquarian writer Macrobius. This treatment was probably influenced by the 1st-century BC scholar Varro, who tended to resolve a great number of goddesses into one original "Terra". The association with Juno, whose Etruscan religion, Etruscan counterpart was Uni (mythology), Uni, is suggested again by the inscription ''Uni Mae'' on the Piacenza Liver. The month of May (Latin ''Maius'') was named for Maia, though ancient etymologists also connected it to the ''maiores'' "ancestors", again from the adjective ''maius, maior'', meaning those who are "greater" in terms of generational precedence. On the first day of May, the Lares, Lares Praestites were honored as tutelary deity, protectors of the city, and the flamen of Vulcan sacrificed a pregnant sow to Maia, a customary offering to an earth goddess that reiterates the link between Vulcan and Maia in the archaic prayer formula. In Roman mythology, Roman myth, Mercury (mythology), Mercury (Hermes), the son of Maia, was the father of the twin Lares, a genealogy that sheds light on the collocation of ceremonies on the Kalends of May. On May 15, the Ides (calendar), Ides, Mercury was honored as a patron of merchants and increaser of profit (through an etymological connection with ''merx, merces'', "goods, merchandise"), another possible connection with Maia his mother as a goddess who promoted growth.

Notes

References

* Apollodorus, ''The Library'' with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. ISBN 0-674-99135-4
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website
*Diodorus Siculus, ''The Library of History'' translated by Charles Henry Oldfather. Twelve volumes. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. 1989. Vol. 3. Books 4.59–8
Online version at Bill Thayer's Web Site
*Diodorus Siculus, ''Bibliotheca Historica. Vol 1-2''. Immanel Bekker. Ludwig Dindorf. Friedrich Vogel. in aedibus B. G. Teubneri. Leipzig. 1888-1890
Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library
*

, ''Theogony'' from ''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica'' with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website
*Ovid, Publius Ovidius Naso, ''Fasti'' translated by James G. Frazer
Online version at the Topos Text Project.
*Publius Ovidius Naso, ''Fasti.'' Sir James George Frazer. London; Cambridge, MA. William Heinemann Ltd.; Harvard University Press. 1933
Latin text available at the Perseus Digital Library
*''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica'' with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Homeric Hymns. Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website