Gaia

Gaia, the Roman Terra or Tellus, is the Earth, and in Hesiod's Theogony one of the very first beings to arise out of Chaos at the beginning of all things. From herself alone she brought forth Ouranos, the starry sky, to cover her, and the mountains and the sea; then, joined with Ouranos, she became the mother of the Titans, and so the ancestress of gods and mortals alike.

She is the deep ground of existence, the womb and tomb of everything that comes to be. When Ouranos imprisoned their children within her, it was Gaia who armed her son Kronos to overthrow him, setting in motion the succession of divine generations. The philosophers honored her as the visible image of the maternal, generative principle of nature — the physis from which all forms spring and to which they return.

Epithets

• Anesidora Ἀνησιδώρα — sender-up of gifts
• Kourotrophos Κουροτρόφος — nurse of the young
• Pandoros Πάνδωρος — the all-giving
• Terra Mater Lat. — Mother Earth (Roman)