In Greek mythology, Pontus (; )[Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pont-eh₁-, *pn̩t-h₁, "path" (see )] was an ancient, pre-Olympian sea-god, one of the Greek primordial deities. Pontus was Gaia's son and has no father (similar to Uranus); according to the Greek poet Hesiod, he was born without coupling,[Hyginus, Fabulae Preface]
Mythology
For Hesiod, Pontus seems little more than a personification of the sea,
ho póntos (), by which Hellenes signified the Mediterranean Sea.
[The Black Sea was the Greeks' ho pontos euxeinos, the "sea that welcomes strangers".] After the castration of his brother Uranus, Pontus, with his mother Gaia, fathered
Nereus (the Old Man of the Sea),
Thaumas (the awe-striking "wonder" of the Sea, embodiment of the sea's dangerous aspects),
Phorcys and his sister-consort
Ceto, and the "Strong Goddess" Eurybia.
[Hesiod, Theogony 233–239; Gantz, p. 16; Grimal, s.v. Pontus. For a genealogical table of the descendants of Gaia and Pontus, see Gantz, p. 805.] With the sea goddess Thalassa (whose own name simply means "sea" but is derived from a
Pre-Greek root), he fathered all sea life.
In a Roman sculpture of the 2nd century AD, Pontus, rising from seaweed, grasps a rudder with his right hand and leans on the prow of a ship. He wears a mural crown, and accompanies Tyche, whose draperies appear at the left, as twin patron deities of the Black Sea port of Tomis in Moesia.
See also
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List of water deities
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Pontus (region)
Notes
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Dimitrov, Zdravko, "Anatolian Stonemasons and the West Pontic Region: Imported Models and Techniques in the Architectural Decorations of the Early Principate", in The Greeks and Romans in the Black Sea and the Importance of the Pontic Region for the Graeco-Roman World (7th century BC–5th century AD): 20 Years On (1997–2017), pp. 290–294, edited by Gocha R. Tsetskhladze, Alexandru Avram, and James Hargrave, Oxford, Archaeopress, 2021. .
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Timothy Gantz, Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, Two volumes: (Vol. 1), (Vol. 2).
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Grimal, Pierre, The Dictionary of Classical Mythology, Wiley-Blackwell, 1996. .
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Fabulae, Fabulae from The Myths of Hyginus translated and edited by Mary Grant. University of Kansas Publications in Humanistic Studies. Online version at the Topos Text Project.
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Hesiod, 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.
