Note: Any and all stories that have not been scientifically proven, I am counting as a myth. This includes religious beliefs, no offence is intended.

What better place is there when looking at myths than “in the beginning”. Pretty much every culture has their own belief on how things came to be. I am going to look at, and compare just a few of them.

Ancient Greek

As told by Hesiod in his Theogony

In the beginning there was Chaos(χάος, khaos meaning emptiness or the void). Out of this primal divine beings emerged. One of such was(Γαῖα meaning land or earth). Gaia asexually gave birth to Uranus(Οὐρανός, Ouranos meaning sky or heaven).

Out of this came twelve titans. Arguably the two most important were Kronos(Κρόνος, Krónos possibly coming from the Indo-European root ker- to cut) and Rhea(Ῥέα most likely a variant Era, ‘earth’). Gaia and Uranus also gave birth to the mono-eyed cyclopes(Κύκλωπες, Kyklōpes meaning round-eyed). They also gave birth to the Hecatoncheires (Ἑκατόγχειρες,Hekatoncheires, meaning Hundred-Handed Ones).

Uranus hated the Hecatoncheires and the cyclopes, so chucked them into Tartarus(Τάρταρος, Tartaros The Abyss). This infurited Gaia, who planted the seed in the mind of Kronos to overthrow his father. He castrated Uranus, becoming the ruler of the Titans.

Kronos and Rhea had 6 children, who became the gods. Kronos, fearful that his children would do the same to him as he did to his father, so he ate all but one, Zeus(Ζεύς, Zeús from a word meaning “to shine” and more or less means “The sky God”). Rhea, replaced Zeus with a large stone. Zeus posed as Kronos’ cup bearer for years, gaining his trust. He then gave Kronos poisoned wine causing him to vomit and release the other five gods.

With the other five gods revived, Zeus staged a rebellion. First they went to Tartarus, to gain the help of the cyclopes and Hecatoncheries. The cyclopes created weapons for the three male gods. They made a lightning bolt of Zeus, a Trident for Poseidon(Ποσειδῶν,Posei-dawōn into the master of waters) and a helmet of darkness for Hades( Ἅιδης Háidēs generally been seen as meaning “the unseen one). Using these items of power, and with the help of the Hecatoncheries, the gods overthrew the titans.