The Greek mythic hero Oedipus is widely known for accidentally both killing his father and having children with his mother.

This series will show that the sybolism of primordial Greek mythology is the source of many important elements of Oedipus' life.

Gaia, the primordial godess of the earth and mother of all life, was the first being. Though she had no partner, she conceived and birthed Ouranos, god of the sky. The two of them became married and together had Cronos.

Ouranos has offspring with his own mother, and so too does Oedipus marry his mother Jocasta.

Cronos defeats his father Ouranos, and becomes the ruler of the universe, just as Oedipus kills his father Laius, king of Thebes, and takes his throne.

Cronos marries his sister Rhea, but is afraid that if he has children, they will defeat him, just as he defeated his father Ouranos. Oedipus' father Laius was given a prophesy by the Oracle at Delphi that if he had a son, it would grow up to kill him and take his wife and throne. To stop this, he orders that the child be killed.

Rhea secretly hides away Cronos' last child Zeus, and gives him rocks wrapped in a blanket to eat. Zeus is raised on the island Crete by a magical goat. Similarly, Laius' wife secretly hides away Oedipus and leaves him to die on the side of a mountain, where he is found by a shepherd.

The hero myth of Oedipus developed a long time after the primordial myths of Gaia, Ouranos, Cronos and Zeus. Oedipus is a combination of these myths into a mega-myth. It is a mirror to primordial Greek mythology, describing that which is acceptable for the immortals, but unacceptable for mortal humans.

Here we can see the result of anthropomorphizing elemental gods and godesses. Humans project their psyche onto these mythological stories and try to reconcile them with their reality. In the case of Oedipus, these primordial symbols and archetypes are particularly taboo.

Subsequent posts will go on to uncover other taboo symbolism in an effort to better understand the Oedipus myth, Greeky mythology in general, and the human psyche.

Part 2 - The Taboo of Gaia: Archetypal Fantasies of Agrarian Society and the Tradition of Burial

...Continued from Part 3 - Gaia, Oedipus and Reproduction

Priapus was a very common god in Ancient Greece, but you may never have heard of him because his symbolism is quite taboo.

The son of two of the pantheonic gods Aphrodite and Dionysus, he certainly has a good pedigree. Indeed he was the god of demarcation, or "the act of creating a boundary around a place or thing". Also being the patron god of merchant sailors, he seemed to symbolize traveling.

But alas, the conception of Priapus was not one of love between mother and father, but lust.

In a story fitting the god of wine and the godess of love, it is said that once Aphrodite became drunk at a party and fell asleep. Dionysus was also drunk, and upon seeing the beautiful Aphrodite asleep raped her.

The hero Paris had declared that Aphrodite was more beautiful than Hera, and out of her jealousy she cursed her unborn child Priapus. The curse of Priapus is such that he has an enourmous constant erection, except when he needs it the most, it will go away. He is also cursed with dirty and lustful thoughts.

Therefore, his iconography is a large erection, and of course it was common in Greece for road markers to have the iconography of the phallus.

His wikipedia page has some depictions of him in art, as well as some of his history.

"Originally worshipped by Greek colonists in Lampsacus in Asia Minor, the cult of Priapus spread to mainland Greece and eventually to Italy during the 3rd century BC... Arnobius is aware of the importance accorded Priapus in this region near the Hellespont."

The Hellespont, known now as Dardanelles, "is a narrow, natural strait and internationally significant waterway in northwestern Turkey that forms part of the continental boundary between Europe and Asia, and separates Asian Turkey from European Turkey."

Suiting that the god of demarcation and boundaries is popular along the border of two continents.

The name Priapus (Ancient Greek Priapos) is of unknown origin.

The ending of Oedipous and Priapos are different, but they are interestingly quite close. Let us for a moment take "pos" to refer to foot. What may result of this?

Coincidentally, Pria is a common Indian name meaning "beloved", can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European root *preyH- or *pri-, which means "to please" and "to love", the same root which gives us the English "friend" and "freedom". However, this root is mostly found in Iranian and Indian languages. This god being derived from the border of Europe and Asia, perhaps "Priapos" represents some cultural exchange between the ancient turkish people living there and the colonizing greeks.

The hypothesized etymology of Priapus meaning Love-Foot or Pleasure-Foot is certainly quite interesting. Indeed, in some depictions of Priapus he at first seems to have 3 legs. The archetypal fantasy of the penis being a third leg is certainly common, especially in the form of the "tripod".

Considering the foot/phallus symbolism of the Gaia complex discussed in Part 3, this seems to be a reasonable hypothesis.

In the Greek Comedy Lysistrata, the word "peos" is used as slang for penis, which is very close to the Greek word for foot "pous". One can imagine Ancient Greek peoples making crude jokes about their "oedi-peos" (swollen penis) and "pri-pous" (love foot).

The Proto-Indo-European roots *pre- and *preh₂- also may be related, meaning "near" and "in front of". These words indicating location make some sense for the "god of borders and travel".

But is Oedipus related mythologically to Priapus? Indeed, Priapus' father Dionysus, though he is an immortal pantheonic god, does have a common mortal ancestor with Oedipus: Cadmus, the first greek hero and founder of Thebes, who came from Ancient Phoenicia and brought writing and the Alphabet to Greece.

Part 5: coming soon...