Gaia
The following is an excerpt from: Cults, Myths and Legends of Ancient Sicily (Author: Ignazio Caloggero – ISBN: 9788894321913)
Gaia or Gea is the earth, seen as the primordial element from which everything springs, even the divine lineages. Of all the female deities considered great mothers , Gaia is probably the most ancient. Gaia was born from Chaos, generating Uranus (the sky), the mountains and the Pontus (the sea). After the birth of Uranus, she united with him and from their union were born not powers of nature but true gods: the six Titans, the six Titanides and the Cyclopes (Arges, Steropes, and Brontes who were deities linked to lightning, thunder and lightning). From her union with Uranus were also born the Hecatonchires, giants with a hundred arms. Uranus, however, imprisoned the Hecatonchires and the Cyclopes in the depths of the earth, their mother. This must not have pleased Gaia, who decided to take revenge by instigating her youngest son, Cronos, to dethrone Uranus. To this end, she provided him with a sharp sickle with which Cronus castrated his father as he prepared to mate with Gaia. The blood that flowed from it fertilized the earth and, mingling with the sea waves, contributed to the birth of Aphrodite.
Gaia does not only represent the earth but also the dead, since whoever dies returns to the womb of mother earth. It is easy to imagine how the earth, from which everything springs, was soon considered the universal mother, the primordial generator of all the gods. Later, on the basis of the Hellenic conception that personified the various aspects of nature, the figure of Gaia with its characteristics was absorbed by other deities such as Demeter or Cybele, who had, compared to Gaia, a more human typology and therefore closer to the popular imagination.
In Sicily, there was an outdoor sanctuary, with an altar of Gaia, located in Syracuse, right on the tip of the island of Ortigia, outside the walls. From this sanctuary the departing sailors took a cup which was then thrown into the sea as soon as the last visible point of the earth disappeared, that is the golden shield of the pediment of the temple of Athena (Athenaeus, XI 462). The remains of a sanctuary, in which the cult of the goddess was associated with that of Dionysus and Pluto, are found in Morgantina, as we have seen when talking about Hermes.
Card insertion: Ignazio Caloggero
Photo: web
Informational contributions : Ignazio Caloggero, Sicily Region