Meet Triton God of the Sea and its Depths. Discover his great powers, relationships, enemies and legends surrounding him.
Triton God of the Sea
Triton God messenger of the deep sea, was the mighty man child of the God and Goddess of the sea, Poseidon and Amphitrite. When he blew the horn of his conch shell he was able to raise or calm the sea and drive away the enemy giants who thought the sounds were the calls of approaching wild animals.
Like his ancestor Nereus, the elder of the sea, he possessed the gift of prophecy. Like his father Poseidon, Triton was powerful and carried a trident. He is mentioned by the epic poet Homer in the Odyssey, by Hesiod in his Theogony, and in the Argonautica, Apollonius’ poetic history of the Argonauts, and in Virgil’s Aeneid.
Family of Triton God messenger of the depths of the sea
Triton’s father, Poseidon, is one of the 12 gods of the Olympian pantheon who became the ruling gods after Gigantomachy, the Great War with the giants. His brother Zeus had overthrown their father, Cronus. The brothers Hades, Zeus and Poseidon drew lots. Zeus won the lot and became the supreme ruler of the gods, Hades became the ruler of the underworld, and Poseidon the Lord of the Sea.
Poseidon married Amphitrite, the eldest of Nereus’ 50 daughters of Nereid of Nereus. She was a direct descendant and granddaughter of the primitive Titan Oceanus. They had three children together: Bentos, the goddess of the waves, Rhodes, the namesake of the island, and Triton. Since Poseidon fathered many other children with goddesses and mortals out of wedlock, Triton is also related to many half-siblings – about 50 in all.
Mermaids
Mermaids, and their male counterparts, tritons, were supernatural nymphs of the sea. They were half-human in form, with the tail of a fish. They were believed at the time to have inhabited saltwater environments and occasionally made landfall. The word mermaid is derived from the English word Middle meaning sea.
There are many legends of mermaids. It has been said that they had enchanting but deadly voices, which they used to distract sailors and lead them into fatal accidents. In other legends they helped men at sea, using their powers to lift the winds or calm storms.
Mermaids are often depicted combing their long hair while looking at themselves in a mirror, evidence of their vanity, self-absorption and inability to be trusted. Aphrodite, the goddess of love, was raised by the sirens. The feared aspect of women in Greek mythology, and especially of mermaids, is their ability to seduce men with their beauty and charm. When a divine female seduces a human male, it almost always results in his death.
Tales of Triton
Apollonius’ poetic tale of the Argonauts is the story of Jason and his journey to retrieve the Golden Fleece from the imaginary island of Colchis. It tells of his relationship with the dangerous princess Medea and the treacherous seas faced by the Argonauts, the sailors of his ship the Argo. Triton was waiting for them at his home on the salt lake of Tritonis. After a storm stranded Jason and his men in the Libyan desert, they were forced to take their ship to the lake.
Triton helped them sail back to the sea. In Virgil’s Aeneid, the story of Aeneas, the Trojan who became the ancestor of the Romans, a trumpeter named Misenus dares to challenge Triton in a musical contest. Angered by his arrogance, the god Triton throws him into the sea and sends a wave to drown him.
Modern Influence
One of the most famous fountains in Rome is a masterpiece by Bernini called the Fontana del Tritone. Sculpted in 1643, it still stands in Piazza Barberini and depicts the fish-tailed Triton surrounded by dolphins and drinking from a conch shell.
The enchanting fish-tailed creatures of the sea remain a fascination and artistic inspiration in popular culture. Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid was first published in 1837. It has been translated into many languages and is still enjoyed by children around the world.
In the 1984 film, Splash, Daryl Hannah played a mermaid named Madison. J. K. Rowling’s, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire featured merpeople underwater. Syrena was a mermaid pleaser in the 2011 film Pirates of the Caribbean, and the infamous King Triton was introduced as the controlling father of the mermaid princess in Disney’s animated film, The Little Mermaid.
Every June in Coney Island, New York, a mermaid queen and King Neptune lead the mermaid parade that kicks off the summer season by bringing the mythology to life and allowing artistic audiences to express themselves and community pride.
It seems that mermaids (sirens and mermen) have captured the human imagination since the time of the ancient Greeks, whose mythology dates back from 700 B.C. to the present day. According to legends, they are all descendants of the ancient god Triton, the mighty messenger of the sea.
Triton since the Renaissance
The largest moon of the planet Neptune has been given the name Triton, as Neptune is the Roman equivalent of Poseidon. In Wordsworth’s sonnet “The world is too much with us” (ca. 1802, published in 1807), the poet laments the prosaic and monotonous modern world, which longs for
In Jacob Jordaens’ ‘The Artist’s Family’, now in the Prado, Madrid, a newt is depicted grasping, perhaps crushing, a child with its snake tail, a scene watched over by an exotic parrot. The meaning of this motif in the context of a painting of domestic bliss is unclear, but it may imply a transfer of functions in the sense that the child appears to be blowing on the conch shell (referred to above) to ward off forces that threaten family peace.
A family of large sea snails, whose shells have been used as trumpets since ancient times, are commonly known as “tritons,” see Triton (gastropod). The name Triton is associated in modern industry with tough, rugged machines such as the Ford Triton engine and the Mitsubishi Triton pickup truck.
King Triton is a character depicted in Disney’s The Little Mermaid, inspired by Triton, as an underwater king, the father of the title character. In The Little Mermaid, Triton has seven daughters for the Seven Seas,[citation needed] the youngest named Ariel, of whom she is very overprotective. However, this character (and all others in the Disney film) are based on Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale.