MENOITIOS

MENOITIOS (Menoetius) was one of the younger Titanes. He was perhaps the god rash action and violent rage. Zeus blasted him with a thunderbolt into Erebos (the Underworld) for his hubris.

Menoitios' name was derived from the Greek words menos meaning "might", "force", "passion" and "batterage", and oitos meaning "ill-fated" or "doomed". Hesiod calls him hybristes--a violent, overbearing and insolent man.

FAMILY OF MENOETIUS

PARENTS

[1.1] IAPETOS & KLYMENE (Hesiod Theogony 507)
[1.2] IAPETOS & ASIE (Apollodorus 1.8)

ENCYCLOPEDIA

MENOE′TIUS (Menoitios). A son of Iapetus and Clymene or Asia, and a brother of Atlas, Prometheus and Epimetheus, was killed by Zeus with a flash of lightning, in the fight of the Titans, and thrown into Tartarus. (Hes. Theog. 507, &c., 514; Apollod. i. 2. § 3; Schol. ad Aeschyl. Prom. 347.)

Source: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.

CLASSICAL LITERATURE QUOTES

Hesiod, Theogony 507 ff (trans. Evelyn-White) (Greek epic C8th or C7th B.C.) :
"Now Iapetos (Iapetus) took to wife the neat-ankled maid Klymene (Clymene), daughter of Okeanos (Oceanus), and went up with her into one bed. And she bare him a stout-hearted son, Atlas : also she bare very glorious Menoitios (Menoetius) and clever Prometheus, full of various wiles, and scatter-brained Epimetheus . . . But Menoitios was outrageous (hybristes), and far-seeing Zeus struck him with a lurid thunderbolt and sent him down to Erebos (Erebus) because of his mad presumption and exceeding pride."

Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 1. 8 (trans. Aldrich) (Greek mythographer C2nd A.D.) :
"The Titanes (Titans) had children . . . Atlas who holds the sky on his shoulders, Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Menoitios (Menoetius) whom Zeus struck with a thunderbolt in the Titan battle and confined to Tartaros (Tartarus), were all sons of Iapetos (Iapetus) and Asia."

COMMENTARY

Menoitios and his brothers all represented human foibles--Prometheus was exceedingly crafty, Epimetheus a fool, Atlas exceedingly daring, and Menoitios insolent and hubristic.

He was perhaps the same as Menoites, herdsman of Haides, whom Herakles encountered and wrestled with in the underworld. This connection with cattle might suggest Menoitios-Menoites was the same as Bouphagos "the Cattle-Eater"--an hubristic son of Iapetos who assaulted the goddess Artemis in Arkadia.

SOURCES

GREEK

• Hesiod, Theogony - Greek Epic C8th - 7th B.C.
• Apollodorus, The Library - Greek Mythography C2nd A.D.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

A complete bibliography of the translations quoted on this page.