Ambrosia

Ambrosia :: Food of the Gods, Its Power and Meaning

Ambrosia is the food of the gods in Greek mythology, usually named together with nectar, their drink. Eating it keeps the gods immortal, and in several myths a god uses it to try to make a mortal immortal. The name belongs to the same word family as ambrotos, “immortal”, the word Homer uses for the “immortal blood” of a wounded goddess (Iliad 5.339).

The Essence of Divinity

In Homer, ambrosia and nectar are what the gods eat and drink, while mortals eat bread and meat. When Hermes visits Calypso, she serves him ambrosia and red nectar (Odyssey 5.91–94); afterwards she sets mortal food before Odysseus, while her maids bring ambrosia and nectar for herself (Odyssey 5.196–199). Doves carry ambrosia to Zeus across the sea (Odyssey 12.62–63). In the Homeric Hymn to Apollo, the newborn god is not nursed by his mother but fed by Themis with nectar and lovely ambrosia (Hymn 3 to Apollo 124–127). Athena drops nectar and ambrosia into Achilles’ chest so that hunger will not weaken him before he goes into battle (Iliad 19.347–354).

The two are not always strictly divided. In Homer, ambrosia is the food and nectar the drink, but the Cyclops calls the wine Odysseus gives him a stream of “ambrosia and nectar” together (Odyssey 9.357–359), and the horses of the gods are given “ambrosial fodder” (Iliad 5.369, 13.35); for Hera’s horses the river Simoeis makes ambrosia spring up to graze on (Iliad 5.777).

Ambrosia and Ichor

The Iliad links the gods’ blood to their diet. When Diomedes wounds Aphrodite, what flows from her is ichor, the blood of the gods, because they eat no bread and drink no wine, and are therefore bloodless and called immortal (Iliad 5.339–342). Homer does not say that ambrosia itself turns blood into ichor.

Other Uses of Ambrosia

Ambrosia is also a perfumed ointment. Hera cleans her body with ambrosia and anoints herself with ambrosial oil when she prepares to seduce Zeus (Iliad 14.170–172). It also protects the dead from decay. Apollo is told to wash Sarpedon’s body and anoint it with ambrosia (Iliad 16.667–670), Thetis drops ambrosia and red nectar through the nostrils of Patroclus to keep his flesh sound (Iliad 19.37–39), and Aphrodite keeps the dogs away from Hector’s body day and night and anoints it with ambrosial rose-oil, so that it is not torn when Achilles drags it (Iliad 23.185–187). In the Odyssey, the sea-nymph Eidothea puts ambrosia under each man’s nose to overcome the smell of the seal skins (Odyssey 4.445–446).

Exclusive to the Gods

Ambrosia is meant for the gods, and stealing it is a crime. In Pindar, Tantalus stole nectar and ambrosia from the gods and gave them to his drinking companions; the gods had made him incorruptible with them, and he was punished with a rock hanging over his head (Pindar, Olympian 1.55–64). Apollodorus lists, among several reasons given for his punishment, that he tried to share ambrosia with his friends (Epitome 2.1).

In other myths the gods give ambrosia to mortals on purpose. In Pindar, Chiron foretells that Hermes will carry the infant Aristaeus to the Horae and Earth, who will drip nectar and ambrosia on his lips and make him immortal (Pindar, Pythian 9.59–65). In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, the goddess nurses Demophon, the baby son of Metaneira, by anointing him with ambrosia and hiding him at night in the fire, until his mother sees it and cries out, and Demeter in anger stops (Hymn 2 to Demeter 233–254).

Achilles’ Immortality

Thetis tried the same method on her son Achilles. In Apollonius’ account, she burned away the mortal parts of the baby in the fire at night and anointed his body with ambrosia by day, so that he would become immortal and escape old age. Peleus leapt out of bed, saw the child writhing in the flames and cried out. Thetis threw the baby on the floor, left the house like a dream and plunged into the sea (Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica 4.869–879). Apollodorus tells it the same way, adding that Thetis then went back to the Nereids and that Peleus brought Achilles to Chiron (Apollodorus, Library 3.13.6). Neither author mentions a vulnerable heel; see Thetis and Peleus for the other versions of the story.