Thalia

Thalia (Greek Thaleia) was the name of three goddesses in Greek mythology: one of the three Charites (Graces), one of the nine Muses, and one of the Nereids. The best known is the Charis, a daughter of Zeus and the Oceanid Eurynome and a sister of Aglaea and Euphrosyne.

Thalia the Charis

Hesiod says that Zeus took Eurynome, the daughter of Oceanus, as one of his wives, and that she bore him the three fair-cheeked Charites: Aglaea, Euphrosyne and lovely Thalia, from whose glancing eyes love flowed that loosens the limbs (Hesiod, Theogony 907–911). Apollodorus gives the same parents and names (Library 1.3.1). Pausanias says that a poem attributed to Hesiod, and the poem of Onomacritus, also made the Graces daughters of Zeus and Eurynome, with the names Euphrosyne, Aglaia and Thalia (Pausanias 9.35.5). He adds that the Boeotians held that Eteocles was the first to sacrifice to them and set their number at three, though they had no tradition of the names he gave, and that the Lacedaemonians recognised only two Graces, Cleta and Phaenna (Pausanias 9.35.1).

Pindar addresses the Charites of Orchomenos together: all pleasant and sweet things come to mortals with them, and the gods themselves organise neither dances nor feasts without the Graces. He then calls on Aglaia, Euphrosyne and Thalia, lover of song, to look on the victory procession (Pindar, Olympian 14.1–16).

Thalia the Muse

The Muse Thalia is one of the nine daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, listed in Hesiod as Clio, Euterpe, Thalia, Melpomene, Terpsichore, Erato, Polyhymnia, Urania and Calliope (Theogony 75–79). Apollodorus names her among the Muses (Library 1.3.1) and says that by Apollo she was the mother of the Corybantes (Library 1.3.4). The ancient tradition connects her name with thallein, “to flourish”: Diodorus says she was so called because men whose praises are sung in poems flourish for long periods of time (Diodorus 4.7). The Muse and the Grace share a name but have different mothers, Mnemosyne and Eurynome.

Thalia the Nereid

A Nereid Thaleia is named in the Iliad among the sea goddesses who gather around Thetis when she hears Achilles lament Patroclus (Homer, Iliad 18.39). Virgil names Thalia among the sea nymphs in the train of Neptune when he calms the sea for the ships of Aeneas (Aeneid 5.822–826).

Thalia Sources

Hesiod, Theogony 75–79, 907–911; Homer, Iliad 18.39; Pindar, Olympian 14.1–16; Apollodorus, Library 1.3.1, 1.3.4; Diodorus Siculus 4.7; Pausanias 9.35.1, 9.35.5; Virgil, Aeneid 5.822–826.

See Also: Charites, Aglaea, Euphrosyne, Zeus, Eurynome, The Muses, Mnemosyne, Nereids