Styx

Styx is a goddess and the great river of the Underworld whose water the gods swear by. In Hesiod she is the eldest daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. She was the first of the gods to come to Zeus’ side against the Titans, and in return Zeus made her name the greatest oath of the gods.

Styx’s Family

Hesiod makes Styx the foremost of the three thousand Oceanid daughters of Oceanus and Tethys (Theogony 361–362; Apollodorus, Library 1.2.2). She is therefore a daughter of Titans rather than one of the twelve Titans herself. She was joined to the Titan Pallas, a son of Crius and Eurybia (Theogony 375–377), and bore him Zelus (Rivalry or Emulation), Nike (Victory), Kratos (Strength or Dominion) and Bia (Force or Violence). Hesiod says that these children have no house or seat apart from Zeus and always sit beside him (Theogony 383–388; Apollodorus, Library 1.2.4).

Styx in Titanomachy

When Zeus called all the gods to Olympus before the war with the Titans and promised that those who fought with him would keep their honours, Styx came first, with her children, following the counsel of her father Oceanus (Hesiod, Theogony 389–398). Zeus honoured her with great gifts. He made her the great oath of the gods and her children his permanent companions in his house (Theogony 399–403; Apollodorus, Library 1.2.5).

The Oath of the Gods

Hesiod describes how the oath worked. When a quarrel arises among the gods and one of those on Olympus lies, Zeus sends Iris to bring the great oath of the gods in a golden jug: the cold water that runs down from a high rock. A god who pours out this water and swears falsely lies breathless and speechless for a year, and is then shut out from the gods’ councils and feasts for nine years more, returning in the tenth (Theogony 775–806). In Homer the gods swear by “the down-flowing water of the Styx, which is the greatest and most dreadful oath for the blessed gods” (Iliad 15.36–38; Odyssey 5.184–186).

The River Styx

Styx also names a place. Hesiod says that the goddess lives apart from the other gods in a house with a roof of tall rocks, held up by silver pillars (Theogony 775–779), and that the oath-water is one tenth of the stream of Ocean, which flows under the earth through the dark night (Theogony 787–792). In the Odyssey, Cocytus is a branch of the water of the Styx and, with Pyriphlegethon, flows into Acheron in the Underworld (Odyssey 10.513–515). The river Titaresius in Thessaly is likewise called a branch of the Styx (Iliad 2.755).

In Arcadia, a water trickling down a high cliff near Nonacris was called the water of the Styx. Pausanias says that it brought death to men and animals alike (Pausanias 8.17.6, 8.18.4). Herodotus tells how the Spartan king Cleomenes tried to bind the leading Arcadians by an oath on the water of the Styx at Nonacris (Histories 6.74).

The story that Thetis dipped the infant Achilles in the Styx is not in Homer. It appears in the Roman poet Statius, whose Thetis recalls plunging her son in the Stygian waters and wishes she had armed him completely (Statius, Achilleid 1.133–134, 1.269–270).

Styx Sources

Hesiod, Theogony 361–362, 375–377, 383–403, 775–806; Homer, Iliad 2.755, 15.36–38, and Odyssey 5.184–186, 10.513–515; Apollodorus, Library 1.2.2, 1.2.4–5; Pausanias 8.17.6, 8.18.4; Herodotus 6.74; Statius, Achilleid 1.133–134, 1.269–270.

See Also: Titans, Oceanus, Tethys, Pallas, Zeus, Nike, Iris, Oceanids, Achilles