Potamides, also called potameides (Greek: ΠοταμηΓδες), were a type of water nymphs of Greco-Roman mythology. They were assigned as a class of nymphs of fresh water known as naiads, and as such belonged to a category that presided over rivers and streams.

Origin and abode

Potamides were identified by the names associated with the rivers of their origin such as the Anigrides, Ismenides, Amnisiades, the Pactolides from the Pactolus river

Pactolus

Pactolus is a river near the Aegean coast of Turkey. The river rises from Mount Tmolus, flows through the ruins of the ancient city of Sardis, and empties into the Gediz River, the ancient Hermus. The Pactolus once contained electrum that was the basis of the economy of the ancient state of Lydia...

, and the Acheloides from the Achelous river. However they had their individual names and also sometimes could be distinguished by the name of the country in which they inhabited.

The rivers were the domains of potamides as well as of the nymphs Fluviales. Every brook had its potamide, who as local divinities, and like all the naiads, were daughters of river gods. Even the rivers of the marshy regions are described as having their nymphs; hence no exception it was made to the waters of Greek underworld

Greek underworld

The Greek underworld was made up of various realms believed to lie beneath the earth or at its farthest reaches.This includes:* The great pit of Tartarus, originally the exclusive prison of the old Titan gods, it later came to be the dungeon home of damned souls.* The land of the dead ruled by the...

 ruled by god Hades

Hades

Hades , Hadēs, originally , Haidēs or , Aidēs , meaning "the unseen") was the ancient Greek god of the underworld. The genitive , Haidou, was an elision to denote locality: "[the house/dominion] of Hades". Eventually, the nominative came to designate the abode of the dead.In Greek mythology, Hades...

, as was quoted in Latin: "Nymphae infernae paludis and Avernales", which means "swampy Avernales, the infernal nymphs". And many of these hellish potamides, the Avernales, were believed to be owners of prophetic ability, and to express that gift to their chosen men.

Characteristics and worship

Like any nymph, potamides were considered subject to mortality but with a long life. For the Greek historian Plutarch

Plutarch

Plutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...

 their term of life reached about 9720 years, and according to Greek poet Hesiod

Hesiod

Hesiod was a Greek oral poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer. His is the first European poetry in which the poet regards himself as a topic, an individual with a distinctive role to play. Ancient authors credited him and...

 there were about three thousands nymphs wandering on the world, and living several thousand years.

Potamides showed themselves very favorably inclined to young girls, and gently removed the freckles from all who bathed in their streams. On the other hand they had an aggressive behavior directed at young men coming near their watery territories, whom they dragged down to their abodes. It was believed by the ancients that they carried water for their river parents, as was quoted: "In the lonely hour of noon the naiads sat with their water-pitcher at the spring-sending forth from it the warbling brook."

Regarded as a profuse class of minor female divinities, they were believed to inspire those that drank of their waters. Thus potamides, and nymphs in general, were conceived to be endowed with oracular power, to inspire men with the same prophetic gift, and to bestow upon them the natural talent of poetry. Hence, as water it is a necessity to all the creation, the water nymphs, along with the gods Dionysus

Dionysus

Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

 and Demeter

Demeter

In Greek mythology, Demeter is the goddess of the harvest, who presided over grains, the fertility of the earth, and the seasons . Her common surnames are Sito as the giver of food or corn/grain and Thesmophoros as a mark of the civilized existence of agricultural society...

, were also worshipped as providing life and blessings to all existing beings, and this attribute is manifested by a diversity of epithets.
Accordingly, in many parts of Greece, offerings of honey, oil, milk, but never of wine, and sometimes sacrifices of a lamb or goat were presented to these divinities. In Sicily was commemorated an annual celebration in their honor. Although they had no temples, the most beautiful spots in forests, gardens and so forth, were regarded as the favorite places of nymphs and invisible spirits, and thus esteemed with special veneration.

See also