In Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

, the Pseudologoi were gods of lies. 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...

's Theogony

Theogony

The Theogony is a poem by Hesiod describing the origins and genealogies of the gods of the ancient Greeks, composed circa 700 BC...

identifies them as the children of Eris

Eris (mythology)

Eris is the Greek goddess of strife and discord, her name being translated into Latin as Discordia. Her Greek opposite is Harmonia, whose Latin counterpart is Concordia. Homer equated her with the war-goddess Enyo, whose Roman counterpart is Bellona...

 ("strife") and brothers of Ponos

Ponos

Ponos was the god of hard labor and toil in Greek mythology. His mother was the goddess Eris , who was the daughter of Nyx . He was brother to Algos, Lethe, Limos, and Horcus....

 ("toil"), Lethe

Lethe

In Greek mythology, Lethe was one of the five rivers of Hades. Also known as the Ameles potamos , the Lethe flowed around the cave of Hypnos and through the Underworld, where all those who drank from it experienced complete forgetfulness...

 ("forgetfulness"), the Algea

Algos

Algea is used by Hesiod in the plural as the personification of sorrows and griefs, which are there represented as the daughters of Eris, Greek goddess of strife. Algos in Greek is a neuter noun literally meaning "pain"...

 ("pains"), Limos

Limos (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Limos was the goddess of starvation. She was opposed by Demeter, goddess of grain and the harvest with whom Ovid wrote Limos could never meet, and Plutus, the god of wealth and the bounty of rich harvests...

 ("starvation"), the Hysminai

Hysminai

The Hysminai are figures in Greek mythology. Descendants of Eris, they are personifications of battle. Quintus Smyrnaeus wrote of them in Book V of the Fall of Troy in a passage translated by Arthur Way:Around them hovered the relentless Fates;...

 ("fightings"), the Makhai

Makhai

In Greek mythology, the Machai were the daemons of battle and combat, and were sons or daughters of Eris, siblings to other vicious personifications like the Hysminai, the Androktasiai, and the Phonoi.The daemons Homados , Alala , Proioxis , Palioxis...

 ("battles"), the Phonoi

Phonoi

In Greek mythology, the Phonoi were the male spirits of murder, killing and slaughter. While their sisters, the Androktasiai , presided over the slaughter of battle, they were considered to be responsible for murder and killing outside the battlefield. They were sons of Eris, goddess of strife,...

 ("murders"), the Androktasiai

Androktasiai

In Greek mythology, the Androktasiai were the female personifications of manslaughter.Hesiod in Theogony names their mother as Eris and their siblings as Lethe , Ponos , Limos , the Algea , the Hysminai , the Makhai , the Phonoi , the Neikea , the Pseudologoi , the Amphilogiai...

 ("man-slaughters"), the Neikea

Neikea

In Greek mythology, the Neikea were goddesses of arguments. Hesiod's Theogony identifies them as children of Eris through parthenogenesis and siblings Lethe , Ponos , Limos , the Algea , the Hysminai , the Makhai , the Phonoi , the Androktasiai , the Pseudologoi , the...

 ("quarrels"), the Amphilogiai

Amphilogiai

In Greek mythology, the Amphilogiai were goddesses of disputes. Hesiod's Theogony identifies them as the daughters of Eris and sisters of Ponos , Lethe , the Algea , Limos , the Hysminai , the Makhai , the Phonoi , the Androktasiai , the Neikea , the...

 ("disputes"), Dysnomia

Dysnomia (mythology)

Dysnomia , imagined by Hesiod among the daughters of "abhorred Eris" , is the daemon of "lawlessness", who shares her nature with Atë ; she makes rare appearances among other personifications in poetical contexts that are marginal to Greek mythology but become central to Greek philosophy: see...

 ("lawlessness"), Atë

Ate

Atë or Aite a Greek word for "ruin, folly, delusion", is the action performed by the hero, usually because of hubris, that leads to his or her death or downfall. There is also a goddess by that name in Greek mythology, a personification of the same.In Homer's Iliad she is called eldest daughter...

 ("ruin"), and Horkos

Horkos

In Greek mythology, Horkos personifies the curse that will be inflicted on any person who swears a false oath. In his Works and Days, Hesiod states that the Erinyes assisted at the birth of Horkos, "whom Eris bore, to be a plague on those who take false oath".Hesiod's Theogony identifies him as...

 ("oath").

Aesop

Aesop

Aesop was a Greek writer credited with a number of popular fables. Older spellings of his name have included Esop and Isope. Although his existence remains uncertain and no writings by him survive, numerous tales credited to him were gathered across the centuries and in many languages in a...

 presents a different account of the Pseudologoi, whom he characterises as a singular, female being (Pseudologos). In his Fables

Aesop's Fables

Aesop's Fables or the Aesopica are a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and story-teller believed to have lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 560 BCE. The fables remain a popular choice for moral education of children today...

, Pseudologos is the creation of Dolos

Dolos (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Dolos is the spirit of trickery and guile. He is also a master at cunning deception, craftiness, and treachery. He is apprentice of the titan Prometheus, and Pseudologi. His female counterpart is Apate who is the goddess spirit of fraud and deception...

, the spirit of deception and apprentice to Prometheus

Prometheus

In Greek mythology, Prometheus is a Titan, the son of Iapetus and Themis, and brother to Atlas, Epimetheus and Menoetius. He was a champion of mankind, known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals...

. The elder god had decided to pour his skill into sculpting the form of Aletheia—Truth—who in turn might regulate the behaviour of men. As he was working, he was called away by an unexpected summons from Zeus

Zeus

In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...

, leaving Dolos alone in the workshop. Fired by ambition, Dolos took up the remaining clay and began to sculpt a second figure, identical to the first. However, before he could complete the piece he ran out of clay, leaving his figure without feet. When Prometheus returned he marvelled at the similarity between the two creations and put both in the kiln. When they had been baked, he infused the figures with life. The first, Aletheia, walked with measured footsteps, but Dolos' replica, lacking feet, stood stuck in her tracks and acquired the name Pseudologos—Falsehood.

External links

• Theoi Project: Pseudologoi, Greek gods or spirits of lies and falsehoods