ouranos

Ouranos, also known as Uranus in English, is the personification of the sky in Greek mythology. A primordial deity, he is said to have emerged at the creation of the cosmos and is commonly described as the husband of Gaia (Earth). Together, Gaia and Ouranos are the parents of the first generation of divine beings, including the twelve Titans, the Cyclopes, and the Hecatonchires (Hundred-Handed Ones).

In Hesiod’s Theogony, Ouranos and Gaia’s offspring are kept within Gaia, which causes her distress. To remedy this, Gaia conspires with their youngest son Cronus to overthrow his father. Cronus castrates Ouranos with a sickle, severing the sky from the earth. This act marks a turning point in Greek myth, moving from primordial rule toward the later order of the Olympian gods.

From the blood that falls onto Gaia after the castration, beings such as the Erinyes (Furies) and the Giants are born. From the sea foam generated by the severed genitals, Aphrodite emerges. Ouranos’s overthrow dissolves his direct authority, but he remains a powerful symbol of the sky and the cosmos.

In later tradition, the name Ouranos is Latinized as Uranus. The association with the heavens extended into astronomy, where Uranus is the name of the planet, reflecting the mythic linkage between the deity and the celestial realm.