Talk:Themis/Archive 1

Comments
This is the first non-useless "Roman equivalent" treatment I've seen. Good stuff. Bacchiad 06:35, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)
 * I hope you don't think I've ever inserted any "Roman equivalents". They're all misleading and should have appropriate caveats. Thanks. Wetman 07:26, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Opening sentence
I'm very confused by the first sentence of this article: "among the six brothers and six sisters of whom Cronos made one". "Made one" what? Was Cronos one of some group of twelve offspring, i.e., Themis's brother? But then why is Cronos, as only one of the twelve brothers, being mentioned at all? I think that rephrasing the first sentence to be clearer would help a lot, but I'm not sure of the factual information. -- Creidieki 06:23, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * That was my gaffe, I think. I've fixed it like this: "In Greek mythology, Hesiod mentions Themis among the six brothers and six sisters&mdash; of whom Cronos was one&mdash; all of them the children of Gaia with Ouranos, that is, of Earth with Sky. " That's clearer, isn't it? --Wetman 08:25, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Whose confusion?
"Themis is sometimes identified with Physis (Nature personified)." I moved this here. Without saying who made the identification, it is meaningless and distracting. In Roman terms this would be a confusion between Justitia and Natura: most unlikely. It sounds like a student's confusion. --Wetman 22:48, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Themis and Drasteia
The article says:

"The name of Themis might be substituted for Adrasteia in telling of the birth of Zeus on Crete."

This is news to me. As far as I know Adrasteia is a completely seperate character from Greek myth, unrelated to Themis. Adrasteia was not even a Titan, she was a nymph on Mount Ida, Crete, who along with Ida was given the infant Zeus to raise. Themis became Zeus's consort, she was never his nurse. What evidence is there that Themis and Adrasteia can be substituted for each other? Unless a source is provided to support this statement it should be removed.

The Prime Source 14:07, 7 May 2007 (UTC)Dale

Third generation of Horae
Why is the third generation of Horae not listed in the article?

ICE77 (talk) 07:35, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Justicia
I've taken this claim out. Every reference I've come across associates her with Dike, not Themis. Mangoe (talk) 17:27, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Symbols — Swords, Scales, and Blindfolds (modern additions)?
From https://lib.law.washington.edu/content/guides/themis, "Themis, Goddess of Justice"

"A common representation of Justice is a blind-folded woman holding a set of scales. The origin of the Goddess of Justice goes back to antiquity. She was referred to as Ma'at by the ancient Egyptians and was often depicted carrying a sword with an ostrich feather in her hair (but no scales) to symbolize truth and justice. The term magistrate is derived from Ma'at because she assisted Osiris in the judgment of the dead by weighing their hearts. [1]

To the ancient Greeks she was known as Themis, originally the organizer of the "communal affairs of humans, particularly assemblies." [2] Her ability to foresee the future enabled her to become one of the oracles at Delphi, which in turn led to her establishment as the goddess of divine justice. Classical representations of Themis did not show her blindfolded (because of her talent for prophecy, she had no need to be blinded) nor was she holding a sword (because she represented common consent, not coercion). [3]

The Roman goddess of justice was called Justitia and was often portrayed as evenly balancing both scales and a sword and wearing a blindfold. She was sometimes portrayed holding the fasces (a bundle of rods around an ax symbolizing judicial authority) in one hand and a flame in the other (symbolizing truth). [4]"

It would be nice if someone could access the primary source,

Cathleen Burnett, Justice: Myth and Symbol, 11 Legal Stud. F. 79 (1987) from http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/lstf11&id=87

Matthew Miller (talk) 15:48, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Comments and questions
I improved and reorganized the article since the sequence of the sections was sloppy and rather random. I have a series of comments.

1. "The world of Odysseus had a highly developed sense of what was fitting and proper".

This sentence seems completely unrelated to what discussed before. I suggest to remove it since it does not seem to provide any useful information on Themis.

2. Prometheus should not be listed as a child because this is only true with Aeschylus. The mother of prometheus was Clymene (according to Hesiod and Hyginus) or Asia (according to Pseudo-Apollodorus).

3. Astraea has nothing to do with the Horae and has no business in the Horae's section.

4. "Themis received the Oracle at Delphi from Gaia and later gave it to Phoebe".

This is inconsistent with the article on Phoebe where Cronos is also mentioned.

5. "When Themis is disregarded, Nemesis brings just and wrathful retribution; thus Themis shared the Nemesion temple at Rhamnous".

This sentence has an awkward structure. I find it unclear.

6. "Themis is not wrathful: she, "of the lovely cheeks", was the first to offer Hera a cup when she returned to Olympus distraught over threats from Zeus".

What threats would those be?

7. "The name of Themis might be substituted for Adrasteia in telling of the birth of Zeus on Crete".

I don't understand the meaning of this sentence.

8. "Dike executed the law of judgments and sentencing and, together with her mother Themis, she carried out the final decisions of Moirai. For Hesiod, Justice is at the center of religious and moral life who, independently of Zeus, is the embodiment of divine will. This personification of Dike stands in contrast to justice viewed as custom or law and as retribution or sentence".

Is it who or which?

I don't quite understand the contrast: is it concept versus personification?

ICE77 (talk) 07:04, 8 February 2018 (UTC)


 * I know this was written in 2018, but some of these comments here are still relevant to the current version of the article. As I've just recently come to this article and done some editing, I thought perhaps I'd see if I can respond to some of these.


 * 1. Strange sentence, unrelated, removed. (That section really needs some work.)


 * 2. I assume what was meant was in the infobox. Whatever the case, it isn't here anymore. The Hesperides, however, were listed in the infobox. I removed them because they are offspring of Themis and Zeus according only to a scholiast (i.e. hardly a widely accepted version).


 * 3. Comment is no longer pertinent, I think it was probably removed when I was restructuring things a bit.


 * 4. Will look at this.


 * 5. Needs a source.


 * 6. Possibly ICE77 has misinterpreted this sentence to mean that Themis was "distraught with threats from Zeus", when in reality it was Hera. Either way, those "threats" are not really relevant to Themis. This sentence, however, could be written in a more clear manner. (Gantz, p. 52, says Hera "returns from a quarrel", so perhaps something along those lines would be better.)


 * 7. Sentence does not seem to be in the article any more.


 * 8. Rather confusing set of sentences; I've read them a few times and I'm still not entirely sure what they're supposed to mean. The last two sentences seem to be about just Dike, I'm not sure why they're here. The first sentence, though, particularly the bit about Themis and Dike "carr[ying] out the final decisions of [the] Moirai", could be mentioned, if it has at least one primary and secondary source.


 * (, you're active on this page, perhaps I ought to ping you.)


 * — Dave12121212 [talk] 07:59, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

4. Eumenides doesn't mention Cronus alloting the oracle, neither do the Wikipedia articles on Cronus or the Pythia, or Theoi.com. The secondary account mentioned in Phoebe (Titaness) seems more relevant to Phoebe than Themis, so I reckon the sentence should stay as it is currently.

7. I removed it because I presume it referred to Adrasteia's role as the nurse of Zeus, and how Hyginus puts Themis and Amalthea instead of Adrasteia and Ida in that role (which is mentioned in the mythology section).

8. I think the last two lines are supposed to differentiate between the roles of Themis and Dike. However, they are complex and difficult to understand, so I suggest replacing them with "Themis ruled over divine justice, while Dike ruled over human justice" like the Dike article. The first line of the paragraph should be kept in my opinion. Pinging.

NeoSIMIAN-Terraform (talk) 09:23, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

Themis, gender roles and the family
I've put a "Citation needed" on this sentence:

"Themis presided over the proper relation between man and woman[citation needed], the basis of the rightly ordered family (the family was seen as the pillar of the deme.)"

I can't find anything in the translated works at theoi.com to support any part of that statement. There's nothing about any prescribed gender roles/relation between men and women which Themis enforced, nothing about her enforcing any particular family structure or even talking about it...

AstridRedfern (talk)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 16:11, 28 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Statue of Themis.jpg