Pontus (mythology)

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Greek deities series
Primordial deities
Titans and Olympians
Chthonic deities
Personified concepts
Other deities
Aquatic deities
Poseidon Oceanus Ceto Nereus Glaucus Thetis Amphitrite Tethys	Triton Ophion Proteus Phorcys Pontus Oceanids Nereids Naiads

This article is about the Greek god. For the geographic location, see Pontus.

In Greek mythology, Pontus (or Pontos, "sea") was an ancient, pre-Olympian sea-god, son of Gaia and Aether, the Earth and the Air. Hesiod (Theogony, line 116) says that Gaia brought forth Pontos out of herself, without coupling. For Hesiod, Pontos seems little more than a personification of Sea.

With Gaia, he was the father of the Old Man of the Sea, Nereus and Thaumas (the awe-striking "wonder" of the Sea), of the Sea's dangerous aspects, Phorcys and his sister-consort Ceto, and of the "Strong Goddess" Eurybia. With Thalassa— whose own name simply means "sea" but in a pre-Greek root— he was the father of the Telchines.

Compare the sea-Titan Oceanus, who was more vividly realized than Pontus among the Hellenes.