Amalthaea
Also called Amalthea, Amaltheia.
Amalthaea is the goat who suckled the infant Zeus hidden in a Cretan cave, and whose broken horn became the cornucopia that pours out whatever its holder wishes.
At a glance
- Tradition
- Greek mythology
- Region
- Crete (place of origin)
- Trait family
- The Tremor-Readers
- Symbols
- Goat
Near this figure
Symbols
Judged against the description by a model. Meanings are our own paraphrase.
- Goat is image-domain The goat denotes untamed lust and fertility, sacred to Pan and Dionysus, nurturing as milk-giver and driven out as bearer of a people's sins.
why
Amalthaea is the goat who suckled the infant Zeus hidden in a Cretan cave, and whose broken horn became the cornucopia that pours out whatever its holder wishes.
Traits
Read from the figure's description, which a model wrote. Open "why" for the sentence a trait came from.
Form
- Forehead crystal or jewel grants power to taker
why
In the usual telling one of the goat's horns is broken off, and it becomes the horn of plenty, filled with or producing an endless supply of whatever its possessor desires; some accounts have Zeus himself break it, others make the breaking accidental.
- Armor-like hide
why
A related strand has Zeus, once grown, take the goat's hide for his aegis in the war against the Titans, so that the creature that sheltered him becomes the shield he fights behind.