So at the same moment there came into being Poros and Tekmor and Skotos. ‘And the third, Skotos' (Scotus, Darkness) ’ : since neither sun nor moorn had come into being yet, but matter was still undifferentiated. When Thetis (Creation) had come into being, a beginning and end of all things came into being simultaneously, and all things have their nature resembling the matter of bronze, while Thetis has hers resembling that of a craftsman, Poros and Tekmor resembling a beginning and the end. And Poros is as a beginning, Tekmor like an end. Then he says that one came into being who set all things in order, then that Poros came into being, and that when Poros had passed by Tekmor followed. So Alkman (Alcman) represents the matter of all things as confused and unformed. called him Poros (Contriver) since the beginning provided all things for when the matter began to be set in order, a certain Poros came into being as a beginning. After that, ancient Poros (Contriver) and Tekmor (Tecmor, Ordinance) ’ : Tekmor came into being after Poros. Greek Lyric II) (Greek lyric C7th B.C.) : THE COSMOGONY OF ALCMANĪlcman, Fragment 5 (from Scholia) (trans. * The Greek word khronos speaks of an indeterminable portion of time, in contrast to hora, a fixed portion.ĬLASSICAL LITERATURE QUOTES CHRONOS & THE BIRTH OF THE COSMOS Aeon, Gaea and the Carpi, Greco-Roman mosaic C3rd A.D., Glyptothek Munich I. THE TWELVE HORAI (Nonnus Dionysiaca 12.15) THE MOIRAI (by Nyx) (Tzetzes on Lycophron) Formed WORLD-EGG out of Aither (containing GAIA & OURANOS) (Orphic Rhapsodies 66, Orphic Frag 54 & 57, Epicuras Frag) KHAOS, AITHER, EREBOS (by Ananke) Formed PHANES & WORLD-EGG (Orphic Fragment 54) KHAOS, AITHER, PHANES (by Ananke) (Orphic Argonautica 12) NONE (he emerged at creation) (Nonnus Dionysiaca 7.7 & 12.34) OFFSPRING HYDROS & GAIA (Orphic Fragments 54 & 57) The poet Nonnus describes Aion as an old man with long, white hair and a beard but mosaic-art presents a youthful figure. He holds a wheel inscribed with the signs of the zodiac and Gaia (Mother Earth) usually reclines at his feet. Khronos was depicted in Greco-Roman mosaic as Aion (Aeon), eternity personified. His equivalent in the Phoenician cosmogony was probably Olam (Eternal Time) whose name is written Oulomos in Greek transcripts. The Orphics sometimes merged Khronos with the creator-god Phanes, and also equated him with the Titan Ophion. The figure of Khronos was essentially a cosmological double of the Titan Kronos (Cronus) ('Father Time'). After this act of creation the couple circled the cosmos driving the rotation of heaven and the eternal passage of time. He and his consort, the serpentine goddess Ananke (Inevitability), enveloped the primordial world-egg in their coils and split it apart to form the ordered universe of earth, sea and sky. Khronos was envisaged as an incorporeal god, serpentine in form, with three heads-that of a man, a bull, and a lion. In the Orphic cosmogony he emerged self-formed at the dawn of creation. KHRONOS (Chronos) was the primordial god of time. Time ( khronos) Aeon and the Zodiac-Wheel, Greco-Roman mosaic C3rd A.D., Glyptothek Munich

Aeons of strife