Athena’s mother was Metis the goddess of prudence, the first wife of Zeus, who he depended upon greatly for advice. Before Athena was born Zeus was warned by mother earth that if Metis bore him a son, this son would overthrown as he had done to his father, and so on. Zeus thought, “This must not happen, I must stop it!” So he came upon the plan to swallow Metis. One day he slyly proposed to play a game of changing shapes and forms. Forgetting her prudence she agreed and began to change shape, after shape. When she came to be a fly he swallowed her whole. Metis then sat inside his head to give him advice from there. Now it just happened that Metis was going to have a daughter, so she sat within Zeus’s head, making a helmet and a beautiful robe for her daughter. Now the helmet took some loud hammering so before Zeus knew it he was having excruciating headaches, crying out in agony and anger. All the gods came to him asking what was wrong with his head, and skilled Hephaestus finally came with his tools and split open his fathers head, and out sprang Athena, wearing the great robe and helmet, her grey eyes flashing. Great roars of thunder came and the gods stood in utter awe.

Retold by Mac