Lady of the Sea

Thetis Takes Achilles from the Centaur Chiron by Pompeo Batoni (1770)

Thetis was one of the fifty Nereids (sea nymphs) who were the daughters of Nereus and Doris. She's known as the goddess of water, and was totally babein' (the technical term for it, naturally). Here's a little bit of the story of Thetis.

She was so much of a babe that both Zeus and Poseidon loved her. However, the goddess of justice, Themis (not to be confused with Thetis!) prophesised that Thetis was fated to bore a son that would end up mightier than his father. Of course, neither god wanted this burden and so withdrew their suits (Zeus was especially worried:  he overthrew this father Cronus, who had overthrown his father, Uranus, and well yeah, you get the picture) so they handed Thetis over to Peleus, king of the Myrmidons. The reason they "handed her over" was to ensure that she produced mortal offspring, and posed no risk of overthrowing an immortal.

Thetis Raped by Peleus by Douris (c. 490 BC)

Thetis didn't particularly warm to Peleus, and refused to marry him. Peleus was then advised to find her whilst she slept, and tie her up tightly enough to avoid her escaping through shape shifting. She put up a hard fight, changing into a flame, water, a lioness and a serpent, but to no avail, and eventually consented to marry him.

They were the parents of the swift-footed Achilles, who became the hero of Homer's Iliad.

Thetis Dipping the Infant Achilles into the River Styx by Peter Paul Rubens (1630-35)

I'm sure you've heard of the myth where Thetis dips her son into the River Styx (the river of Hades), which would have made him immortal. However, the heel in which she held him by was not dipped into the river, and so it was not protected. It proved to be poor Achilles' downfall.

I don't want to go into too much detail on Achilles, especially in The Iliad, as I'd really like to do that in a post of its own. But in the epic poem we see a goddess care more for a mortal than any other god in the story, and goes to great lengths to help him maintain his honour.

More on Thetis and Achilles next time!

I scrawled my name with a hurricane,
When out of the blue
Roared a fighter plane.
Then my tongue was flame
And my kisses burned,
But the groom wore asbestos.
So I changed, I learned,
Turned inside out – or that’s 
How it felt when the child burst out.
- Carol Ann Duffy