Pontus (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Pontus (or Pontos, "sea") was an ancient, pre-Olympian sea-god, son of Gaia and Aether, the Earth and Sky. 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.