Eris

Eris was the goddess or personified spirit (daimona) of strife, discord, contention, rivalry and battle-cries. She was often portrayed, more specifically, as the daimona of the strife of war, haunting the battlefield and delighting in human bloodshed with an insatiable desire. Even after all the other gods had withdrawn from battle, she remained, rejoicing over the slaughter. Eris was closely identified with the war-goddess Enyo. Homer uses the names interchangeably, and describes her as repulsive, pale-skinned and covered in gore, brandishing a lance as the earth quakes beneath her feet and blasts of fire shoot from her mouth.

Along with Athena, Eris/Enyo is described as a "sacker of cities." Eris, along with other daimones like Phobos, Alke, and Ioko, empowers Athena's aegis, which she received from Zeus and had set with the head of the fearsome Gorgon Medusa. She is described as having the ability to "take away the mind and senses" of men with her loud battle-cries, taking her place in the middle so as to affect both sides.

According to Hesiod, she was a daughter of Nyx (Night), and the poet describes her as the mother of a variety of allegorical beings, the Kakodaimones, evil spirits which plagued mankind.


When Pandora opens the amphora that she had been forbidden from looking in, Eris' children are the ones who escape to wreak havoc on the world and cause ill.

Because of Eris' disagreeable nature she was the only goddess not to be invited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis. When she turned up anyway and was refused admittance, she raged and threw a golden apple amongst the goddesses inscribed "To the fairest." Three laid claim to it--Hera, Aphrodite and Athena--and in their rivalry brought about the events leading up to the Trojan War.

According to the Iliad, she wanders about, at first small and insignificant, but she soon raises her head up to heaven. She is the friend and sister of Ares (as Enyo), and with him she delights in the tumult of war, increasing the moaning of men. She is gluttonous and insatiable in her desire for bloodshed, and after all the other gods have withdrawn from the battlefield she still remains rejoicing over the havoc, shown in the Iliad where she remains on the battlefield even after Zeus order all immortals to back-off. She is also said to have given her niece, the Amazon Penthesilea and daughter of Ares, a large halberd during the Trojan War to ravage the battlefield and reap the souls of men.

Eris' Roman counterpart, Discordia, was introduced by Virgil, appearing in the company of Mars, Bellona, and the Furies. Virgil describes her as wearing a torn mantle, "viperine hair caught up with a headband soaked in blood," and "snakey locks entwined with bloody ribbons".