Trident of Poseidon- Greek ArtifactArtifact · Weapon

Forging by the Cyclopes

Zeus freed the three Cyclopes — Brontes, Steropes, and Arges — from the pit where Ouranos had chained them. In gratitude, they forged a weapon for each of the three brothers who would rule the cosmos: thunderbolts for Zeus, a helm of invisibility for Hades, and the three-pronged trident for Poseidon. With these gifts the Olympians overthrew the Titans. When the brothers drew lots for their shares of the world, Poseidon took the sea. From his palace beneath the waves at Aigai, he ruled the deep and shook the earth.

The Contest for Athens

When Poseidon and Athena both claimed Athens, each offered a gift. Poseidon drove the trident into the rock of the Acropolis, and a saltwater spring burst from the gash. Athena planted an olive tree beside it. Cecrops, the serpent-tailed king who judged the contest, chose the olive — useful fruit over barren salt water — and the city became Athena's. The wound in the rock and the saltwater well were preserved in the Erechtheion for centuries; the water still surged when the south wind blew.

The Earth-Shaker's Weapon

Each blow of the trident carried the force of earthquakes. Driven into the ground, it split rock and brought forth springs; in Thessalian tradition, the first strike opened the earth and the first horse leapt from the crack. In the Iliad, Poseidon wielded it to tear the Greek wall at Troy from its foundations, shaking the logs and stones into the sea. It earned him his Homeric name Ennosigaios — "Earth-Shaker."

In the war against the Giants, Poseidon turned the trident on Polybotes. He chased the giant across the sea to Cos, broke off a mass of the island with a single stroke, and hurled it on top of him. The landmass that crushed Polybotes became the island of Nisyros, where locals held that the giant's struggles beneath the earth still caused tremors and eruptions.