Thetis

Family: Nereid · Role: daughter of Nereus · First appears: Apollodorus, Library 1.2

🌐 Also appears in: The Iliad (as Thetis) · The Odyssey (as Thetis) · The Metamorphoses of Ovid (as Thetis) · Greek Tragedy — The Same Myth, Three Voices (as Thetis)

Thetis is a Nereid, daughter of Nereus and Doris. At Lemnos, she saved Hephaestus after Zeus cast him from heaven: “Hephaestus fell on Lemnos and was lamed of his legs, but Thetis saved him.” Zeus and Poseidon were rivals for her hand, but Thetis would not consort with Zeus because she had been brought up by Hera.

Afterwards, Peleus seized Thetis despite her changing into fire, water, and a beast, and married her on Pelion. She bore Achilles, but after Peleus saw the child writhing on the fire, Thetis abandoned him and departed to the Nereids, while Peleus entrusted him to Chiron. When Achilles was nine, Thetis disguised him in female garb and entrusted him to Lycomedes to keep him from the war at Troy; after his identity was discovered, he went to Troy. Thetis later persuaded Neoptolemus to wait two days and offer sacrifice, and she also sheltered Dionysus in the sea and once steered a ship with the Nereids at Hera’s summons.