Thaumas is a sea-god, a son of Pontus (Sea) by Gaia (Earth), and by the Oceanid Electra the father of swift Iris the rainbow and of the storm-borne Harpies.1
When Sea mingled with Earth, he begot a brood of elder sea-powers. Among them Hesiod sets "great Thaumas," named in one breath with proud Phorcys, fair-cheeked Ceto, and flint-hearted Eurybia — a generation of the deep older than the Olympians.2
Apollodorus repeats the same begetting, listing the children of Pontus and Earth as Phorcus, Thaumas, Nereus, Eurybia, and Ceto, and binds Thaumas into the wider genealogy of the deep: for to Phorcys and Ceto, his kin, were born the Phorcides and the Gorgons.3
Thaumas wedded Electra, daughter of deep-flowing Ocean, and she bore him swift Iris and the long-haired Harpies — Aello, the storm-swift, and Ocypete, the swift-flier, who on their wings keep pace with the blasts of the winds and the birds. So from a god whose very name means "wonder" came both the bright messenger-rainbow and the snatching whirlwinds.4
The patronymic clung to his bright daughter: Hesiod calls Iris "the daughter of Thaumas" as she comes with a message over the sea's wide back.5
In Latin verse the same patronymic endures: Ovid styles Iris "Thaumantias," child of Thaumas, as she purifies Juno's limbs with sprinkled water. Hyginus traces from Thaumas and Electra a fuller line — Iris, Celaeno, Ocypete, Podarce — so that the names and number of the Harpies waver from source to source.6
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the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story
