Sometime after the birth of Uranus, Gaia went into labor again. Her pains were unbearable, a whole war was going on deep in the bowels of Earth, which was shaking all over. Thus, after some time, huge giants started to sprout up from the earth’s surface, immense and vast with peculiar bodies. These giants were the terrible Mountains (Oroi). Earth never liked these children that had made her suffer so much until their birth. But she had to live with them and to put up with them since they were attached to her enormous body since their birth. Each time earth tried to remove them from her body horrible pains tortured her. Finally, Mother Earth accepted her fate.

Yet, before recovering from the pains caused by the Mountains, Earth again felt something moving in her womb. This time, however, the pregnancy was sweet and painless. Earth felt a pleasant tickle and a babbling sound could be heard at night that caressed her ears. Of course, she was curious to see what kind of creature would come out of her profound depths. But in reality, she had an intuition that this time, her new child would not be as terrible as the Mountains. Sometime later the immense Pontus (Sea) sprang from her body. Right away it poured out and surrounded Gaia cooling her and making her more beautiful as he covered her all over with his deep-blue body. Pontus took her in his huge arms and Gaia was glad and proud of her new son, who was beautiful, dashing and mighty, sometimes calm and serene, and sometimes frothy and swelling with enormous waves.

It is also said, that after the defeat of Uranus by Cronus, Gaia was also united with her second son. From this union, she gave birth to all the divinities personifying the forces and the forms of the sea, the rivers, the springs, the lakes and all the liquid elements in general. The children of Pontos and Gaia were Nereus, the god of the water, Thavmas the magnificent, Euryvia the powerful, Phorcys and Ceto, protectors of the maritime cetaceans. Nereus coupled with Doris, a daughter of Oceanus and had fifty daughters, the Nereids, who protected the seas and the seamen and lived in caves by the sea. Thavmas joined with Electra, the other daughter of Oceanus, who bore the winged Iris and the voracious Harpies, Aello, Thyella (Tempest), and Ocypete (Gorgoptere). Phorcys joined with his sister Ceto who gave birth to the two Graeae (Grey Old Women), grey-haired from birth, and the three Gorgons (mermaids).

Gaia symbolized for the Greeks the inexhaustible power and the source of fertility. She was considered to be the Universal Mother and the mother of the gods. As for Eros, the third primordial divinity, it must be mentioned that he is not the famous mischievous god, the son of Aphrodite, who shot humans and gods alike with his bow, but a primeval force of attraction that led the elements to their unions and compositions. He had unlimited power but was the only one of the three primeval divinities that had no offspring at all.