Pallas (Giant)


In Greek mythology, Pallas was one of the Gigantes, the offspring of Gaia, born from the blood of the castrated Uranus. According to the mythographer Apollodorus, during the Gigantomachy, the cosmic battle of the Giants with the Olympian gods, he was flayed by Athena who used his skin as a shield. Though the origin of Athena's epithet "Pallas" is obscure, according to a fragment from an unidentified play of Epicharmus, Athena, after having used his skin for her cloak, took her name from the Giant Pallas.
This story, related by Apollodorus and Epicharmus, is one of a number of stories in which Athena kills and flays an opponent, with its hide becoming her aegis. For example, Euripides tells that during "the battle the giants fought against the gods in Phlegra" that it was "the Gorgon" that Athena killed and flayed, while the epic poem Meropis, has Athena kill and flay the Giant Asterus, using his impenetrable skin for her aegis. Another of these flayed adversaries, also named Pallas, was said to be the father of Athena, who had tried to rape her.
The late 4th century AD Latin poet Claudian in his Gigantomachia, has Pallas, as one of several Giants turned to stone by Minerva's Gorgon shield, calling out "What is happening to me? What is this ice that creeps o're all my limbs? What is this numbness that holds me prisoner in these marble fetters?"
Pallas was also the name of a Titan, with whom the Giant is sometimes confused or identified.