ABSTRACT
ARES, the god of war, was a god of lesser stature than one might expect, above all because he represented the more brutal aspects of warfare – battle-frenzy and slaughter and strife as enjoyed for their own sakes. His name seems to have originated as an ancient word for war or battle, and he can virtually be regarded as bellicosity personified. Disciplined courage and chivalry were not his concern. He is portrayed in a most unflattering light from the time of Homer onwards, as a god who is disdained by other members of the Olympian circle; when he complains to his father in the Iliad after Diomedes has wounded him in battle, Zeus tells him not to sit and whine at his feet, saying that he finds him the most hateful of all the gods who inhabit Olympos, for he delights in nothing other than strife, war and slaughter.126 Ares never developed into a god of social, moral or theological importance, in this respect contrasting sharply not only with Apollo but with the Italian Mars, with whom he was identified in Graeco-Roman cult and legend; for Mars had agricultural as well as warlike functions, however he came by them, and, at least in the Augustan cult of Mars Ultor, he was capable of embodying the idea of righteous vengeance, while his Greek counterpart was no more than a divine swashbuckler. This wild god lived in a suitably wild territory, the northern land of Thrace, which was noted for its savage, warlike peoples; in the Iliad, he sets out from Thrace when he comes to join battle, and he hurries off to Thrace in the Odyssey after he is caught in adultery by Hephaistos.127 It is far from certain, however, that he was actually a god of Thracian origin as has often been supposed.
