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Pallas Athena

Athena's epithet Pallas – her most renowned one – is derived either from πάλλω, meaning "to brandish ", or, more likely, from παλλακίς and related words, meaning "youth, young woman". On this topic, Walter Burkert says "she is the Pallas of Athens, Pallas Athenaie, just as Hera of Argos is Here Argeie." In later times, after the original meaning of the name had been forgotten, the Greeks invented myths to explain its origins, such as those reported by the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus and the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, which claim that Pallas was originally a separate entity, whom Athena had slain in combat.

In one version of the myth, Pallas was the daughter of the sea-god Triton, and she and Athena were childhood friends. Zeus one day watched Athena and Pallas have a friendly sparring match. Not wanting his daughter to lose, Zeus flapped his aegis to distract Pallas, whom Athena accidentally impaled. Distraught over what she had done, Athena took the name Pallas for herself as a sign of her grief and tribute to her friend and Zeus gave her the aegis as an apology. In another version of the story, Pallas was a Giant; Athena slew him during the Gigantomachy and flayed off his skin to make her cloak, which she wore as a victory trophy. In an alternative variation of the same myth, Pallas was instead Athena's father, who attempted to assault his own daughter, causing Athena to kill him and take his skin as a trophy.

The palladium was a statue of Athena that was said to have stood in her temple on the Trojan Acropolis. Athena was said to have carved the statue herself in the likeness of her dead friend Pallas. The statue had special talisman-like properties and it was thought that, as long as it was in the city, Troy could never fall. When the Greeks captured Troy, Cassandra, the daughter of Priam, clung to the palladium for protection, but Ajax the Lesser violently tore her away from it and dragged her over to the other captives. Athena was infuriated by this violation of her protection. Although Agamemnon attempted to placate her anger with sacrifices, Athena sent a storm at Cape Kaphereos to destroy almost the entire Greek fleet and scatter all of the surviving ships across the Aegean.