Deimos (deity)
Deimos (Ancient Greek Δεῖμος "terror", Latin terror, also Metus and Formido) is a daimon of Greek mythology.
Deimos usually appears together with Phobos, "fear". Already in Homer's Iliad both spread fear and terror among the fighters before Troy as the retinue of Ares. Together with Phobos he serves Ares, to whom they harness the horses in front of the battle chariot. Since Homer makes Phobos the son of Ares, it can be assumed that for Homer Deimos was also the son of Ares. For Hesiod they are together sons of Ares and Aphrodite, whom he calls Kythereia. In the Dionysiaka of Nonnos of Panopolis, both are sons of Enyalios, an epiklesis of Ares also worshipped as a separate deity. They appear here not only as chariot servants and companions of Ares in the battle against Dionysus, but also as assistants of Zeus, who has them compete in his second battle against Typhon, equipping Phobos with the thunderbolt, Deimos with the thunderbolt. The Suda, a Byzantine lexicon probably written in the 10th century, names Deimos and Phobos, together with Kydoimos, the daimon of melee, sons of Polemos, that is, of war, and companions of Ares. According to Suda, they suffered the same fate as Ares, who wanted to bring Hephaestus back to Olympus by force, so that he would free Hera from her bondage on the throne. Undeterred, Hephaistos chased the god of war away with fiery fires. According to Semos of Delos, Deimos was the father of Scylla, whom he begot with Krataiis, a primordial demonic power related to Hecate.
The poet Antimachus of Colophon, active around 400 BC, counted Deimos as well as Phobos among the four fire-breathing horses of Ares, probably as a result of a misinterpretation of the chariot scene in Homer. Also in the Argonautika of Valerius Flaccus Terror and Pavor, the Roman translations of Deimos and Phobos, are the horses of the Roman god of war Mars (Martis equi).
In the Iliad Deimos was depicted together with Phobos on the shield of Agamemnon and also the shield of Heracles showed both standing next to Ares on the chariot. Finally, in Quintus of Smyrna they adorn the shield of Achilleus alongside Enyo ("melee") and Eris ("strife"). Representations that can be identified with certainty as Deimos, in contrast to those of Phobos, are not known from ancient art.
After the companions of Ares, to whom the god Mars corresponds in Roman mythology, the moons of the planet Mars were given the names Deimos and Phobos.
