[13][14] In the Western classical tradition, Prometheus became a figure who represented human striving (particularly the quest for scientific knowledge) and the risk of overreaching or unintended consequences.

In particular, he was regarded in the Romantic era as embodying the lone genius whose efforts to improve human existence could also result in tragedy: Mary Shelley, for instance, gave The Modern Prometheus as the subtitle to her novel Frankenstein (1818).

Some other aspects of the story resemble the Sumerian myth of Enki (or Ea in later Babylonian mythology), who was also a bringer of civilisation who protected humanity against the other gods, including during the great flood,[20] as well as created man from clay.

Hesiod also adds more information to Theogony's story of the first woman, a maiden crafted from earth and water by Hephaestus now explicitly called Pandora ("all gifts").

[25] The Titanomachy is a lost epic of the cosmological struggle between the Greek gods and their parents, the Titans, and, in addition to the works of Hesiod, is a probable source of the Prometheus myth.

[32] Lynch's general thesis concerns the rise of humanist and secular tendencies in Athenian culture and society which required the growth and expansion of the mythological and religious tradition as acquired from the most ancient sources of the myth stemming from Hesiod.

The playwright undoubtedly had religious concerns; for instance, Jacqueline de Romilly[35] suggests that his treatment of time flows directly out of his belief in divine justice.

"[38] Karl-Martin Dietz states that in contrast to Hesiod's, in Aeschylus' oeuvre, Prometheus stands for the "Ascent of humanity from primitive beginnings to the present level of civilisation.

Epimetheus sets to work but, being unwise, distributes all the gifts of nature among the animals, leaving men naked and unprotected, unable to defend themselves and to survive in a hostile world.

[41] The ancients by way of Plato believed that the name Prometheus derived from the Greek prefix pro- (before) + manthano (intelligence) and the agent suffix -eus, thus meaning "Forethinker".

[51] Prometheus' association with fire is the key to his religious significance[45] and to the alignment with Athena and Hephaestus that was specific to Athens and its "unique degree of cultic emphasis" on honouring technology.

Although perhaps made explicit in the Prometheia, later authors such as Hyginus, the Bibliotheca, and Quintus of Smyrna would confirm that Prometheus warned Zeus not to marry the sea nymph Thetis.

[44] Reflecting a myth attested in Greek vase paintings from the Classical period, Pseudo-Apollodorus places the Titan (armed with an axe) at the birth of Athena, thus explaining how the goddess sprang forth from the forehead of Zeus.

Prometheus finally makes an appearance in Athenian playwright Aristophanes's comedy The Birds, where he is seen living on Mount Olympus after the end of his long torture, apparently having reconciled with the other gods.

Of the relatively rare expressions found of the creation of Adam in those centuries of late Roman antiquity, one can single out the so-called "Dogma sarcophagus" of the Lateran Museum where three figures (commonly taken to represent the theological trinity) are seen in making a benediction to the new man.

This can be found upon a sarcophagus of the Church at Mas d'Aire[71] as well, and in an even more direct comparison to what Raggio refers to as "a coarsely carved relief from Campli (Teramo)[72] (where) the Lord sits on a throne and models the body of Adam, exactly like Prometheus".

[69] In Georgian mythology, Amirani is a cultural hero who challenged the chief god and, like Prometheus, was chained on the Caucasian mountains where birds would eat his organs.

It is recognisable from a Greek gem roughly dated to the time of the Hesiod poems, which show Prometheus with hands bound behind his body and crouching before a bird with long wings.

[74] In the often cited and highly publicised interview between Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers on Public Television, the author of The Hero with a Thousand Faces presented his view on the comparison of Prometheus and Jesus.

The comparison of the suffering of Jesus after his sentencing in Jerusalem is limited to the three days, from Thursday to Saturday, and leading to the culminating narratives corresponding to Easter Sunday.

The symbolic import for comparative religion would maintain that suffering related to justified conduct is redeemed in both the Hebrew scriptures and the New Testament narratives, while in Prometheus there remains the image of a non-forgiving deity, Zeus, who nonetheless requires reverence.

[77] Anecdotally, the Roman fabulist Phaedrus (c. 15 BC – c. 50 AD) attributes to Aesop a simple etiology for homosexuality, in Prometheus' getting drunk while creating the first humans and misapplying the genitalia.

In his book written in 1476–77 titled Quaestiones Quinque de Mente, Ficino indicates his preference for reading the Prometheus myth as an image of the human soul seeking to obtain supreme truth.

After the writings of both Boccaccio and Ficino in the late Middle Ages about Prometheus, interest in the Titan shifted considerably in the direction of becoming subject matter for painters and sculptors alike.

The Romantics drew comparisons between Prometheus and the spirit of the French Revolution, Christ, the Satan of John Milton's Paradise Lost, and the divinely inspired poet or artist.

Shelley, as the author himself discusses, admits the debt of his version of the myth to Aeschylus and the Greek poetic tradition which he assumes is familiar to readers of his own lyrical drama.

[87] Although Bloom is least interested in the first two schools, the second one on the Christian orthodox has special bearing on the reception of the Prometheus myth during late Roman antiquity and the synthesis of the New Testament canon.

The primary theme is a parallel to the aspect of the Prometheus myth which concentrates on the creation of man by the Titans, transferred and made contemporary by Shelley for British audiences of her time.

In his 1952 book, Lucifer and Prometheus, Zvi Werblowsky presented the speculatively derived Jungian construction of the character of Satan in Milton's celebrated poem Paradise Lost.

Works of classical music opera, and ballet directly or indirectly inspired by the myth of Prometheus have included renderings by some of the major composers of both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.