Helios

Helios, (Ἥλιος in Ancient Greek) was formerly the Titan of the sun. He faded due to the laziness of the Romans after which his duty of driving the sun chariot was passed on to Apollo. The death of his demi-Titan son Phaëton was a major factor in this, as he loved him very much. Helios was the son of Hyperion and Theia, brother of Selene, the moon and Eos, the dawn. He was married to Rhodes,a nymph daughter of Poseidon. His Roman counterpart is Sol.

History
The best known story involving Helios is that of his son Phaeton (Φαέθων in Ancient Greek), who begged his father to let him drive the sun chariot. Helios agreed, albeit reluctantly and granted the wish of his son who soon after lost control over the immortal horses and set the earth aflame, scorching the African plains to desert. Zeus, appalled by the destruction that was caused blasted the youth out of the chariot with one of his lightning bolts. Phaethons flaming body was hurled from the sky and right into the river Eridanos. His sisters gathered on the banks of the river, mourning over their brother's demise and transformed into amber-teared poplar trees. After his death the boy was either placed among the stars as the constellation Auriga (the charioteer) or became the god of the wandering star (the planet Jupiter or Saturn).

Helios was sometimes referred to with the epithet Helios Panoptes ("the all-seeing"). In the story told in the hall of Alcinous in the Odyssey (viii.300ff), Aphrodite, the consort of Hephaestus, secretly beds Ares, but all-seeing Helios spies on them and tells Hephaestus, who ensnares the two lovers in nets to punish them.

In the Odyssey, Odysseus and his surviving crew land on Thrinacia, an island sacred to the sun god, whom Circe names Hyperion rather than Helios. There, the sacred red cattle of the sun were kept.

"You will now come to the Thrinacian island, and here you will see many herds of cattle and flocks of sheep belonging to the sun-god. There will be seven herds of cattle and seven flocks of sheep, with fifty heads in each flock. They do not breed, nor do they become fewer in number, and they are tended by the goddesses Phaethusa and Lampetia, who are children of the sun-god Hyperion by Neaera. Their mother when she had borne them and had done suckling them sent them to the Thrinacian island, which was a long way off, to live there and look after their father's flocks and herds."

Though Odysseus warns his men not to, they impiously kill and eat some of the cattle of the Sun. The guardians of the island, Helios' daughters, tell their father, and Helios appeals to Zeus, who destroys the ship and kills all the men except for Odysseus.

In one Greek vase painting, Helios appears riding across the sea in the cup of the Delphic tripod which appears to be a solar reference. Athenaeus in Deipnosophistae relates that, at the hour of sunset, Helios climbed into a great golden cup in which he passes from the Hesperides in the farthest west to the land of the Ethiops, with whom he passes the dark hours. While Heracles traveled to Erytheia to retrieve the cattle of Geryon, he crossed the Libyan desert and was so frustrated at the heat that he shot an arrow at Helios, the sun. Helios begged him to stop and Heracles demanded the golden cup which Helios used to sail across the sea every night, from the west to the east. Heracles used this golden cup to reach Erytheia.

The Titan's Curse
When Apollo explained how a god can fade to Percy Jackson, he used Helios and Selene as examples. He told Percy that when the Romans took over, many of the roles that Helios was responsible for (like driving the Sun Chariot) where given over to other gods. Apollo called this downsizing, which resulted in Helios eventually fading.

Appearance
Although he has faded and never made any appearance in the the series, Helios was imagined as a handsome youth crowned with the shining aureole of the sun, most of the time seen on his chariot.

Abilities

 * He presumably has the standard powers of a titan
 * He can travel at the speed of light
 * He can control light
 * He can control fire
 * He can control heat
 * He can induce or cure blindness
 * He sees everything
 * He may have had the gift of prophecy
 * He can control the sun

Consorts and Children

 * By the Oceanid Perse, Helios became the father of Aegea, Aeëtes, Circe, and Pasiphaë and Perses.
 * By the Oceanid Clymene he became the father of the Heliades, Astris and Phaethon.
 * By the nymph Neaera he became the father of Phaethusa ("radiant") and Lampetia ("shining").
 * By his sister Selene he became the father of the 4 Horae (seasons) and the 12 Horae (hours).
 * By Aigle he may have been the father of the Graces.
 * By Rhode his wife and daughter of Poseidon he became the father of the Heliadae and Electryone.
 * By the Oceanid Ocyrrhoe he became the father of Phasis.
 * By Leucothoe he became the father of Thersanon.
 * By Nausidame he became the father of Augeas, one of the Argonauts.
 * By undetermined mothers he was the father of Aegiale, Aithon, Aix, Aloeus, Camirus, and Mausolus.

Trivia

 * The center of Helios' worship was on the isle Rhodes.
 * The Colossus of Rhodes was one of the ancient seven wonders of the world and a representation of the Titan of the sun, built between 292 and 280 BC it stood 107 feet tall making it one of the tallest statues of the ancient world.
 * Helium is a chemical element that can be found in the sun, therefore it was named after the Greek word for sun, which is Helios.
 * Copernicus' Theory was called Helios-Centrism because he stated the Sun was at the center of the universe, not the Earth.
 * Helios' statue that was portrayed as the Colossus of Rhodes was destroyed by an earthquake in 224.