Introduction
Pan is the god of the wild, forests, mountain pastures, shepherds and their flocks, and of rustic music, depicted with the upper body of a man and the horns, legs and hindquarters of a goat. A son of Hermes, he is one of the more distinctive and immediately recognisable figures of Greek religion, closely associated with the region of Arcadia and with the wilder, less civilised corners of the Greek countryside.
Family
- Father: Hermes
Nature and appearance
Pan's half-human, half-goat form marks him as unusual among the major Greek gods, most of whom are depicted in fully human shape; this hybrid appearance reflects his close association with wild nature and untamed places, as opposed to the ordered civic life represented by the Olympians proper.
Music and Syrinx
Pan is credited with inventing the panpipes (syrinx), a set of reed pipes named for the nymph Syrinx, who, fleeing his amorous pursuit, was transformed by the river into a bed of reeds; Pan, unable to distinguish which reed had been her, cut several and bound them together, creating the instrument that carries her name.
Panic
Pan's sudden, startling appearance, or simply the eerie, wild sounds of the countryside at midday or in remote places, was believed capable of inducing a sudden, groundless terror in travellers or armies, giving rise directly to the English word "panic". The Battle of Marathon tradition credits Pan with helping cause such a panic among the invading Persian forces.
Worship
Pan was especially venerated in Arcadia, his homeland, and in caves and rustic shrines throughout Greece, worshipped by shepherds, hunters and country people generally, in a less formal, more intimate style of devotion than the grander state cults of the major Olympians.