In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pan (/ p æ n /; [2] Ancient Greek: Πάν, romanized: Pán) is the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, rustic music and impromptus, and companion of the nymphs. [3]

Pan is considered to be one of the oldest of Greek gods. He is associated with nature, wooded areas and pasturelands, from which his name is derived. The worship of Pan began in rustic and rural areas, far from the populated city centers. Communities were modest and he didn’t have any large temples built to worship him.

Jan 24, 2025 · Pan’s Origins and Family. In most accounts, Pan is the son of Hermes and an unnamed nymph, one who is usually recorded as a daughter of Dryops.The Homeric Hymn to Pan, “Hymn 19,” recounts how Hermes wed a “rich-tressed” daughter of Dryops, and from their happy union came Pan, “with goat’s feet and two horns—a noisy, merry-laughing child.”

Pan, in Greek mythology, a fertility deity, more or less bestial in form. He was associated by the Romans with Faunus. Originally an Arcadian deity, his name is a Doric contraction of paon (“pasturer”) but was commonly supposed in antiquity to be connected with pan (“all”).

Part man and part goat, Pan was the god of wild groves, shepherds, and flocks. Born in Arcadia to Hermes and a Dryad, Pan was a precocious child whose goat’s feet and horned head delighted gods, but startled mortals.

May 20, 2023 · Pan was a nature deity who seems to have originally been worshipped in Arcadia, a pastoral region of the northern Peloponnese. However, he was soon adopted throughout the Greek and Roman world. Pan was above all a god of goatherds and shepherds, as well as their domestic animals and pastures.

Pan was the ancient Greek god of shepherds and hunters, and of the meadows and forests of the mountain wilds. His unseen presence aroused panic in those who traversed his realm. Pan idled in the rugged countryside of Arcadia, playing his panpipes and chasing Nymphs.

Pan is usually represented as shaggy and human-ish, but with the legs, horns, tail and ears of a goat. He is lustful and highly-sexed, as befits a fertility deity who enjoyed endlessly cavorting with nymphs and nearly anything else that stood still long enough.