Triton (mythology) Triton (mythology) Triton (; "Tritōn") is a mythological Greek god, the messenger of the sea. He is the son of Poseidon and Amphitrite, god and goddess of the sea respectively, and is herald for his father. He is usually represented as a merman which has the upper body of a human and the tail, soft dorsal fin, spiny dorsal fin, anal fin, pelvic fins and caudal fin of a fish, "sea-hued", according to Ovid "his shoulders barnacled with sea-shells". Like his father, Poseidon, he carried a trident. However, Triton's special attribute was a twisted conch shell, on which he blew
Greek sea gods therefore stand as a powerful symbol of the unknown and otherworldly. Although many people thought about the sea and her depths, no one would enter the watery grave. Thus Cape Tanaerum, the point at which mainland Greece juts most sharply into the Mediterranean, was at once an important sailor's landmark, a shrine of Poseidon, and the point at which Orpheus and Heracles were said to have entered Hades. This motif is apparent in the paradoxical festivals of the shadowy sea-deity Leucothea ("white goddess"), celebrated in many cities throughout the Greek world. Identifying her with the drowned heroine Ino, worshippers would