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There are many myths regarding how Zeus became the ruler of the world, and they are known as 'Succession Myths.' This article relates how he became ruler of Olympus and King of the gods and goddesses. There is no one version of how the ruler of Olympus became King of the Gods.
====Background to Who were the rise of Zeus==Titans?==The first ruler of the gods was Uranus, the personification of the sky. He was married to Gaia, the goddess of the earth. Uranus had twelve children with Gaia. The After a prophecy that his children would overthrow him, the original ruler of the world hid his children inside their mother (earth), after a prophecy that his children would overthrow him. Gaia hated him for this. The children of the sky and the earth were known in the ancient sources as the Titans. The youngest of these Titans was Cronus. He conspired with his mother to depose his father. Only he, among all the Titans, was brave enough to move against his father.<ref>Hesiod, Theogony, 113.</ref>
Gaia crafted a sickle for Cronus, and he sneaked upon his father and castrated him. Uranus was weakened, and Cronus was able to imprison his father in Tartarus, which is often mistakenly referred to as hell. Cronus imprisoned several monsters, the Hecatonchires , and the Cyclopes , with his father under the earth. He was regarded as the personification of time in the Classical sources. He, along with his sister Rhea, became the monarchs of the gods. His reign was considered to be a Golden Age when men did not require laws and where everything was shared equally.
[[File: Titan two.jpg|200px|thumb|left|A seventeenth-century painting of the Titans and the Olympians in battle]]
However, Cronus heard a prophecy that was made by his father Uranus and his mother Gaia He was told that he too would be deposed by his son. This prophecy naturally threatened Cronus, and he decided to remove all his children so that they could not threaten him. Now the King of the gods had six children with his queen, who was also his half-sister. Rhea bore him three daughters Demeter, Hestia and , Hera, and three sons Hades, Zeus, and Poseidon. Zeus, the future King of Olympus, was the youngest of the children.
Mindful of the prophecy Cronus came up with a strategy to make sure ensure that his children could never threaten or depose him. When they were born, he swallowed them all whole. When Rhea was pregnant with Zeus, he also intended to swallow him, so he would not be a threat.<ref>Hesiod, Theogony, 480</ref>
====The birth of Zeus====
