1. Pan and the origin of panic Tantalus and the origin of tantalizing. By Matt Vito and Timmy

2. Pan Pan was a mischievous forest sprite, inhabiting the lonely stretches of wilderness that separated the Greek city- states.

3. Legend has it that one of Pan's favorite hobbies was to torment ancient Greek travelers traversing the roads of the wilderness. Pan would wait as travelers passed by and would rattle bushes behind them to make them think something was there.

4. Travelers would get scared by Pan’s trickery and pick up their pace. Pan would then run ahead to the next dark turn on the path, where he would then rustle the bushes even more when the traveler passed.

5. The traveler would then start to breathe heavily thinking that he was being chased by a wild beast and start to “panic” and begin to run as fast as they can out of the forest. This is how the word panic was made because it was Pan who would instill panic in unwary travelers.

6. Tantalus Tantalus was a welcomed guest by Zeus to the table in Olympus. Tantalus offered up his son, Pelops, as a sacrifice to the gods. He cut Pelops up, boiled him, and served him up as food for the gods.

7. All of the gods realized what he had done except Demeter. She ate part of the boy's shoulder. When the gods shed light on what Tantalus had done, she was shocked.

8. Pelops’s body parts were collected and boiled in a sacred cauldron and he was revived. Zeus threw Pelops out of Olympus out of anger towards Tantalus.

9. Tantalus‘s punishment was to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches. Whenever he reached for the fruit that were “tantalizingly” close, the branches raised his intended meal from his grasp. Whenever he bent down to get a drink, the water receded before he could get any.

10. Works Cited Hoffman, Ronald. “The origin of ‘Panic.’” Dr. H’s Blog. 27 Feb. 2009. Pontikis, Nick. “Tantalus.” Thanasi’s Olympus Greek Restaurant. 2003. 27 Feb. 2009.