In Greek mythology, Prometheus (ancient Greek: Προμηθεύς, "forethought") is the Titan honored chiefly for stealing fire from Zeus and giving it to mortals for their use. For this transgression, Zeus ordered that Prometheus be chained to the summit of the Caucasus Mountains for eternity. On each day that followed, an eagle would come and eat his liver. Since Prometheus was immortal, his liver always regenerated, and so he was left to bear this horrible pain every daily. Prometheus is commonly depicted in myth as an intelligent and cunning figure who had sympathy for humanity; today, the term "Promethean" is used to describe people who are connected with great creativity, intellect, and boldness.
Place among the gods
Prometheus was a son of the Titan Iapetus by Clymene, one of the Oceanids. He was also a brother of Atlas, Menoetius, and Epimetheus (the "one who thinks too late;" his polar opposite). He surpassed each of these siblings in cunning and deceit. He would go on to become the father of Deucalion with Pronoia. It was Prometheus who warned Deucalion of Zeus' plan to send a flood to destroy humankind, and subsequently advised his son to build an ark in order to sail to safety.
In general, Prometheus was not fearful of the gods, and he openly ridiculed Zeus, although he was favored by the supreme god for his assistance in the fight against Cronus. Furthermore, it was Prometheus who helped cure Zeus of a particularly horrendous headache. No healer was able to emancipate the king of the gods from this ailment, and so Prometheus came to him and declared that he knew the appropriate remedy, then promptly took a rock from the ground and hit Zeus over the head with it. Out of the wound on Zeus' head climbed the Goddess Athena, and Zeus' headache disappeared. Alternative versions of these myths identify Hephaestus or Hera, rather than Prometheus, as the individual who split Zeus' head open.
Creation of humanity
Prometheus, in Ovid's Metamorphoses, is credited with the creation of human-beings "in godlike image" from clay, a role which is assigned to Zeus in other variations of the creation myth. According to the myths, Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus were ordered by Cronus to make creatures that would populate the earth. Prometheus carefully crafted a creature after the shape of the gods: A man. Prometheus and Epimetheus journeyed to Earth from Olympus, then ventured to the Greek province of Boitia and made clay figures. Zeus took the figures and breathed life into them. The figures that Prometheus had created became human beings and honored him. The figures that his brother Epimetheus had created, meanwhile, became the beasts, which turned and attacked him.
Zeus was angered by the actions of Prometheus and Epimetheus, and he forbade the pair from teaching humanity the ways of civilization. Athena chose to go against Zeus and taught Prometheus so that he might teach humanity. For their actions, Zeus demanded that a sacrifice be made to the Gods from human beings to demonstrate that they were obedient and worshipful. The gods and mortal man had arranged a meeting at Mecone where the matter of division of sacrifice was to be settled. Prometheus slew a large ox, and divided it into two piles. In one pile he put all the meat and most of the fat, cleverly covering it with the ox's grotesque stomach, while in the other pile, he dressed up the bones artfully with shining fat.
Prometheus then invited Zeus to choose a pile for the gods. Zeus, however, saw through the trick, but nonetheless chose the pile of bones, since he realized that in willfully getting tricked he would have an excuse to vent his anger upon mortal humans. Alternative sources claim that Zeus did not, in fact, see through this ruse.  This provides a mythological explanation for the common practice in ancient Greece whereby worshipers would sacrifice only bones to the gods, while keeping the meat and fat for themselves.
In his wrath, Zeus denied humankind the secret of fire. In the wake of this punishment, Prometheus watched his creations as they shivered tho