Oceanus. The god of the water which was believed to surround the whole earth, is called the son of Heaven and Earth, the husband of Tethys, and the father of all the river-gods and water-nymphs. The early Greeks regarded the earth as a flat circle, which was encompassed by a river perpetually flowing round it, and this river was Oceanus. Out of and into this river the sun and the stars were supposed to rise and set; and on its banks were the abodes of the dead. Before Neptune, Oceanus, son of the heavens and the earth, and husband of Thetis, was honored as god of the sea.
