Helios greek mythology1/29/2024 The first time occured when Zeus killed Apollo’s son Asclepius, a great healer, who defied fate by bringing the Greek hero Hippolytus back from the dead. Apollo was temporarily stripped of his immortal power by Zeus – twice. Apollo was so entranced that he exchanged his entire herd for the instrument. Hermes, however, once stole fifty of these cows as a joke when Apollo found out, the only thing keeping him from killing the god of thieves on the spot was Hermes’ invention – a lyre. Apollo liked cows…but he liked music more.Īlthough his sacred animals were the wolf, the raven and the dolphin, Apollo was also known as the god of cowherds and kept (bright red) sacred cows, the finest cattle in the world. Impressively, Apollo defeated the mighty Python at just four days old. Some stories say it only took a single arrow each time to bring the two monsters down. Apollo wasn’t too pleased and killed both Python and Tityos. While Leto was pregnant, Hera sent Python, a giant snake, to attack her and later sent Tityos, a giant, in an attempt to get her long-awaited revenge. Hera, angry at Zeus’ affair with Leto, tried to kill her in plenty of different ways. Apollo wasted no time in avenging his mother, Leto. King Midas had his ears transformed into donkey ears for not choosing Apollo as the winner of a contest against Pan and Apollo also cheated in a contest with the satyr Marsyas – then, for being his equal in talent, flayed the unfortunate soul alive.ģ. Music is among his most well-known gifts, and he is known to have participated in many musical contests – though, being a god, he could never stand to lose a competition. He was the god of so many things that even the Ancient Greeks got confused.Īpollo was the god of practically everything – including but not limited to music, poetry, art, prophecy, truth, archery, plague, healing, sun and light (although the god is always associated with the sun, the original sun god was the titan Helios, but everyone forgot about him). The most famous, however, were Daphne, a nymph Apollo fell in love with after being struck with Cupid’s arrow (but Daphne didn’t like him, having been shot with a leaden arrow that caused her to be repulsed by Apollo, so her father, the river god Peneus, turned her into a laurel tree to save her from the god’s advances) and Hyacinthus, a Spartan prince who was loved by both Apollo and Zephyrus (which caused such jealously between them that in the end Zephyrus killed Hyacinthus with a discus to the head). Apollo appears to be, what we might call today, bisexual.Īpollo was not hung up about whether his lovers were male or female. Though each god is remarkable in their own way, I found Apollo to be particularly interesting. Since I was ten, I have been fascinated by mythology – in particular Greek mythology, with its array of gods, monsters and heroes.
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