Apollo--Renaissance God

Greetings fans of Greek and Roman mythology! After having recently written about the Olympians Zeus, Hera, Demeter, Poseidon, and Artemis, with a serpentine digression upon Medusa, I will now return to the twin brother of Artemis, the god Apollo. Apollo was probably the god with the most attributes. One might wonder, even with his godlike status, how Apollo could be the god of light, music, archery, civilization, law, medicine, prophecy, truth, poetry, and even the "arts;" how did he even have time to breathe? Even with the blood of the gods, ichor, flowing through his veins, and imbibing nectar, the drink of the gods, and eating ambrosia, the food of the gods, you'd think he wouldn't have enough energy. All the arts??? Might I suggest that today Apollo would be the god of multitasking?

Apollo was the twin son of the god Zeus and the Titan Leto. Apollo's Roman name is very difficult to remember, as it is often confused with his Greek name. Take a moment now to breathe as I present this difficult name to thee. OK. Now. "A" "P" "O" "L" "L" "O".

On to simpler matters.

Apollo probably had the most influential oracle of the ancient world. His shrine at Delphi (at Mount Parnassus in the Phocis valley), of which he was the patron, was visited by people in the ancient world who just had to know what was going to happen (life in the ancient world was highly unpredictable). The seeress (or the Oracle) Pythia would sit upon a tripod over a crack in the earth at Delphi, where she would interpret the messages from Apollo for those wanting to know their future by breathing in the fumes from the depths of the earth. Delphi itself was founded when Apollo slew the monster Python (and hence the name of the seeress). Delphi was considered by the Greeks to be the omphalos of their culture, or the very spiritual center of the Greek world. By the bye, omphaloskepsis is the meditation upon one's navel, the "center" of one's body, or torso.

Of course, some of the prophecies or prognostications by Pythia went rather awry. When Acrisius heard that his grandson would one day kill him, he imprisoned his only daughter Danae in a tower of bronze, the shining light of which unluckily caught the eye of Zeus. Perseus never would have been born had Acrisius not tried to either counteract the prophecy, or had not gone to Delphi in the first place. Years later, Perseus was in a discus-throwing contest, threw the discus so far that it sailed out of the arena, and hit ... guess who on the head, killing him at once. Some believed that the voice of the Oracle (Pythia) brought about mortals creating their own destiny.

Once Apollo had his beautiful cattle stolen by his mischievous half-brother Hermes (after being just born, no less). Apollo complained to Maia, the mother of Hermes, who said that Hermes couldn't have stolen the cattle since he had remained sleeping by her side all night, wound up in swaddling clothes (Hermes was VERY sneaky, being the god of thieves); Hermes began to play his lyre, soothing the arguing gods, and Apollo offered all his cattle for the lyre that Hermes had invented from the intestines of a cow + the shell of a tortoise. So that is how Apollo got his lyre, with which he is often pictured as god of music. Hermes also traded the pan pipes and flute (which he also invented) for Apollo's caduceus. The caduceus was a magical wand with two snakes entwining on a rod with two wings sprouting from the top. It is NOT a medical symbol, which is properly the rod of Asclepius, the god of healing, which only has one snake entwining on a rod.

Although Apollo is often referred to as the god of the sun, he is actually the god of the light of the sun, or the power behind its radiance; in much the same way, his sister, Artemis, is the goddess of the light of the moon, whereas Selene was the goddess of the moon proper. Note that the god of the sun was Helios (whence helium, the product of fusion which fuels the sun). The Greeks envisioned the sun as a flaming chariot driven by two horses, with Helios as its charioteer.

There are many tales about Apollo, but probably the most famous is that of the nymph Daphne. Apollo was madly in love with Daphne, who would have nothing to do with him. One day, frustrated in his love for her, Apollo began to chase her through the woods; Daphne screamed in terror to her father, the river Peneus, who rose up, took human form, and transformed Daphne into a laurel tree. Apollo decided to use the laurel as his sacred tree, and put a wreath of its leaves on his head. Besides the laurel wreath, his other symbols were the bow and arrow, lyre, and raven.

The direct opposite of Apollo was the god Dionysus. Whereas Apollo was interested in law and order, Dionysus was most concerned with lawlessness and disorder (and probably wasn't as stiff and certainly had much more fun). More about Dionysus in the future. Philosophers, such as Nietzsche, love to bandy about the terms Apollonian and Dionysian to describe states of order vs. chaos.

**Mythology Book Corner**  Speaking of the Apollo of mythographers, Robert Graves has written what is definitely the most comprehensive guide to Greek mythology today, entitled:  The Greek Myths.  It is available in both hardcover and paperback.  The hardcover edition of The Greek Myths is hard to find these days.

My next post will feature another of the primary 6 Olympians: the goddess Hestia, about whom there are the fewest number of stories (great pitch, huh?).


Interested in improving your vocabulary? Find out how the Greek and Latin languages gave rise to most of the English language at www.wordempire.com.