Artemis--Cold Goddess of the Hunt, Chastity, and the Moon

Greetings fans of Greek and Roman mythology! After having recently written about the Olympians Zeus, Hera, Demeter, and Poseidon, and with a serpentine digression upon Medusa, one of the children of Poseidon, I will now return to the Olympian goddess Artemis, twin of Apollo. Artemis (Roman name Diana) was the child of Zeus and the Titaness Leto (Roman Latona). Artemis was the goddess of the hunt, chastity, and the moon (that is, the light of the moon; Selene was the goddess of the moon itself, just like Apollo was the god of the light of the sun, whereas Helios was the god of the sun chariot). She was probably the most unforgiving goddess or god for that matter; if you got on her bad side, you were doomed, often for the slightest offenses.

Consider the story of Actaeon. Actaeon was an innocent hunter out with his hunting dogs one day. He had no luck all morning long, and it was a hot day. Becoming thirsty, he went off to look for a cool drink, and came upon a pool in which the goddess Artemis happened to be taking a bath along with her handmaidens. Artemis immediately detected the innocent Actaeon, and became so enraged that she turned him into a stag; at that point Actaeon's hunting dogs, no longer recognizing their master, began to bay and chased after the stag, which they soon cornered, caught, and tore to pieces. Good grief.

Unfair, you say? Well, yes. Artemis can easily be viewed as a goddess who embodies the unfairness of life. She is cold (consider the light of the moon which gives no heat, the idea of chastity, and the idea of killing in cold blood during the hunt). Stone cold. In fact, she symbolizes those times during one's life when nothing seems to go right, when, in fact, a string of horrible occurrences happen for seemingly meaningless reasons. I remember one year in my life when my wife miscarried twins (5 months along), my wife's brother fell off a cliff, my father died, my grandfather died, and I suffered from a career-ending injury to my leg. I hope that Diana does not decide to frown upon me again for quite some long time, or upon you either, for that matter.
Another example of her cold nature is in the story of Niobe. Niobe, a queen of Thebes at the time, had fourteen wonderful children. One day she met Leto, the mother of Artemis and Apollo; they struck up a conversation, in which it was revealed that Leto only had two children. Niobe rather made fun of her (the more children one had in that time and culture the better) for having so few children (making fun of a deity is never a good idea, by the bye), so Leto, in her rage, sent Apollo and Artemis to slaughter those 14 children with their arrows (Apollo was the god of archery, and Artemis also possessed a silver bow, similar to the crescent of the silver moon); only one child remained after the twin god's killing spree, the daughter Chloris.
Like mother, like daughter.

The deer and the cypress tree were sacred to Artemis; since she was the goddess of chastity she never got married, nor did she bear any children. It was thought that she once fell in love with Orion, but please don't tell her that I said that (Orion preferred Eos, the goddess of the dawn, to her). She did kill Orion--you can tell her that, because she still might be proud of that part of the story.

Artemis was also the goddess who sent the Calydonian Boar to ravage the kingdom of King Oeneus. King Oeneus had forgotten to offer the first fruits of the harvest to her. This precipitated the great hunt for the Calydonian Boar, whom Atalanta at last vanquished.
And so, let us leave the cheery goddess Artemis behind for now.
My next post will focus upon her twin brother, the god Apollo.

**Mythology Book Corner**  If you simply cannot get enough of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, why not delve deeper and read Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Ultimate Guide?  Of course, there's also the fabulous book on tape, Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.  If you have a long drive to work everyday like I do, it's the perfect remedy to shrink time.

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.