What do you think about when you raise your eyes to the sky? Taking a quick look at the night picture, what do you see?
Every night the stars light up in the sky, and every time they burn the same way, they are in the same location. This is a kind of picture that appears after sunset, and which is drawn by nature itself. What kind of drawings does she create?
There are 88 constellations in the northern and southern hemispheres, and each of them is beautiful in its own way. The constellation of Scorpio, Cygnus, Lyra or Eagle, each captivates our gaze.
So, Orion is very easy to find in the sky, in winter, at night, with fairly good visibility, it is located in the southern part of the sky. If you are well versed in astronomy, then it is located next to Sirius, but if these words do not tell you anything, then take a good look and try to find three stars located almost on the same straight line and at the same angular distance from each other. They are called Orin's Belt. Below and above this trinity, two bright stars. Above are the stars Betelgeuse and Bellatrix. Betelgeuse has a reddish tint and is located along left side constellations, Bellatrix on the first. Below are the stars Rigel and Saif, but, unfortunately, Saif is not such a bright star, and in order to see it, you need to look closely enough. It is located on the left, just below the Rigel level.
If you think about associations, then for many this constellation evokes the silhouette of an hourglass, and indeed, it looks similar.
Unfortunately, the most beautiful part of the constellation is hidden from our eyes, does not lend itself to human vision. Just below Orion's belt (Alnitak, Alnilam, Mintaka) are two closely spaced stars, between which is the beautiful Orion Nebula, resembling a wonderful rose bud.
At given constellation there is a very beautiful legend. IN ancient Greek mythology Orion is a famous hunter, it is no coincidence that the constellations Canis Major and Minor, the Hare and Leo are found next to him. He was distinguished by his extraordinary beauty and such growth that he was sometimes called a giant.
Orion was the son of the god of the seas, Poseidon. He was a slender, handsome and agile man. With his two dogs (Big Dog and Small Dog) he went to hunt wild animals in the forests and mountains, but his heart was kind. Once, on behalf of the gods, he cleared the island of Chios from wild animals. The grateful inhabitants of the island staged a magnificent celebration of the hero, during which he was crowned with a laurel wreath and presented with expensive gifts. The holiday was accompanied by the performance of hymns and dances of girls. Among them, Orion saw the beautiful Merope, the daughter of the local king. The young people liked each other, and Orion began to ask the king for the hand of his daughter. However, the father had other plans, and he refused the hero. Then, with the consent of Merope, Orion kidnapped the beauty. The king went to the trick: catching up with the fugitives, he pretended to give consent to their marriage. But at night, having drunk the hero, he blinded him. Poseidon, having learned about this, was terribly angry and asked Helios to restore his son's sight. It seemed that the issue of the wedding after all the misadventures would be resolved, but Hera intervened in the matter. Once upon a time, Orion accidentally killed the beloved bull of the goddess. Knowing that Orion is a brave and dexterous hunter, who has no equal in the art of capturing the beast, she set a Scorpion on him, whose bite was fatal. Orion died, but at the request of Poseidon, Zeus placed him in the sky and even made it so that he could not meet the terrible Scorpio. Indeed, the constellations Orion and Scorpio are never visible in the sky at the same time.
Also, there is a legend that the famous pyramids in Egypt (Khufu, Khafre, Mikerin) were built precisely on these three stars, and the truth is, if we look at them, we will notice the similarity of the location.
“On the ceiling of one of the burial chambers - the pyramid, a walking man is depicted; above it are the three stars of Orion's belt."
The famous French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote the following phrase in his book The Little Prince:
“I wish I knew why the stars shine. Probably, then, so that sooner or later everyone could find their own again. Each person has their own stars.
Think about it, have you already found your stars?
40. Eos
The night passes, and Eos, pink-fingered in saffron attire, the daughter of the titan Hyperion and the titanide Theia, rises from her bed in the east, ascends the chariot drawn by the stallions Lamp and Phaeton, and hurries to Olympus, where she announces the approach of her brother Helios. When Helios appears, she becomes Hemera and accompanies him all the way and, finally, turning into Hespera, announces their safe arrival on the western shores of the Ocean 1.
B. Annoyed once at having found Ares in the bed of Eos, Aphrodite instilled in Eos an eternal passion for mortal youths, whom she from then on seduced one by one, shy and doing everything in secret. First, Orion became her lover, then Cephalus, then the grandson of Melampus Clitus. Moreover, all this time she was the wife of the titan Astrea, to whom she gave birth to the North, West and South winds, as well as the Morning Star and, according to some, all other stars in heaven 2 .
C. Finally, Eos kidnapped Ganymede and Tithon, who were the sons of Tros or Il. When Zeus took Ganymede away from her, she begged the Thunderer to grant immortality to Titon. However, she forgot to ask him for eternal youth, as Selene did for Endymion. Therefore, Titon began to grow old every day, gray and wrinkled. His voice began to tremble. When Eos got tired of tending to him, she locked him up in her bedroom, where he turned into a cicada 3 .
1 Homer. Odyssey V.1 and XXIII 244-246; Theocritus. Idylls II.148.
2 Apollodorus I.4.4; Homer. Odyssey XV.250; Hesiod. Theogony 378-382.
3 Scholia to Apollonius of Rhodes III.115; Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 218-238; Hesiod. Theogony 984; Apollodorus III.12.4; Horace. Odes III.20; Ovid. Fasti I.461.
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1. Dawn Maiden is a Hellenic fantasy that mythographers grudgingly recognized as a second-generation Titanide. Her chariot drawn by a pair of horses and the fact that she announced the appearance of the sun in the firmament are more allegories than myths. An unsubstantiated claim. For primitive thinking, "everything is full of gods" (the words of Thales): every tree, every stream, every hillock, every a natural phenomenon have their own deity, or rather, they are also a deity (dryads, naiads, oreads, etc.). Why shouldn't the dawn have its own mythical incarnation? The allegorical perception of mythological images begins later and marks the beginning of the end of the mythical worldview..
2. The endless amorous adventures of Eos and mortal youths are also allegories: with the dawn, erotic passion returns to the lovers, and attraction usually arises in men. The allegory of the union of Eos and Astrea is also quite simple: in the east, the light of the stars merges with the light of dawn, and, as if born by them, the predawn wind of Astrea arises. And since the wind was considered fertile, Eos gives birth to the Morning Star from Astrea, shining alone in the sky. Astraeus is one of the names of Cephalus, who was also considered the father of the Morning Star, born of Eos. IN philosophical sense it turned out the following: since the Evening Star was identified with the Morning Star and since Evening is the last manifestation of the morning dawn in the sky, therefore, all the stars were born from Eos, like all winds, except for the predawn. Such an allegory, however, contradicts the myth It is generally impossible to build a consistent system from myths, just because they are multi-layered and polysemantic, and also because they are magical, i.e. it must be contrary to reason. that Borea was created by the moon-goddess Eurynome (see 1.1).
3. In Greek art Eos and Hemera are an inseparable unity. Allegorists believe that the name Titon means "gift of extension" (from teino and one), i.e. this is, as it were, an indication of the extension of life, which Eos requested for him. However, it is more likely that this is simply a masculine form of the name of Eos herself - Titon, formed from the word tito ("day") (Tsets. Scholii to Lycophron 941) and the word one ("queen"). This name must mean "companion of the queen of the day" The etymologies cited by Graves are of little evidence.. The cicada comes alive as the day gets warmer. In addition, the golden cicada was the emblem of Apollo, the sun god among the Greek colonists who lived in Asia Minor.
41. Orion
A hunter from the Boeotian Hyria and the most handsome man who ever lived, Orion was the son of Poseidon and Euryale. Arriving once in Chios Hyria, he fell in love with Merope, the daughter of the son of Dionysus Oenopion. Enopion promised to give Merope as a wife to Orion if he frees the island from the terrible wild animals that appeared there. Orion began to fulfill this condition, bringing the skin of the beast to Merope every day. When, finally, the condition was fulfilled and Orion demanded Merope as his wife, Enopion began to repeat that lions, bears and wolves still prowl the hills, and refused him the hand of his daughter, although the reason was that he himself was in love with her. .
b. One night, annoyed Orion drank a whole wineskin of enopion wine, and it inflamed his blood so much that he burst into Merope's bedroom and forced her to share a bed with him. At dawn, Enopion turned to his father Dionysus and he sent satyrs to Orion, who made him drunk so that he fell asleep soundly. Then Enopion gouged out his eyes and threw them on the seashore. The oracle declared that the blind Orion would regain his sight if he went east and turned his eye sockets to Helios when he began to rise from the Ocean. Orion immediately set off on a fragile boat into the sea and, sailing to the sound of the hammer of Cyclops, reached Lemnos. There he entered the forge of Hephaestus, grabbed one of his students named Kedalion, put him on his shoulders and made him his guide. Kedalion led Orion through the lands and seas, and, finally, they reached the farthest shore of the Ocean, where Eos fell in love with him and her brother Helios returned Orion's sight.
C. Having visited the island of Delos accompanied by Eos, Orion decided to return to take revenge on Enopion, whom, however, he could not find on Chios, because he was hiding in an underground chamber built for him by Hephaestus. Going across the sea to the island of Crete, where, according to Orion, Oenopion could have escaped in the hope of finding protection from his grandfather Minos, he met Artemis, who, like himself, was passionately fond of hunting. She quickly managed to persuade Orion to abandon his plans for revenge and instead go hunting with her 1 .
D. By this time, Apollo had already learned that Orion did not refuse Eos and shared a bed with her on the sacred island of Delos; from this shamelessness, Dawn was filled with a blush, and it remained crimson. Moreover, Orion boasted that he would free the whole earth from wild animals and monsters. Fearing that his sister Artemis would not resist, like Eos, the beauty of Orion, Apollo went to mother earth and, not without intent repeating Orion's boast, made her set a monstrous scorpion on him. Orion met the scorpion with arrows, but seeing that they did not harm him, he rushed at him with a sword. However, he soon realized that no mortal weapon could defeat a scorpion, dived into the sea and swam towards Delos, where he hoped Eos could save him. Apollo, meanwhile, called Artemis and asked: “Do you see, far out to sea, closer to Ortigia, something black is floating? This is the head of the villain who just seduced Opis, one of your Hyperborean priestesses. His name is Kandaon. I beg you, pierce him with an arrow!” It must be said that Orion was called Kandaon in Boeotia, but Artemis did not know this. She aimed carefully, fired, and swam to look at her prey. What was her grief when she saw that she struck Orion in the head. Then she begged the son of Apollo Asclepius to revive Orion. But Asclepius did not have time to fulfill her request, as the thunderbolt of Zeus struck him himself. Then Artemis placed the image of Orion among the stars, where he was eternally pursued by Scorpio. The spirit of Orion by that time had already flown to Asphodel Meadows.
E. Some say that Orion died from a scorpion sting and that Artemis was offended by him because he began to pursue her virgin companions - the seven Pleiades, daughters of Atlanta and Pleione. They were forced to flee from him through the meadows of Boeotia until the gods turned them into doves and placed their images among the stars. However, this is not true, because the Pleiades were not virgins: two of them shared a bed with Zeus, two with Poseidon, one with Ares, and the seventh became the wife of Sisyph of Corinth and did not end up in the constellation because Sisyph was a mere mortal 2.
Others tell this strange story about the birth of Orion to explain his name (sometimes it was written Urion), and also the origin of the tradition in which he was called the son of mother earth. The poor beekeeper and farmer Giriei was in anguish because he had no children, and as the years went by, he became decrepit. When one day Zeus and Hermes, having changed their appearance, visited him and met with a warm welcome, they asked Hyrieus about his most cherished desire. Sighing heavily, Giriei replied that what he most wanted, namely, to have a son, was already impossible for him. The gods, however, told him not to despair, but to sacrifice a bull, urinate on his skin and bury it in his wife's grave, which Giriei did. Nine months passed and he had a child, whom he named Urion, i.e. "one who urinates." And indeed: when the constellation Orion rises and sets in the sky, it rains 3 .
1 Homer. Odyssey XI.310; Apollodorus I.4.3-4; Parthenius. Love Stories 20; Lucian. About the house 28; Theon. Scholia to Aratus 638; Hygin. Poetic Astronomy II.34.
2 Apollodorus. There.
3 Servis. Commentary on the Aeneid by Virgil I.539; Ovid. Fasty V.537 et al.; Hygin. Poetic Astronomy II.34.
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1. The story of Orion consists of three or four unrelated myths. The first tells about Enopion. This is a story about the unwillingness of the king-priest to give up the throne at the end of his reign, even after the new candidate for kingship won all the ritual fights and arranged a feast on the occasion of his marriage to the queen. However, the new king is only an interrex who spends only one day on the throne, after which he is killed and devoured by maenads (see 30.1); the former king, who all this time pretends to be dead and lies in the grave, remarries the queen and continues to reign (see 123.4).
2. Such a minor detail as the hammer of the Cyclopes explains the blindness of Orion: the myth of how Odysseus burned out the eye of the drunken Cyclops (see 170. d) was supplemented by a Hellenic allegory in which the titan-sun is blinded by enemies every evening, but by the dawn of the next the day he regains his sight. Orion's boast that he will exterminate all wild beasts not only refers to his ritual duels (see 123.1), but is also a parable of the rising sun, at the appearance of which all animals hide in their lairs (cf. Ps. 103:22).
3. The story of Plutarch about how the god Set sent Scorpio to kill the child Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, in the hottest period of summer, explains the death of Orion from the bite of Scorpio and the appeal of Artemis to Asclepius (Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris. 19). Horus dies, but the sun-god Ra revives him, and then avenges the death of his father Osiris. In the original myth, Orion is also brought to life. Orion is somewhat reminiscent of the Babylonian Hercules - Gilgamesh, about whom the tenth tablet of the calendar epic says that he is attacked by a scorpion man - a myth that tells how a mortal wound is inflicted on the priest-king on the day when the sun begins to rise in the constellation Scorpio. The season at which the mortal wound was inflicted on the priest-king depends on the antiquity of the myth. When the zodiac arose, Scorpio was probably the sign of August, but in the classical era, as a result of the precession, it was shifted to October.
4. Another account of Orion's death is recorded on Hittite tablets found at Ras Shamra. The goddess of war Anat, or Anata, fell in love with a beautiful hunter named Akhat, and when he, using all sorts of tricks, refused to give her his bow, the goddess begged the bloodthirsty Yatpan to steal the bow from Akhat. Much to her regret, the clumsy Yatpan not only killed Akhat, but also dropped the bow into the sea. The astronomical significance of this myth comes down to the fact that Orion and Luke are part of the constellation that the Greeks call the "Hound" and which every spring falls below the southern horizon for two whole months. In Greece, this myth probably turned into a legend about how the orgiastic priestesses of Artemis (since Opis is an epithet of Artemis herself) killed the loving visitors to their tiny island of Ortigia. Since in Egypt, with the advent of the constellation Orion, the summer heat was established, he was confused with the enemy of Horus Set, and the two bright stars above him were considered the ears of his donkey.
42. Helios
Helios, to whom the titan Hyperion was born by the long-eyed Euryphaess, or Theia, is the brother of Selene and Eos. He rises with the crow of a rooster, which is considered his sacred bird and, greeted by Eos, drives his four-horse chariot to heaven, daily making his way from a beautiful palace in the east, near Colchis, to an equally magnificent palace in the west, where he unharnesses his horses and let them graze on the Isles of the Blessed 1 . He sails home along the stream of the Ocean, which washes the whole world, loading the chariot and horses on a gilded ferry made for him by Hephaestus, and sleeps all night in a cozy chamber 2 .
B. Helios sees everything that happens on earth, but he is not very attentive and once did not even notice how Odysseus's companions stole the sacred cattle from him. Helios owns several such herds, and each has three hundred and fifty heads. In Sicily, his daughters Faetusa and Lampetia look after the herd. But he keeps the best herd on the island of Erythea 3 . Rhodes was given to him. It so happened that when Zeus distributed the cities and islands among the various gods, he forgot about Helios. “What a pity,” Zeus said, “now I have to start all over again.” “It’s not worth it,” Helios politely replied, “today I noticed that a new island appears in the sea south of Asia Minor. It's enough for me."
C. Zeus summoned the goddess of fate, Lachesis, and asked her to ensure that any new island belonged to Helios 4 . When Rhodes rose high enough above the waves, Helios declared it his possession, and on this island the nymph Rod gave birth to him seven sons and one daughter. Some argue that Rhodes existed before that, it was simply flooded by the waters brought down by Zeus to the ground. The island was originally inhabited by Telchines and nymphs, and Poseidon fell in love with one of them - the nymph Galia, who bore him Rod and six sons. These are the six sons who offended Aphrodite during her transition from the island of Cythera to Paphos and whom she deprived of reason for this. They abused their mother and committed many such heinous crimes that Poseidon could not stand it and drove them underground, where they became eastern demons. Galia threw herself into the sea, and they began to worship her as the goddess Levkofeya. However, the same story is told about Ino, the mother of the Corinthian Melicertes. The Telchines, foreseeing the flood, swam in different directions, but most of them turned out to be in Lycia. They no longer claimed their rights to Rhodes. Therefore, Rhoda remained the only heiress of the island and her seven sons from Helios ruled the island after he again rose from the water. They all became famous astronomers, and their only sister, Elektrio, died a virgin and is worshiped as a demigod. One of the brothers named Actius was expelled for fratricide and fled to Egypt, where he founded the city of Heliopolis and was the first to teach the Egyptians astrology, as his father Helios wanted. In his honor, the Rhodians built a Colossus seventy fathoms high. Zeus added to the possessions of Helios the island of Sicily, which arose when a stone thrown in a battle with the giants fell into the sea.
D. One morning, Helios yielded to the insistence of his son Phaethon and entrusted him to drive the chariot. Phaeton wanted to show off in front of his sisters Prota and Klymene, and, admonished by Rhoda (whose name cannot be given with certainty, since she was called both Rhoda and the names of both her daughters), set off. However, unable to cope with the run of the white horses harnessed for him by his sisters, Phaeton first sent the chariot too high and the people on the ground began to freeze, and then lowered it so close to the ground that the heat began to burn the fields. Seeing this, Zeus, in a fit of rage, struck Phaeton with a thunderbolt and he fell into the Po River. His saddened sisters turned into poplars on the banks of this river and dropped amber tears into it. Some say they have turned into alder 5 .
1 Homeric hymn to Helios 2 and 9-16; Homeric Hymn to Athena 13; Hesiod. Theogony 371-374; Pausanias V.25.5; Nonn. Acts of Dionysus XII.1; Ovid. Metamorphoses II.1 and 106 ff.; Hygin. Myths 183; Athenaeus VII.296.
2 Apollodorus II.5.10; Athenaeus XI.39.
3 Homer. Odyssey XII.323 and 375; Apollodorus I.6.1; Theocritus. Idylls XXV.130.
4 Pindar. Olympian Odes VII.54 et seq.
5 Scholia to the Olympian Odes of Pindar VI.78; Tsets. Chiliad IV.137; Hygin. Myths 52, 152 and 154; Euripides. Hippolytus 737; Apollonius of Rhodes IV.598 ff.; Lucian. Conversations of the gods 25; Ovid. Metamorphoses I.755; Virgil. Bucolics VI.62; Diodorus Siculus V.3; Apollodorus I.4.6.
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1. The subordination of the sun to the moon, up to the moment when Apollo took the place of Helios and turned the sun god into an intellectual deity, is distinguishing feature ancient Greek myth. Helios was not even an Olympian, but just the son of a titan As is clear from the previous one, the titans are more ancient gods than the Olympians, which means that, from the point of view of mythological thinking, they are more revered gods. So the words "just the son of a titan" give a completely wrong picture of the system of the gods. And from any point of view, being a cousin of Zeus is very honorable.. Although in time Zeus acquires some solar characteristics borrowed from the Hittite and Corinthian god Tesup (see 67.1) and other eastern solar deities, they remain insignificant compared to the fact that thunder and lightning were subordinate to him. The number of cattle in the herds of Helios, who in the Odyssey appears under the name of Hyperion (see 170. t), recalls his subordination to the Great Goddess: it corresponds to the number of days contained in twelve full lunar months, as in the calendar of Numa (Censorinus XX), minus five days dedicated to Osiris, Isis, Set, Horus and Nephthys. In addition, this work lunar numbers- fifty and seven. The so-called daughters of Helios are the priestesses of the moon, since in ancient European mythology cows belonged to the moon, and not solar cult. The mother of Helios, the hairy Euryphaessa, is none other than the moon-goddess herself. The solar chariot crossing the firmament is, in fact, a Hellenic allegory, but Nilsson in his book Primitive Perception of Time (1920) showed that the cult of ancestors, even in classical Greece, was built only on lunar calendar, like all agriculture in Boeotia from the time of Hesiod. Gold rings found in Tiryns and on the Mycenaean acropolis confirm that both the moon and the sun, which was depicted above her head, obeyed the goddess.
2. In the story about Phaeton, whose name is just one of the names of Helios himself (Homer. Iliad XI.735 and Odyssey V.479), there is a moralizing in which the chariot plays the role of an allegory, and the essence of the moralizing is that the fathers should not spoil their sons by allowing them to act on the advice of women. However, this parable is not as simple as it seems. Its mythological significance lies in the indication of the annual sacrifice of a young man of the royal family, and the sacrifice was performed on a day that did not belong to the sidereal year, but was considered part of the earthly year. It was the day following the shortest day of the year. At sunset, the death of the king-priest was played out: the interrex boy immediately received all the titles, honors and sacred relics king, married the queen, and a day later was sacrificed. In Thrace he was torn to pieces by women in mare masks (see 27. d and 130.1), and in Corinth and other places he was tied to a sun chariot and furious horses carried it until it broke and the youth died. After that, the former king reappeared from his tomb, which had served him all this time as a shelter (see 41.1), and inherited the throne from the boy king. The myths about Glaucus (see 71. a), Pelops (see 109. j) and Hippolytus (see 101. g) tell of just such a custom, which, in all likelihood, the Hittites brought to Babylon.
3. Black poplars were sacred trees Hecates, and white poplars symbolized the hope of resurrection (see 31.5 and 134. f). Therefore, the transformation of Phaethon's sisters into poplars indicates the presence of an island-tomb, where the priestesses performed rituals at the soothsayer of the tribal king. This point of view is also confirmed by the fact that Phaeton's sisters also turned into thickets of alder, and alder grew along the shores of the island of Eya, which belonged to Kirke. This is a tomb island located in the Adriatic Sea, not far from the confluence of the Po River (Homer, Odyssey V.64 and 239). Poplars were the sacred trees of Phoroneus, the soothsaying hero who discovered the secret of obtaining fire (see 57.1). The Po valley was the southern end of the Bronze Age "amber route" along which the sacred sun stone amber was delivered from the Baltic to the Mediterranean (see 148.9).
4. Rhodes was the property of the moon-goddess Danaë, who was also called Camira, Ialise, and Linda (see 60.2), until she was displaced by the Hittite sun-god Tesup, who was worshiped in the form of a bull (see 93.1). Danae can be identified with Galia ("sea"), Levkofeya ("white goddess") and Elektrio ("amber"). The six sons and one daughter of Poseidon and the seven sons of Poseidon are an indication of a seven-day week, each day of which was dedicated to a particular planet or titan (see 1.3). Actius did not found Heliopolis, since Onn, or Aun, is one of the oldest Egyptian cities. The claim that he taught the Egyptians astrology looks ridiculous. However, after the Trojan War, the Rhodians remained for some time the only sea merchants who were recognized by the pharaohs, and it is possible that they maintained cult ties with Heliopolis, which was the center of the cult of the god Ra. The “Heliopolis” Zeus, surrounded by statues representing the seven planets and installed in the basement of the monument, was probably created not without Rhodian influence, like similar statues found in Tortos (Spain) and Byblos (Phoenicia) (see 1.4).
Retelling of Graves' Myths of Ancient Greece
A hunter from the Boeotian Hyria and the most handsome man who ever lived, Orion was the son of Poseidon and Euryale. Arriving once in Chios Hyria, he fell in love with Merope, the daughter of the son of Dionysus Oenopion. Enopion promised to give Merope as a wife to Orion if he frees the island from the terrible wild animals that appeared there. Orion began to fulfill this condition, bringing the skin of the beast to Merope every day. When, finally, the condition was fulfilled and Orion demanded Merope as his wife, Enopion began to repeat that lions, bears and wolves still prowl the hills, and refused him the hand of his daughter, although the reason was that he himself was in love with her. .
One night, annoyed Orion drank a whole wineskin of enopion wine, and it inflamed his blood so much that he burst into Merope's bedroom and forced her to share a bed with him. At dawn, Enopion turned to his father Dionysus and he sent satyrs to Orion, who made him drunk so that he fell asleep soundly. Then Enopion gouged out his eyes and threw them on the seashore. The oracle declared that the blind Orion would regain his sight if he went east and turned his eye sockets to Helios when he began to rise from the Ocean. Orion immediately set off on a fragile boat into the sea and, sailing to the sound of the hammer of Cyclops, reached Lemnos. There he entered the forge of Hephaestus, grabbed one of his students named Kedalion, put him on his shoulders and made him his guide. Kedalion led Orion through the lands and seas, and, finally, they reached the farthest shore of the Ocean, where Eos fell in love with him and her brother Helios returned Orion's sight.
Having visited the island of Delos accompanied by Eos, Orion decided to return to take revenge on Enopion, whom, however, he could not find on Chios, because he was hiding in an underground chamber built for him by Hephaestus. Going across the sea to the island of Crete, where, according to Orion, Oenopion could have escaped in the hope of finding protection from his grandfather Minos, he met Artemis, who, like himself, was passionately fond of hunting. She quickly managed to persuade Orion to abandon his plans for revenge and go hunting with her instead.
By this time, Apollo had already learned that Orion did not refuse Eos and shared a bed with her on the sacred island of Delos; from this shamelessness, Dawn was filled with a blush, and it remained crimson. Moreover, Orion boasted that he would free the whole earth from wild animals and monsters. Fearing that his sister Artemis would not resist, like Eos, the beauty of Orion, Apollo went to mother earth and, not without intent repeating Orion's boast, made her set a monstrous scorpion on him. Orion met the scorpion with arrows, but seeing that they did not harm him, he rushed at him with a sword. However, he soon realized that no mortal weapon could defeat a scorpion, dived into the sea and swam towards Delos, where he hoped Eos could save him. Apollo, meanwhile, called Artemis and asked: “Do you see, far out to sea, closer to Ortigia, something black is floating? This is the head of the villain who just seduced Opis, one of your Hyperborean priestesses. His name is Kandaon. I beg you, pierce him with an arrow!” It must be said that Orion was called Kandaon in Boeotia, but Artemis did not know this. She aimed carefully, fired, and swam to look at her prey. What was her grief when she saw that she struck Orion in the head. Then she begged the son of Apollo Asclepius to revive Orion. But Asclepius did not have time to fulfill her request, as the thunderbolt of Zeus struck him himself. Then Artemis placed the image of Orion among the stars, where he was eternally pursued by Scorpio. The spirit of Orion by that time had already flown to Asphodel Meadows.
Some say that Orion died from a scorpion sting and that Artemis was offended by him because he began to pursue her virgin companions - the seven Pleiades, the daughters of Atlanta and Pleione. They were forced to flee from him through the meadows of Boeotia until the gods turned them into doves and placed their images among the stars. However, this is not true, because the Pleiades were not virgins: two of them shared a bed with Zeus, two with Poseidon, one with Ares, and the seventh became the wife of Sisif of Corinth and did not end up in the constellation because Sisif was a mere mortal.
Others tell this strange story about the birth of Orion to explain his name (sometimes it was written Urion), and also the origin of the tradition in which he was called the son of mother earth. The poor beekeeper and farmer Giriei was in anguish because he had no children, and as the years went by, he became decrepit. When one day Zeus and Hermes, having changed their appearance, visited him and met with a warm welcome, they asked Hyrieus about his most cherished desire. Sighing heavily, Giriei replied that what he most wanted, namely, to have a son, was already impossible for him. The gods, however, told him not to despair, but to sacrifice a bull, urinate on his skin and bury it in his wife's grave, which Giriei did. Nine months passed and he had a child, whom he named Urion, i.e. "one who urinates." And indeed: when the constellation Orion rises and sets in the sky, it rains.
Apollo's twin sister Artemis (A r t e m i z) etymology unknown, possible options: "bear goddess", "mistress", "murderer" - was the goddess of hunting, mountains and forests, the daughter of Zeus and Leto. Born on the island of Astrea (Delos)
According to Kotta, there were three Artemis:
The daughter of Zeus and Persephone, gave birth to the winged Eros from Hermes.
Daughter of Zeus III and Leto.
The daughter of Upis and Glauca, who is called Upis.
About her veneration by the Greeks already in the II millennium BC. testify to the name "Artemis" on one of the Knossos clay tablets and data on the Asia Minor goddess Artemis of Ephesus, characterizing her as the mistress of nature, the mistress of animals and the leader of the Amazons. In the Olympian religion of Homer, she is a huntress and the goddess of death, who retained from her Asia Minor predecessor her commitment to the Trojans and the function of the patroness of women in childbirth.
Artemis not only killed wild boars, deer, but also took care of them, took their cubs in her arms, and protected them from predators. But this was not a manifestation of kindness, but of divine foresight. Artemis guarded the wild nature from senseless destruction. She liked the virgin meadow, not trampled by herds, where only bees and bumblebees, collecting pollen, buzzed the praises of nature.
She took rest in the most remote places of mountains and forests, usually in caves near the source.
Artemis spends time in the forests and mountains, hunting surrounded by nymphs - her companions and also hunters. She is armed with a bow, walks in short clothes, she is accompanied by a pack of dogs and a beloved fallow deer. Tired of hunting, she rushes to her brother Apollo in Delphi and there she dances with nymphs and muses. In a round dance, she is the most beautiful of all and taller than all by a whole head.
The goddess has a decisive and aggressive character. It has much in common with the Amazons, who are credited with founding the oldest and most famous temple of Artemis in Ephesus in Asia Minor. People came to this temple to receive a blessing from Artemis for a happy marriage and the birth of a child. Its main features are energy, inflexibility and ruthlessness. She liked blood and torment.
In ancient times, human sacrifices were performed on the altars of Artemis. After their abolition in Sparta, during the days of the festival of Artemis, young Spartans were flogged with willow rods, and their blood irrigated her altar. The priestess, who was watching the torture, held in her hands the statuette of Artemis, and by tilting or lifting it indicated that it was necessary to strengthen or weaken the blows.
Children of niobe (niobe)
Arrogance towards the immortals has never brought people to good. So Niobe, the wife of the king of Thebes, did not escape this bitter fate. In order to hurt Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis, Niobe boasted that she had given birth to seven sons and seven daughters, while the goddess had only two children. The twins terribly avenged the insult inflicted on their mother: Apollo killed the seven sons of Niobe with his arrows that hit without a miss, and his sister, the goddess of the hunt, killed all her daughters. To top it all off, Zeus turned Niobe into a tear-filled rock in her native Lydia. The terrible end of the children of Niobe served as the subject of the painting of this crater, the composition of which unfolds in a frame of two ribbons of an ornament of lotuses and palmettes. The name of the artist of this scene is unknown, so scholars have given him an appropriate pseudonym: Master Niobid.
image of callisto
Was among the companions of Artemis the hunter. Accompanied Artemis on the hunt and vowed to remain a girl. Zeus shared a bed with her, taking the form of Artemis (according to another version, Apollo). According to one version, Artemis shot her because she did not keep her virginity, and Zeus sent Hermes to save the child that Callisto was carrying in her womb.
According to another story, Zeus turned her into a bear, but Hera convinced Artemis to shoot her with a bow like a wild beast (or became a bear because of Hera's anger). She was caught by goatherds and given to Lycaon with her son. She gave birth to a son Arkad (or Arkad and Pan).
myth of actaeon
On a hot afternoon, leaving the other hunters, Actaeon, accompanied by hunting dogs, climbed into an impenetrable thicket. With difficulty getting out of it, he saw a stream and next to it a shady grotto. He should run without looking back! And he was possessed by curiosity, which has already ruined mortals more than once. With inaudible steps, he approached the grotto and looked inside. The beauties of the nymph appeared before his eyes. With a cry, they surrounded Artemis, who had already undressed for ablution. The face of the goddess was covered with a blush, her eyes lit up with anger. A petas suddenly fell from Actaeon's head, although it was calm. Glancing at the bathing pond, the hunter saw with horror that he had grown branched horns. "Oh gods! What is happening to me," he thought. The bow fell from his hand, for the fingers grew together, turning into hooves, and he can no longer stand upright, but stands on four legs. Spotted skin covered the body. He is no longer in control of the language. Instead of a plea, a moo came out of his mouth.
Artemis came out of the cave with a laugh. She had nothing to hide. In front of her is no longer a man, but a deer trembling with horror. Although he kept human mind, he can't tell what Artemis looks like. But people will find out how she punishes impudence!
Laughing enough, the goddess picked up a tight bow from the ground and pulled back the bowstring. Frightened, Actaeon started to run. It would be better if he stayed where he was and accepted death at the hands of the one that heartlessly changed his appearance.
A beautiful deer runs through the gorges of Kieferon, and an unstoppable pack of dogs rushes after it. Closer and closer their barking. Actaeon realizes that he cannot leave. Stopping, he addresses each of the dogs: - Don't jump like that, Nisa! Remember how I got you back on your feet when the boar hit you. Lark! How dare you lash out at your master? After all, I have always distinguished you in a pack. But dogs do not distinguish in the lowing of a human voice.
They cannot smell by scent that in front of them in the skin of a deer is their master, their god. Nisa dug into her throat. Lark clutched at his hip. Actaeon fell to his knees. Such grief froze in his huge bulging eyes that if Artemis herself were in this clearing, her stone heart would melt!
Well, the merciful Artemis sent prey to the dogs of Actaeon! - exclaimed the senior hunter.
For this she will get a hind leg, ”another responded, pulling out a knife.
Where did Actaeon himself disappear to? - said the third hunter. - Here he will be delighted when he finds out what kind of deer his pack drove!
Orion myth (Late Antiquity)
So Artemis hid in the thickets and caves, not letting a single man near her. But one day she heard about Orion, the son of Poseidon and Euryale, the daughter of King Minos. The fame of his power, beauty and hunting success filled the whole world, And most of all the gods and mortals were surprised that Orion moved from island to island on the water. The gift of walking on the waves was from Poseidon, who singled out Orion among other sons. Using it, he quickly reached the island of Chios and killed with his copper club many animals that had bred and attacked the islanders. Orion had such power that it cost him nothing to move mountains to create a harbor or erect a temple to Poseidon in a place he liked.
And Artemis decided to hunt with Orion. The giant had a wife, Side (Pomegranate Fruit), who bore him 50 sons and two daughters. For a long time she persuaded her husband to stay away from the goddess who killed many mortals. But he was eager to show Artemis that he was not inferior to her either in strength or in dexterity.
So Artemis and Orion began to hunt together, chasing animals around the world. They were accompanied by the faithful dog of Orion, Sirius, who had incredible tirelessness and sharpness of scent. Artemis looked at her companion more and more often. She, hostile to Aphrodite and her gifts, for the first time felt a previously incomprehensible desire to be closer to a being of the opposite sex, to touch his face, to feel his breath. Who knows what this would have led to if they had not gone out onto a wide meadow, as if adapted for throwing a stone or a disc. Orion and Artemis took copper discs in their palms.
Drop first! Orion suggested.
He was always inferior to Artemis as a woman and goddess.
Artemis brought her hand back and the disk whistled out in a huge arc. At the site of the fall, a pit was formed, visible from afar.
Orion threw his disc further. The goddess could not stand the fact that the mortal turned out to be the winner, and hit Orion with an arrow. Recovering herself, she sobbed and began to tear her beautiful hair. Rushing to Zeus on Olympus, she prayed that he would return life to Orion.
It's not in my power, my daughter, - Zeus explained to her. You better learn to control your anger.
Then make it so that I can admire the beauty of Orion, - Artemis did not let up.
This I can! Zeus spoke.
And soon a new constellation Orion appeared in the sky. It still shines in the skies of Hellas from the beginning of summer until the onset of winter.
The ancient idea of Artemis is associated with her lunar nature, hence her affinity for the sorcery of the moon goddess Selene and the goddess Hekate, with whom she sometimes approaches. Late heroic mythology knows Artemis the moon, secretly in love with the handsome Endymion.
artemis bear, many-breasted
Usually Artemis was depicted as a huntress: in a short, sloppy girded robe, her legs and arms were bare; a quiver on his shoulder, a bow in his hand. A diadem shaped like a crescent moon flashed in her hair. On the coast of Asia Minor, in Ephesus, a temple was built in honor of Artemis, where she is depicted in a completely different way: as the mother of all things, with a hundred breasts. It was not Artemis, but an Asian goddess, whose cult the local Greeks adopted from their neighbors, but renamed the deity in their own way.
The most ancient Artemis is not only a hunter, but also a bear. In Attica (in Bravron), the priestesses of Artemis Brauronia put on bear skins in a ritual dance and were called she-bears. Sanctuaries of Artemis were often located near springs and swamps (veneration of Artemis Limnatis - "marsh"), symbolizing the fertility of the plant deity. The chthonic unbridledness of Artemis is close to the image of the Great Mother of the Gods - Cybele in Asia Minor, whence the orgiastic elements of the cult, glorifying the fertility of the deity. In Asia Minor, in the famous temple of Ephesus, the image of Artemis with many breasts was venerated. Rudiments of the archaic plant goddess in the image of Artemis are manifested in the fact that she, through her assistant (in her former incarnation) Ilithyia, helps women in childbirth. Only when she was born, she helps her mother accept Apollo, who was born after her. She also has the prerogative to bring a quick and easy death. However, the classical Artemis is a virgin and the protector of chastity. She patronizes Hippolytus, who despises love. Before the wedding, Artemis, according to custom, was offered an atoning sacrifice. To King Admet, who forgot about this custom, she filled the bridal chamber with snakes. Artemis killed the terrible Bufaga ("bull-eater"), who tried to encroach on her, as well as the hunter Orion.
She gave a harvest to the earth, so swamps, streams and rivers were dedicated to her; her name was glorified in the fields, and in the valleys, and in the forests on the hills of Taygetus, because she blessed plants, and animals, and children who were given under her protection, and supported women in childbirth during childbirth. In Sparta, boys were flogged every year in front of her altar so that their blood splashed on the statue of the goddess. It was an echo of those times when people were sacrificed to Artemis as the goddess of death. The inhabitants of Taurida (present-day Crimea), probably, even in ancient times, sacrificed it to foreigners caught on the coast.
Orion was the son of Poseidon and Euryale (one of the three Gorgon sisters).
He was born in the Greek province of Beiotia, and was a great hunter, handsome and strong man. One spring day he recovered to the island of Chios. At that time, King Oinopion ruled there. He had a beautiful daughter, whose name was Merope. Orion fell madly in love with her and asked Oinopion for her hand in marriage.
The king did not like the thought of being separated from his daughter, and he gave Orion an impossible task: to rid the island of the wild animals that inhabited it, hoping that Orion would die. He told Orion that he would allow the wedding once the job was done. Orion showed all his skill and the task of the cruel father was completed.
He came to claim Merope, but King Oinopion refused to let his daughter go and stated that the work had not been fully completed. Orion realized that Oinopion simply did not want to give him his daughter, and, in a fit of rage, took Merope by force. The next morning, Merope told her father that Orion had raped her. The king was very angry, but, on the other hand, he was glad for such a good excuse to get rid of Orion. The next night, Oinopion blinded Orion and threw him on the seashore.
The oracle told Orion that he would see clearly if he went east and let the rays of the rising sun touch his eyes. The blinded hunter reached Limnos, and there he regained his sight.
Eos, the goddess of the morning dawn, saw Orion when he was leaving Chios and fell in love with him. Orion spent some time with Eos, then he decided to return to Chios to take revenge on Oinopion. When the king learned that Orion had returned, he immediately hid in a secret cave. Orion searched for a king for a long time, but did not find it.
Obsessed with revenge, Orion went to Crete in search of Oinopion, but he was nowhere to be found. There he met the beautiful Artemis - the same beautiful hunter as he himself. She decided that Orion was the one she had been waiting for all her life. The feelings were mutual. Orion fell in love so much that he abandoned his thoughts of revenge.
Orion boasted that he was the greatest hunter in the universe. When Zeus' wife, Hera, heard his statements, she got angry and sent poisonous scorpion kill Orion. The scorpion crept up to Orion and stung him, causing him to die.
Artemis was horrified by what had happened. In her deepest grief, she took Orion's body to her nephew Asclepius, begging him to revive Orion, but before Asclepius could do anything, Zeus destroyed Orion's body with lightning. Artemis finally came to terms with his death, and sent her beloved to heaven.
Hera placed her scorpion on the opposite side of the sky. Even now, Orion tries to hide from the scorpion until his sunset. Scorpio rises in the east when a few of Orion's stars are still visible above the western horizon.
