The Sun and The Moon

Greetings!

In today’s mythology lesson, we’ll be talking about Apollo and Artemis, the twin offspring of Zeus and Leto; we have quite some things to cover, so let’s get started.

We’ve already established that Zeus had numerous affairs and offspring, right?

As soon as a girl stroke his fancy, he had had to have her; Leto was no exception to that rule.

Leto, the daughter of titans Coeus and Phoebe, was a very beautiful girl; at some point, she had caught Zeus’s attention, so naturally, he started pursuing her.

Leto kept rejecting his advances; she even transformed into a quail in order to avoid him. That didn’t faze Zeus of course; he, too, transformed into a quail and mated with her.

Like most of the divine escapades, this one too resulted into a pregnancy; when Hera found out that Leto was pregnant and Zeus was the father, she was enraged.

Instead of going after Zeus for impregnating Leto, she turned against Leto and banned her from giving birth on “terra firma”, meaning Leto could not give birth either on the mainland or any real island. And, in order to be completely certain that Leto would not be able to find a place to deliver her babies, she also sent Python after her.

What a lovely lady indeed!

Leto kept wandering and, finally she found refuge in the newly created floating island of Ortygia (later called Delos) and there, she gave birth to her children.

Artemis was born first, without giving Leto any birth-pains; Apollo’s birth was a different story though; Leto was exhausted and she went through a nine day labor and delivery, before Apollo was born; despite being only a newborn, myth has it that it was Artemis that assisted her mother in giving birth to Apollo.

As a thank you to Delos for providing shelter to Leto, Zeus secured it to the ocean, making it a real island.

Now, Leto was the impersonation of the Night, so both of her children were associated with the sky too; Apollo is associated with the sun and Artemis is associated with the moon.

Apollo was the god of light, truth and prophecy, healing, and the arts while Artemis was the goddess of the hunt, wilderness, childbirth, virginity and protector of young girls.

Apollo and Artemis through Eirini's eyes: young and beautiful (hmm that sounds like a soap opera...)
I may be a little biased (just a tiiiiiny bit :-p ), but I think they are remarkable!

Both of them were extremely good looking, and associated with youth and beauty. They were skilled archers (hence they were often depicted carrying a bow and arrows –gold for Apollo and silver for Artemis), and they both possessed the gift of healing.

Apollo was kind and just; he had a very clear idea of right and wrong. He was unable to tell a lie, yet he had the ability to use his charm to get his way. Sometimes he can be a bit vain too, but it’s only because he’s well aware of his superiority; he’s good looking, and multi-talented too; who can blame him?

Artemis was loyal, brave, strong and kind to those who deserved it; very much like Apollo, she had a very strong sense of right and wrong. Those who crossed her though had better watch out.

Despite their many similarities, there was a main difference between them.

Apollo, pretty much like their father, had numerous affairs and offspring, while Artemis had asked their father for eternal virginity; she was very protective of her purity, and gave grave punishment to any man attempting to dishonour her.

Apollo and Artemis had the best possible relationship (surprisingly, there’s no sibling rivalry between those two!) and remained close to each other forever. Naturally, It goes without saying that they cherished and respected their mother for all the trouble she went through for them and were always hard on those who insulted her.