Musical inspiration of Apollo
Apollo is a highly skilled in various fields of endeavor similar to the Celtic God Lugh. He is the God of Sunlight, Prophecy, Music, Medicine, Truth and Archery to name a few. Although his sister, Lady Artemis is associated with all wild animal especially the deer and the bear, Apollo's sacred animals are wolves, dolphins, deers, and prophetic birds.
Apollo is a god you need to respect or suffer his wrath. Like all the gods of the Greek 12 Olympians, he can also be harsh. When Niobe, Queen of Thebes and a proud mother of 6 sons and 6 daughters, on the Feast of Leto she said that she is greater than Leto. Mother Leto called her children to revenge her. Happy to help their mother, Apollo killed Niobe's sons and Artemis killed Niobe's daughters. He also sent plagues to cities that defied him, (as the God the Medicine he can inflict illness and disease as well cure it).
Apollo never married, and like most Olympians he have numerous affairs, and producing several children. Some of his known, female affairs are:
- Coronis who later was killed for marrying a mortal man. Her son was Asclepius, God of Healing and Medicine
- Cyrene is Mother of the Prophet Idman and Aristaeus, inventor of beekeeping
- The Muse Thalia. Their children Corybantes, male followers of the Great Mother Cybele
- Muse Urania. Their sons: the Famous Musician Orpheus and Linus
Apollo loves the ladies and some of the ladies loved him back. he do not limit himself to love affair with just women; he love young men. Male couples, in the gay Greek myths, usually consist of a god in the role of the adult lover, and a hero in the role of the adolescent boy beloved. Children, even mythical ones, were not involved, as the Greeks frowned upon sexual relationships with little boys who wouldn't. In actual practice the most prized boys were well into adolescence and would be of legal age in many countries today.
The gay myths here, like Greek male love in general, are not mainly about sex. They are first of all about friendship and love as reflected in conflicts about trust and betrayal, pride and humility, and right and wrong. It's also problematic to say that the myths are about "gay" love. Greek homosexuality is more complex and the Greeks would not have thought of themselves as gay. On one hand, sex between adult men was frowned upon (which proves that it existed). On the other, most men and boys who fell in love with each other would later go on to marriage and children. Accordingly, mythical Greek homosexuality defies the modern fashion of gay and straight.
Comments
Post a Comment