Apollo was the twin brother of Artemis, the goddess of the hunt and the Moon. Like his sister, Apollo loved hunting with a bow and arrow. He was the god of wisdom, poetry, and music.
Apollo was a handsome god, with long black hair. He drove a golden chariot drawn by swans. He was the leader of the Muses, the nine goddesses of the arts.
This god liked lions, wolves, stags, crows, and dolphins. He also liked cattle, and once had a herd of his own. The baby Hermes stole that herd from him. But Apollo let Hermes keep the cattle in return for his lyre. The lyre was a kind of harp that Hermes had made out of a tortoise shell.
When Apollo was still a young god, he wanted to know his future. So he went to a town called Delphi, where a priestess was said to tell fortunes. She was called an “oracle.”
When Apollo arrived in Delphi, he found trouble awaiting him. A monster named Python was supposed to guard the oracle. But Python had turned cruel and was terrorizing the people of Delphi.
Apollo killed Python with his bare hands. Then the citizens of Delphi built a temple in his honor. The oracle kept telling people’s fortunes there.
After that, Apollo became known as the god of prophecy—which means the ability to foretell the future. He was believed to always tell the truth.
Apollo was also known as great healer. However, he sometimes caused disease as well. His son, Asclepius, was the god of medicine for a while. But Asclepius grew so powerful that he could raise the dead. The gods couldn’t allow that, so Zeus killed Asclepius with his thunderbolt.
Because Apollo was called the god of light, he was sometimes mistaken for the sun god. The real god of the sun was Helios, who drove a flaming chariot across the sky.
Helios once made a terrible mistake. He allowed his half-mortal son Phaeton to drive his chariot. But Phaeton couldn’t control Helios’s horses. He almost destroyed the world with that flaming chariot. Like Asclepius, Phaeton was killed by Zeus’s thunderbolt.
Here are some interesting facts about Apollo’s story:
•A huge snake called a python can be found in parts of Africa and Asia. It’s named after the monster that Apollo killed.
•In ancient times Delphi was said to be the center of the world. Its ruins are still visited today.
•The Pythian Games were an athletic event held every four years in Delphi. They were named after the monster slain by Apollo. Those games were something like today’s Olympics. The earliest Olympic games were also played in Ancient Greece.
•A priestess in Delphi really was believed to tell fortunes. Once she was asked about the Athenian philosopher Socrates. She said that no one in the world was wiser than he. Socrates was surprised, because he thought he knew nothing at all. He soon noticed that people who thought themselves wise knew no more than he did. So Socrates was truly wise in knowing himself to be ignorant.
•Today the word Apollonian means wise, prudent, and well thought-out. The god Dionysus was thought to be reckless and unruly, most unlike the calm and sensible Apollo. So the word Dionysian means wild, uncontrolled, and lacking reason.
Apollo was a handsome god, with long black hair. He drove a golden chariot drawn by swans. He was the leader of the Muses, the nine goddesses of the arts.
This god liked lions, wolves, stags, crows, and dolphins. He also liked cattle, and once had a herd of his own. The baby Hermes stole that herd from him. But Apollo let Hermes keep the cattle in return for his lyre. The lyre was a kind of harp that Hermes had made out of a tortoise shell.
When Apollo was still a young god, he wanted to know his future. So he went to a town called Delphi, where a priestess was said to tell fortunes. She was called an “oracle.”
When Apollo arrived in Delphi, he found trouble awaiting him. A monster named Python was supposed to guard the oracle. But Python had turned cruel and was terrorizing the people of Delphi.
Apollo killed Python with his bare hands. Then the citizens of Delphi built a temple in his honor. The oracle kept telling people’s fortunes there.
After that, Apollo became known as the god of prophecy—which means the ability to foretell the future. He was believed to always tell the truth.
Apollo was also known as great healer. However, he sometimes caused disease as well. His son, Asclepius, was the god of medicine for a while. But Asclepius grew so powerful that he could raise the dead. The gods couldn’t allow that, so Zeus killed Asclepius with his thunderbolt.
Because Apollo was called the god of light, he was sometimes mistaken for the sun god. The real god of the sun was Helios, who drove a flaming chariot across the sky.
Helios once made a terrible mistake. He allowed his half-mortal son Phaeton to drive his chariot. But Phaeton couldn’t control Helios’s horses. He almost destroyed the world with that flaming chariot. Like Asclepius, Phaeton was killed by Zeus’s thunderbolt.
Here are some interesting facts about Apollo’s story:
•A huge snake called a python can be found in parts of Africa and Asia. It’s named after the monster that Apollo killed.
•In ancient times Delphi was said to be the center of the world. Its ruins are still visited today.
•The Pythian Games were an athletic event held every four years in Delphi. They were named after the monster slain by Apollo. Those games were something like today’s Olympics. The earliest Olympic games were also played in Ancient Greece.
•A priestess in Delphi really was believed to tell fortunes. Once she was asked about the Athenian philosopher Socrates. She said that no one in the world was wiser than he. Socrates was surprised, because he thought he knew nothing at all. He soon noticed that people who thought themselves wise knew no more than he did. So Socrates was truly wise in knowing himself to be ignorant.
•Today the word Apollonian means wise, prudent, and well thought-out. The god Dionysus was thought to be reckless and unruly, most unlike the calm and sensible Apollo. So the word Dionysian means wild, uncontrolled, and lacking reason.