A Guide to Mythology

by Helen A. Clarke

THE STORY OF ARTEMIS AND ORION

(Greek)

Orion, the son of Neptune, was a giant and a mighty hunter, whose prowess and manly favor gained for him the rare good-will of Artemis. It is related that he loved Merope, the daughter of Œnopion, king of Chios, and sought her in marriage. He cleared the island of wild beasts, and brought the spoils of the chase as presents to his beloved; but as Œnopion constantly deferred his consent, Orion attempted to gain possession of the maiden by violence. Her father, incensed at this conduct, made Orion drunk, deprived him of his sight, and cast him out on the seashore. The blinded hero, instructed by an oracle to seek the rays of morning, followed the sound of a Cyclop’s hammer till he reached Lemnos, where Vulcan, taking pity on him, gave him Cedalion, one of his men, to be his guide to the abode of the sun. Placing Cedalion on his shoulders, Orion proceeded to the east, and there meeting the Sun God, was restored to sight by his beam.

Diana or Artemis. Correggio.

After this he used to go hunting with Artemis, much to the displeasure of Apollo, who did not like his sister to make such a friend of Orion. One day, therefore, observing Orion as he walked through the sea, with his head just above water, Apollo pointed out the black object to his sister, and maintained that she could not hit it. The archer goddess discharged a shaft with fatal aim; the waves rolled the dead body of Orion to the land. Then, bewailing with many tears the death of her friend, Artemis placed him among the stars, where he appears as a giant, with a girdle, sword, lion’s skin, and club. Sirius, his dog, follows him, and the Pleiades fly before him. In the beginning of winter, all through the night, Orion follows the chase across the heavens, but with dawn he sinks toward the waters of his father, Neptune. In the beginning of summer he may be seen, with daybreak, in the eastern sky, till Artemis draws again her darts and slays him.

The myths of the stars are almost as numerous as those of the sun and moon, and exist everywhere. A very prevalent idea in regard to them is that human beings are transformed into stars; for example, in Australia they say that the god Pundjel made stars of all the good men and women after the Deluge. In Greek mythology, the gods very frequently turned men and women into stars. Both in Australia and Greece the stars the Greeks called, and we know now as, Castor and Pollux were two young men. In the first case they are said to be two hunters, in the second they were two brothers so famous for their brotherly love that Zeus, desiring to make their memory immortal, placed them both among the stars. Sometimes a human being or an animal is transformed into a whole constellation or group of stars. The story told about the constellations of the Great Bear and the Little Bear in Greece is that once a nymph, Callisto, of the train of Artemis, who fell in love, was changed into a bear by Juno. One day long after she saw a youth hunting, and recognized him as her own son. She stopped and wanted to embrace him, but her son, not recognizing her in her bear form, was on the point of transfixing her when Zeus arrested the crime, and, snatching away both of them, placed them in the heavens as the Great Bear and the Little Bear. The story of Orion’s translation into a constellation has already been given. Around the group of stars called the Pleiades cluster many legends. Of this group of seven stars one is so dim that it seems entirely to disappear. A South Australian legend tells that the Pleiades were a queen and her six attendants. The Crow fell in love with the queen, who refused to be his wife. The Crow, however, found that the queen and her six maidens were in the habit of hunting for white, edible grubs in the bark of trees. The Crow at once changed himself into a grub and hid in the bark of a tree. The six maidens sought to pick him out with their wooden hooks, but he broke the points of all the hooks. Then came the queen with her pretty bone hook; he let himself be drawn out, took the shape of a giant, and ran away with her. Ever since there have only been six stars and six maidens in the Pleiades. According to a Greek myth, the Pleiades, who still fly before Orion in the heavens, were daughters of Atlas and nymphs of the train of Artemis. One day they were pursued by the giant hunter Orion, and, being very much frightened, they prayed to the gods to change their form. Zeus heard their prayers, changed them into pigeons, and placed them among the stars. Though their number was seven, only six stars are now visible, for it is said Electra left her place that she might not behold the ruin of Troy, which had been founded by her son Dardanus. The sight had such an effect on her sisters that they blanched, and have been pale ever since. But Electra became a comet. Her hair floating wildly, she still ranges inconsolably the expanse of heaven.

The prettiest notion in regard to the stars is that they are the souls of the dead. In Germany, for example, they thought that when a child died, God made a new star.

The North American Indians are particularly fond of star myths, and they have invented some charming star stories. According to them, stars might come down and talk to men, after the manner of one whose story is given below. It came down and told a hunter where to find game.