Irlandos at 11:05, July 13, 2006

2006-07-13T11:05:20Z

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In earlier [[Greek mythology]], the [[sun]] was personified as a deity called '''Hêlios''' ([[Greek language|Greek]] for "the sun"), whom [[Homer]] equates with the sun [[Titan (mythology)|Titan]], [[Hyperion (mythology)|Hyperion]]. Other sources say Helios is Hyperion's son by his sister [[Theia]]. Helios was to be seen driving a fiery [[chariot]] across the sky. He has two sisters, the moon goddess [[Selene]] and the dawn goddess [[Eos]]. The solar roles of Helios were assumed by [[Apollo]], who eclipsed Helios as [[Artemis]] eclipsed lunar [[Selene]]. The equivalent of Helios in Roman mythology is '''Sol'''.

The etymology of ''Helios'', unlike most of the major figures in Greek myth, is Indo-European (Burkert p 17).

==Greek mythology==
The best known story involving Helios is that of his son [[Phaethon]], who drove the sun chariot to his own disaster.

Helios was sometimes referred to with the epithet '''Helios Panoptes''' ("the all-seeing").

The names of the horses were Pyrois, Eos, [[Aethon]] and Phlegon.

"The island of [[Rhodes]] is almost the only place where Helios enjoys an important cult", Burkert asserts (p 174), instancing a spectacular rite in which a [[quadriga]], a chariot drawn by four horses, is driven over a precipice into the sea, with its overtones of the plight of Phaethon noted. There annual gymnastic tournaments were held in his honor. The [[Colossus of Rhodes]] was dedicated to him.

Helios was often depicted as a haloed youth in a chariot, wearing a cloak and with a globe and a whip. Roosters and eagles were associated with him.

In the ''[[Odyssey]]'' (book XII), [[Odysseus]] and his surviving crew landed on [[Thrinacia]], an island sacred to the sun god, whom [[Circe]] names Hyperion rather than Helios:
:You will now come to the Thrinacian island, and here you will see many herds of cattle and flocks of sheep belonging to the sun-god. There will be seven herds of cattle and seven flocks of sheep, with fifty head in each flock. They do not breed, nor do they become fewer in number, and they are tended by the goddesses [[Phaethusa]] and [[Lampetia]], who are children of the sun-god Hyperion by Neaera. Their mother when she had borne them and had done suckling them sent them to the Thrinacian island, which was a long way off, to live there and look after their father's flocks and herds."

There were kept the sacred red Cattle of the Sun. Though Odysseus warned his men not to, they impiously killed and ate some of the cattle. The guardians of the island, Helios' daughters, told their father. Helios, however, had to appeal to [[Zeus]], who destroyed the ship and all the men save Odysseus.

While [[Heracles]] traveled to [[Erytheia]] to retrieve the cattle of [[Geryon]], he crossed the Libyan desert and was so frustrated at the heat that he shot an arrow at Helios, the sun. Helios begged him to stop and Heracles demanded the golden cup which Helios used to sail across the sea every night, from the west to the east. Heracles used this golden cup to reach Erytheia.

In one story Aphrodite bedded [[Ares]] while having an affair with [[Hephaestus]]. Helios spied on them and told Hephaestus who ended up punishing the two lovers. By the Oceanid Perse he became the father of Aeëtes, Circe, and Pasiphae. His other children are Phaethusa ("radiant") and Lampetia ("shining") and Phaethon.

==Helios and Apollo==

Apollo as he appears in [[Homer]], a plague-dealing god with a silver (not golden) bow, has no solar features. "Different names may refer to the same being," Walter Burkert observes (p 120), "or else they may be consciously equated, as in the case of Apollo and Helios."

The earliest certain reference to Apollo identified with the sun titan Helios appears in the surviving fragments of [[Euripides]]' play ''Phaethon'' in a speech near the end (fr 781 N²), [[Clymene]], Phaethon's mother, laments that Helios has destroyed her child, that Helios whom men rightly call Apollo (the name ''Apollo'' here understood to mean ''Apollon'' "Destroyer").

By [[Hellenistic]] times Apollo had become closely connected with the sun in cult. His epithet [[Phoebus]] "shining", drawn from Helios, was later also applied by Latin poets to the sun-god Sol.

The identification became a commonplace in philosophic texts and appears in the writing of [[Parmenides]], [[Empedocles]], [[Plutarch]] and [[Crates of Thebes]] among others, as well as appearing in some Orphic texts. [[Pseudo-Eratosthenes]] writes about [[Orpheus]] in ''[[Catasterismi]]'', section 24:

:But having gone down into [[Hades]] because of his wife and seeing what sort of things were there, he did not continue to worship [[Dionysus]], because of whom he was famous, but he thought Helios to be the greatest of the gods, Helios whom he also addressed as Apollo. Rousing himself each night toward dawn and climbing the mountain called Pangaion, he would await the sun's rising, so that he might see it first. Therefore Dionysus, being angry with him, sent the Bassarides, as [[Aeschylus]] the tragedian says; they tore him apart and scattered the limbs.

Dionysus and [[Asclepius]] are sometimes also identified with this Apollo Helios.

Classical Latin poets also used ''Phoebus'' as a byname for the sun-god, whence common references in later European poetry to Phoebus and his car ("chariot") as a metaphor for the sun. But in particular instances in myth, Apollo and Helios are distinct. The sun-god, the son of Hyperion, with his sun chariot, though often called ''[[Phoebus]]'' ("shining") is not called ''Apollo'' except in purposeful non-traditional identifications. Roman poets often referred to the sun god as ''Titan''.

==Consorts/Children==
# [[Aegle]]
## [[Charites]]
### [[Aglaea]]
### [[Euphrosyne (mythology)|Euphrosyne]]
### [[Thalia]]
# [[Clymene]]
## [[Heliades]]
### [[Aegiale]]
### [[Aegle]]
### [[Aetheria]]
### [[Helia]]
### [[Merope]]
### [[Phoebe]]
### [[Dioxippe]]
## [[Phaethon]]
# [[Merope]]
## [[Phaethon]]
# [[Neaera]]
## [[Phaethusa]]
## [[Lampetia]]
# [[Rhodus]]
## [[Elektryo]]
## [[Heliadae]]
### [[Ochimus]]
### [[Cercaphus]]
### [[Macareus]]
### [[Actis]]
### [[Tenages]]
### [[Triopas]]
### [[Candalus]]
# [[Perse]]
## [[Aegea]]
## [[Aeetes]]
## [[Calypso]]
## [[Circe]]
## [[Pasiphae]]
## [[Perses]]

==Epithets==
*[[Terpsimbrotos]]

==References==
*Walter Burkert, 1982. ''Greek Religion''.
*Konrad Schauenburg, 1955. ''Helios: Archäologisch-mythologische Studien über den antiken'' (Mann)
*Karl Kerenyi. ''Apollo: The Wind, the Spirit, and the God: Four Studies''

{{Credit wikipedia}}

[[Category:Greek gods]]
[[Category:Titans]]

Helios - Revision history

Irlandos at 11:05, July 13, 2006