Why does artemis favor orion

He averted his eyes from her in respect. Orion looked up at her, and foresaw many days of sport and fun together, and laughed with the pleasure of the thought. Artemis and Orion passed the summer together. By day they hunted and sported, challenging each other to foot races, archery, and storytelling. In the evenings around the fire they bared their souls and told each other about their lives, their lost loves, their secrets.

Orion spoke of the men he had loved and hoped to love again. Artemis spoke of the nymphs who attended her, their love affairs, and her romantic attachments to the goddesses and women of her cities. They became, in short, fast friends. One night, when Artemis and Orion sat at their fire telling stories, Orion turned to her and said, " Artemis, my friend, my most beautiful crescent moon, I give thanks to the Fates that we are so well met.

The love we share is as valuable as my life, and I am a better man for knowing you. Thou art a fine man and I bless our time together. They shared an embrace. Then Orion jumped up and danced in celebration around the fire.

Artemis followed him, and their shouts and laughter rang through the dark forest. The next day, Apollo, the brother of Artemis, was walking through the forest. He smelled a low-burning campfire, and found the glade where Orion and Artemis lay still asleep.

He saw and appreciated the beautiful Orion, but grew angry when he saw that Artemis lay with him. He assumed that Artemis also appreciated Orion in the masculine manner he himself did, and had compromised her virginity, her separateness from the sexuality of men.

But he concealed his anger, put on a mask of friendliness, and whistled a bright tune until the two friends awoke. Seeing who was making the noise, they invited him to breakfast. Later in the morning, Artemis attended to her priestesses elsewhere, and left her brother and friend to amuse themselves together. Now Apollo is very beautiful; he is the sun; he is a god selected to sit among the twelve Olympians.

He is vain, yet kind; wise, yet full of fun. Orion was immediately captivated by him, and naturally so. Apollo's heart was also caught by Orion's friendly company and gentle yet thoroughly masculine manner.

Apollo took as his lovers many women and goddesses, and also men and gods. For Tityus's offense, Zeus consigned the giant who was his own son to eternal torment in the Underworld see What the Hell? Adventures in the Underworld. Artemis and Apollo also defended their mother's honor or perhaps their own pride when Niobe, the daughter of Tantalus, boasted of having more and better children than Leto.

The two killed most or all of Niobe's children, leaving Niobe to weep eternally. Artemis and Apollo remained close to each other forever. Both siblings would become associated with the skill of archery, and they enjoyed hunting together. In addition, both had the power to send plagues upon mortals. Artemis grew to become the virgin goddess of the hunt, of wild animals, and of childbirth due to her participation in the birth of her brother.

She and her brother also became the protectors of young children. When she was just three, Artemis was asked by her father, Zeus, to name any gifts she wanted. Among many others, she named:. Zeus gladly provided her with everything she wanted and more.

He ordered the Cyclopes to forge a silver bow and fill a quiver with arrows for her. He promised her eternal virginity. Zeus gave her all the mountains as her domain. And he presented her with 30 cities?

Artemis, constantly attended by nymphs, could almost always be found in the mountains she loved. Though she was the guardian of wild animals, Artemis enjoyed nothing more than hunting. Orion, a giant hunter, joined both Artemis and her mother on many of their hunts. Like most of the Olympians, Artemis reacted strongly whenever she did not receive the honors due her as a goddess. After Apollo had helped Admetus win Alcestis as his bride, for instance, the groom neglected to sacrifice to Artemis at his wedding.

Imagine his horror that night when he found his bridal bedchamber teeming with snakes! Admetus quickly followed Apollo's advice and made the necessary sacrifices to the god's sister. The hunter Orion greatly offended Gaia by boasting that his hunting skill was so great he could kill all of the animals on Earth. Gaia decided to protect her domain by sending a giant scorpion after the hunter.

After the scorpion stung and killed Orion, Artemis and Leto prevailed upon Zeus to immortalize him as a constellation? King Oeneus of Calydon similarly offended Artemis by forgetting to dedicate the first fruits of the harvest to her one season.

Artemis sent a monstrous boar to ravage and terrorize his kingdom. To rid the kingdom of this vicious beast, Oeneus was forced to call on some of the greatest heroes of the age to participate in the hunt. Actaeon, the son of Autonoe and grandson of Cadmus, offended the goddess by stumbling across her once while she was bathing in the woods. Furious that a mortal had seen her naked, Artemis transformed the hunter into a stag.

His own hounds then ripped Actaeon to pieces. The biggest penalty paid for offending the goddess was that of King Agamemnon of Mycenae, who foolishly boasted that his hunting prowess outstripped even hers. On the eve of the Trojan War, Artemis stranded the Greek fleet with ill winds. To appease her, Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter Iphigenia? Having won the right to eternal virginity from her father, Artemis sometimes found it necessary to fiercely defend it.

Buphagus, son of the Titan Iapetus, once tried to rape her, but she shot and killed him. The twin sons of Poseidon, Otus and Ephialtes, also met their doom trying to violate the goddess? Otus chased after Artemis while Ephialtes pursued Hera. But suddenly a deer? Distracted, the brothers quickly hurled their spears at it, but it sped away.

Otus's spear pierced Ephialtes and Ephialtes' hit Otus? Artemis instantly knew what had happened. She grabbed the scorpion and flung it into the sky, where it was transformed into the constellation Scorpius. Then, Artemis lovingly placed the body of Orion in the opposite side of the sky, where it, too, became a constellation.

Artemis made sure the scorpion and the hunter were as far apart as possible. Write to him at mike wlynch comcast. Visit his website at facebook. By Mike Lynch Sky Watch. Mike Lynch This month, that constellation is standing nearly upright in the early evening in the southern sky. More in Things to Do.