Category Archives: Artemis

The island of Delos

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According to Greek myth, this small, rocky island was the birthplace of Apollo and Artemis. (OK, how many knew Artemis is Apollo’s twin?)

Leto, the mother of the twins, was raped by Zeus in the form of a swan. Hera was so jealous that she decreed Leda could not find any solid ground on which to rest or to deliver her babies.

But Delos was a floating island so Leto was able to deliver her children there, under a palm tree. Since Artemis was born first, she helped her mother with Apollo’s birth and thus became a protector of women especally during childbirth. (Artemis must have been very precocious since she was, what?, ten minutes old at the most.)

Delos is home to the iconic Terrace of the Lions, a wide pathway lined on both sides by statues of lions. Originally, there were nine to twelve but now only five remain. This terrace was erected by the people of Naxos and dedicated to Apollo. It faces east, toward the Sacred Lake of Delos.

I imagine it was quite scary walking past these lions, with their mouths open as though roaring.


Creator: Mark Cartwright | Credit: Mark Cartwright / World History Encyclopedia
Copyright: Mark Cartwright – CC BY-NC-SA – 

Delos is covered with excavations, including the Terrace of Lions. But now, with rising seas, Delos is in danger of being swamped.

More about Artemis

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Further proof that Artemis is linked with the Minoan Cretan hunting Goddess Britomartis (or Diktynna which means of the nets.) By the 5th century B.C, this goddess had been completely assimilated into Artemis.

Britomartis, whose name means sweet maiden, was said to have invented hunting nets. This is thought to be one reason she was also called Diktynna. And yes, I took Martis from her name as the name of my main character in the Bronze Age Crete series.

In one of the myths, Britomartis jumps into the sea to escape King Minos and his lust. Fishermen hid her in their nets (an alternate reason for the name Diktynna.)

Am I the only one appalled by the constant stories of rape of all the women in the myths? It does make Artemis’s reaction to the men who watched her or pursued her – frequently death – a little more understandable.

Who is the Minoan Lady of the Beasts?

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Artemis is described in the Iliad as Potnia Theron or the Lady of the Beasts. (Potnia is a term of respect, meaning Lady or Mistress.) It is also a title formerly used by a Minoan Goddess – the Lady of the Beasts.

A similar goddess was worshipped throughout the Aegean. In fact, the Mistress of the Beasts – or something similar – was worshipped as far back as the Neolithic, including Crete. I don’t think it is a big stretch of the imagination to believe that Artemis either took over the role of her precursor or was the Lady of the Beasts under a different name.

What do we know about Artemis? She was a beautiful winged Goddess, usually associated with the Moon. (Although, since her twin brother was Apollo, the sun, there are solar elements as well. Both were children of Leto and Zeus.) She was passionate about her virginity and could be quite cruel to her nymphs when they lost their theirs, even if usually by rape. Young girls were frequently dedicated to her at the age of somewhere between 9 and fifteen. (Scholars disagree about the age.) Suidas and Arktos e Brauroniols wrote that the Athenians decreed that no virgin could be married unless they played the bear for the Goddess. (Interesting and odd to me in light of the beliefs about young girls who die before marriage and children – who become spirits, or willies.) Martis would have been dedicated as well but, unlike most of her peers, she plans to remain a virgin and dedicated to the Virgin Goddess.

Artemis is also a patron of childbirth, again an interesting juxtaposition with a virgin goddess. Women prayed to her for an easy and safe childbirth and shrines to her were present well into Roman times.

She was also a huntress and is frequently pictured with her golden bow and arrows and a pack of hunting dogs. This is the piece that fits in with the Lady of the Beasts. As a beautiful but unattainable woman, she was frequently the object of men’s attentions. With the Greek predilection for violent drama, her reaction toward them tended to be fatal. In one myth, a mortal saw her bathing naked. Artemis turned him into a stag and his own hunting dogs tore him apart.

Although Artemis is a hunter and a protector of women in childbirth, the apparent disconnect does make sense. Fertility of both women and animals, domestic and wild, was necessary for prosperity.

In Classical Greece, Artemis is a daughter of Zeus. But her history is far older than that.

Artemis

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As I’ve discussed in earlier posts, Artemis is one of the Gods who, it is believed, was a goddess in Bronze Age Crete and was adopted by the mainland Greeks. She remained virtually unchanged, unlike Hera who diminished from a goddess in her own right to the jealous wife of Zeus in Classical Greece.

Artemis was a virgin goddess and a goddess of the hunt, of vegetation, and of birth. Women in labor prayed to her.

In the myths of Classical Greece, Artemis was the twin sister of Apollo. (Daughter of Leto by Zeus.) And since those myths all seemed to be dark and full of cruelty, Artemis too could be cruel. She turned a young hunter, Acteon, who accidentally saw her bathing, into a stag and his own hunting dogs took him down.

In my Ancient Crete mystery series, Martis, my protagonist, is a follower of Artemis.

Coming April 24, 2024

As a devotee of Artemis, Martis plans to remain a virgin her whole life.

As part of my research, I hope to visit Ephesus where the ruins of a temple to Artemis still stand. Enormous in scale, the temple boasted a double row of columns that became a model for other Greek temples. Besides honoring Artemis, the temple also served as a place of sanctuary. Recent excavations have shown the stalls, where refuge seekers slept.

Historical note: Cleopatra’s sister Arsinoe was double-crossed and murdered on the temple steps before she could reach the safety of the temple.