She was also well known for her many affairs with men and her love that possibly . 200 (cited in the scholia on Aristophanes Frogs 1033); Orphica frag. Although Endymion slept for eternity, many sources said Selene continued to see him. Both Theocritus in his second Idyll and Pindar write about how young women would pray to or invoke spells in the name of the moon goddess for help with their love lives. [134], Selene was sometimes associated with childbirth, for it was believed that during the full moon women had the easiest labours; this helped in her identification with the goddess Artemis,[138] as well as other goddesses connected to women's labours. She was worshipped at the new and full moons. [32], The usual account of Selene's origin is given by Hesiod in his Theogony, where the sun-god Hyperion espoused his sister Theia, who gave birth to "great Helios and clear Selene and Eos who shines upon all that are on earth and upon the deathless Gods who live in the wide heaven". By all accounts, Selene seemed to have played a major role in this war. Greek mythology has beautiful explanations for many natural phenomena. The chemical element Selenium was named after Selene by Jns Jacob Berzelius, because of the element's similarity to the element tellurium, named for the Earth (Tellus).[156][157]. Selene was not the only lunar goddess of the Greeks. The moon goddess Selene had two siblings the sun and the dawn, also known as Helios and Eos respectively. Their daughter Eos was the first to appear each day. In memory of the beautiful Endymion, the fly still grudges all sleepers their rest and annoys them. Watched over by nymphs and visited often by the goddess, it was marked by glowing moonstones and pure white rock. Selene and Endymion relief, Alessandro and Lancellotto Pusterla's gravestone, 16th century. fr. Selene herself, upon discovering this, took her own life. In the Homeric Hymn to Selene, she bears the beautiful Pandeic to Zeus, while Alcman says they are the parents of Herse, the dew. The goddess took offense, and sent a gadfly to sting Ampelus' bull. Mason-Dixon Line H. G. Evelyn-White. [33] The Homeric Hymn to Helios follows this tradition: "Hyperion wedded glorious Euryphassa, his own sister, who bare him lovely children, rosy-armed Eos and rich-tressed Selene and tireless Helios",[34] with Euryphassa ("widely shining") probably being an epithet of Theia. All Rights Reserved. [16][18], Although attempts have been made to connect Selene to Helene due to the similarity of their names, in two early dedications to Helen from Laconia her name is spelled with a digamma (Ancient Greek: , romanized:Welna), ruling out any possible connection between them. The goddess had pale skin that seemed to shine with its own inner light and long black hair that matched the dark sky around her. [108], In antiquity, artistic representations of Selene/Luna included sculptural reliefs, vase paintings, coins, and gems. Selene had a relationship with the god Pan, according to Virgil. 573 Bernab. [95], Anaxagoras also reports that the Nemean lion was said to have fallen from the moon. The air, unlit before, glows with the light of her golden crown, and her rays beam clear, whensoever bright Selene having bathed her lovely body in the waters of Ocean, and donned her far-gleaming raiment, and yoked her strong-necked, shining team, drives on her long-maned horses at full speed, at eventime in the mid-month: then her great orbit is full and then her beams shine brightest as she increases. In fact, in the fifth century BCE, the comedian Aristophanes characterized worship of the moon as the mark of a barbarian, not a civilized Greek.[33]. The Greeks recognized several goddesses as having a connection to the moon, but none was as closely associated with it as Selene. Selene, the goddess of the moon, has two siblings: Eos, the goddess of the dawn, and Helios, the sun god. Greek Mythology >> Galleries GALLERIES. Selene, goddess of the moon, truly represented the moon itself to the Greeks. The moon goddess was said to have had several lovers, including Zeus and the wild god Pan. In the more familiar tradition, however, the Horae were the daughters of Zeus and Themis, and there were only three of them (even their names are completely different: Eirene, Eunomia, and Dike). Selene and Endymion by Sebastiano Ricci (1713). [127] Selene (along with Helios, Nyx and others) received an altar at the sanctuary of Demeter at Pergamon, possibly in connection with the Orphic mysteries. A third version of the story had Endymion himself choose an ageless sleep as opposed to living a mortal life. Selene was said to drive her moon chariot across the sky every night, from east to west, following her brother. Although Zeus had taken many mortal lovers, the goddess of the moon had been abandoning her duties and could cause chaos if she continued. 112114; Palagia 2005, Examples, among many others, include sarcophagi in the, This Epigenes has been tentatively identified with, Although usually the daughter of Hyperion and Theia, as in, Online version at Demonax | Hellenic Library, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, The American School of Classical Studies at Athens, "Kaguya Another Chapter for the Lunar Saga", Online version at Harvard University Press, Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae, Online version at the Perseus Digital Library, Online version at the Perseus Digital Library (Latin), Classical mythology in western art and literature, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Selene&oldid=1142206020, Articles containing Ancient Greek (to 1453)-language text, Articles having different image on Wikidata and Wikipedia, Pages using sidebar with the child parameter, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Cohen, Beth, "Outline as a Special Technique in Black- and Red-figure Vase-painting", in. For the people of old, natural phenomena was an important part of their worship. Her father was the Titan god of heavenly light, while her mother represented the blue color of the sky. The other gods, angered, sent him two lions to tear him apart. Her lunar sphere or crescent was either a crown set upon her head or the fold of a raised, shining cloak. There were other goddesses worshiped by the Greeks who were widely associated with the moon themselves. The most enduring story of Selene concerns the love she felt for an ordinary human man. Hill, D. E. "THE THESSALIAN TRICK." [34] She also had a sacred statue (which stood alongside one of her brother Helios) in the public market of Elis.[35]. Modern audiences do not often think about Selenes cyclical nature, however. Upon the head of Selene was normally found a crown that was representative of the spherical moon. In the most familiar account, Selene first saw the beautiful Endymion as he lay sleeping in a cave on Mount Latmus. [144] And, according to a scholium on Theocritus, Pindar wrote that lovesick women would pray to Selene for help, as Euripides apparently had Phaedra, Selene's great-niece, do in his lost play Hippolytus Veiled. [72] A scholiast on Apollonius says that, according to Epimenides, Endymion fell in love with Hera, and Zeus punished him with eternal sleep. [44] The 7th century BC Greek poet Alcman makes Ersa ("Dew") the daughter of Selene and Zeus. Though Selene had many consorts, the most famous of them was Endymion, a handsome young mortal. She was often said to be the mother of the Horai, the personifications of the division of time and the seasons. On the other hand, her eyes and hair were believed to have been as dark as the night. The name Selene is also quite popular in the English-speaking world. Often when one god supplanted another in a particular domain, the stories that involved that god were changed to reflect this. Most of the important Greek gods and goddesses had temple sites of their own. Selene (probably) and Helios adorned the east pediment of the Parthenon, where the two, each driving a four-horsed chariot, framed a scene depicting the birth of Athena, with Helios and his chariot rising from the ocean on the left, and Selene and her chariot descending into the sea on the right. Selene goddess of the moon, Athenian red-figure kylix C5th B.C., Antikensammlung Berlin. She was depicted as a woman riding sidesaddle on a horse or driving a chariot drawn by a pair of winged steeds. [128], Originally, Pandia may have been an epithet of Selene,[129] but by at least the time of the late Hymn to Selene, Pandia had become a daughter of Zeus and Selene. Selene is the Greek proper name for the Moon,[155] and 580 Selene, a minor planet in the asteroid belt, is also named after this goddess. 1. Selene was the Greek goddess of the moon. Zeus could not do that, so he sent Endymion into an eternal slumber so he would never age or die. [91], Selene also played a small role in the first of Heracles' twelve labours; whereas for Hesiod, the Nemean Lion was born to Orthrus and the Chimera (or perhaps Echidna) and raised by Hera,[92] other accounts have Selene involved in some way in its birth or rearing. The name of the moon goddess is surrounded by accounts of the consorts she had and their children. Those that do exist are somewhat generic (like the previously mentioned epithets). Thus, both the sun and the moon were seen as gods embodied in those forms. [141], Selene played an important role in love magic. The ancient Greeks believed that a lunar eclipse was the work of a witch, particularly the witches of Thessaly. While Selene was known for pulling the moon across the sky in her silver . Most famous classical poets describe her beauty as so intriguing that gods and mortals alike could not resist her godly charms. Selene also has several other names. Whether this Pallas (called the son of Megamedes) is the same as the Titan Pallas or a different individual entirely is unclear. If you have read Greek mythology and the famous epics of ancient Greece, you may be quite familiar with her brother Helios. She was the goddess of the dawn and brought new light to the world every morning. As the most important and visible features in the sky, the people of ancient Greece thought that Selene, goddess of the moon, and her brother Helios, god of the sun, were the ones responsible for the movement of the two celestial bodies across the sky. Pandia (or Pandia Selene) may have personified the full moon,[130] and an Athenian festival, called the Pandia, usually considered to be a festival for Zeus,[131] was perhaps celebrated on the full moon and may have been associated with Selene. Endymion was, depending on the source, a prince in exile or a simple shepherd. 2. Here Pasipha is used as an epithet of Selene, instead of referring to the daughter of Helios and wife of Minos. However, hers might not be a name that is quite as well-known. Selene. Pandia Usually said to be the daughter of Selene and Zeus, Pandia was also sometimes given as another name for Selene herself. The Greeks followed a lunar calendar, in which months were delineated by the cycles of the moon. Kapach, A. The name Selene is probably derived from the Greek selas, meaning "light".She was also called Mene, which means "month" referring to the lunar month which was calculated from the new moon to the dark moon and Phoebe, meaning "bright". Instead, Zeus collected all the herbs for himself. 245 M-W; Pherecydes, FHG 1 frag. Selenes Roman counterpart was called Luna (from the Latin word meaning moon). Artemis has been commonly associated with Selene. The scientist Jons Jacob Berzelius named it such since the element was very similar in nature to tellurium, which was named after the Earth, whose Greek name is Tellus. My work has also been published on Buzzfeed and most recently in Time magazine. Their names differed from the other triads of Horae and they were considered to be the personifications of the four seasons itself. Selene, the moon goddess, was reputed to have had many children by various fathers. In ancient Greek mythology and religion, Selene (/slini/; Greek: pronounced[seln], meaning "Moon"[2]) is the personification of the Moon. In ancient Greek mythology, Selene, is the Titan goddess of the moon and is said to drive her glowing chariot powered by beautiful white horses across the sky each night. Selenes siblings and Selene herself carried on their fathers legacy by shining light from the heavens upon the earth. From her immortal head a radiance is shown from heaven and embraces earth; and great is the beauty that ariseth from her shining light. Deciphering the Role of Helios, the Sun God of Greek Mythology. Selene was one of the daughters of the Titan gods Hyperion and Theia and the sister of the sun god Helios and the goddess of the dawn Eos. Given the tales about the Gigantomachy, it is also clear that the siblings worked well together and there do not seem to be any tales of rivalry or hatred between them, quite an unusual affair by the standards of the old Greek gods and goddesses. Worshiped as one of the important celestial lights of the heavens, Selene was also reputedly revered as a deity of agriculture and fertility. Selene and Endymion, fresco on ceiling by Giuseppe Antonio Orelli, circa 1730-1770, Palazzo Riva. Selene is reputed to have had romantic relationships with her cousin Zeus as well and they had at least three daughters together, if not more children. Witchcraft has long been believed to have had a connection with the moon and it was no different in antiquity. Not only was she the goddess of the moon, but she was considered a personification of the moon itself and that was how she was portrayed by many of the old poets and writers. 260 M-W; Epimenides, FHG 4 frag. Though Hesiod made the Nemean Lion the child of Echidna, other authors wrote that Selene gave birth to it or brought it up at Heras request. Selene was one of the twelve Olympian gods and goddesses, and her story is one of the most captivating in Greek mythology. Oil lamp fragment with the head of Selene, early classical period, Muse de Die. If youve ever wondered what role the moon played in ancient life, here is your chance to learn about how the Greeks viewed Selene, the personification of the moon. In her later identification with Artemis, Selene came to be called Phoebe or Cynthia. 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