Artemis (Diana)

Virgin goddess of childbirth and of wild animals. Artemis was daughter of Zeus and the Titaness Leto, offspring of the Titans Coeüs (Coeus) and Phoebe. Artemis was the twin sister of Apollo.

Artemis was the goddess of hunting and the chase. Artemis often hunted with her brother. She carried a silver bow made by the Cyclopes, but her arrow shafts were made out of gold. Maidens and woodland nymphs often accompanied her during her hunt.

These mortal huntresses tried to remain virgin like the goddess they worshipped. However, many of the gods, particularly her father (Zeus), often ravished her beautiful companions.

Strangely enough, Artemis was also the protectress of young animals. She was like a game warden; she would kill any hunter who killed pregnant animals or their young.

Artemis drove her golden chariot from Smyrna to Claros to meet her brother before hunting, while her horses were usually watered at Meles. Artemis was also the guardian of all wild animals of the forest, but the hind, bear, dog and boar were her favourites. Artemis was often called the Lady of the Beasts. Her sacred tree was the laurel, like her brother.

Artemis was also the goddess of childbirth. When Leto was pregnant with the twins from Zeus, Eileithyia refused to help Leto with labour, since Eileithyia was the daughter of Hera, Zeus' wife. Leto suffered greatly from the pain. Artemis was born first on the island of Ortygia. Leto suffered from labor pangs for nine days on the island of Delos, before Artemis helped her mother with the delivery of her twin Apollo.

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Her arrows brought swift but violent death to young women. Apollo's arrows also did the same thing to young men. When Niobe boasted that she had given birth to seven strong sons and seven beautiful daughters - more than Leto - Artemis killed all of Niobe's daughters, while Apollo killed her sons.

Artemis protected her virginity with sudden violence. Artemis could be a vengeful goddess. When Actaeon, a grandson of Cadmus, probably accidentally saw her bathing, she transformed him into a stag. Actaeon's hounds did not recognise their master, so the hounds tore him apart.

She caused the death of the giants Otus and Ephialtes when they pursued her through the woods. She tricked them into killing one another with their spears.

When Oeneus king of Calydon forgot to sacrifice to her, Artemis punished the king by sending a giant wild boar to ravage the countryside. The Calydonian Boar was hunted by many Greek heroes. See Atalanta for the story of the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Sometimes these punishments were not enough, so the goddess demanded an even greater sacrifice. She was sometimes not satisfied unless human blood was shed in offering to her.

So when Agamemnon forgot to sacrifice to her, Artemis sent a strong wind that prevented the Greek fleet from embarking at Aulis to sail to Troy, unless Agamemnon sacrificed one of his daughters (Iphigenia). In some accounts, Artemis spirited Iphigeneia away to the land of the Taurians and replaced the sacrifice with a deer. In probably the original story, Iphigeneia died in Aulis. In whatever version, Agamemnon lost his daughter to the goddess and the Greeks were able to sail to Troy. According to Euripides, Iphigeneia served as high priestess of Artemis' Tauric temple where she had to perform human sacrifice of strangers who set foot on their land. This practice continued until her brother came, helping her to escape.

As it can be seen by the references to the cult of Artemis with human sacrifices, she was a bloodthirsty goddess. Of all the gods in Olympus, only one other god demanded human sacrifice – Ares.

Artemis seemed to be the goddess of nymphs, since many of her followers joined the chase with her, particularly the woodland nymphs and the mountain nymphs. They were often their companions whenever the goddess desired to go hunting. According to Callimachus' Hymn To Artemis, young Artemis gathered 60 daughters of Oceanus and Tethys and 20 nymphs of Amnisus, a river in Crete, as her companions and handmaidens. The Oceanids were all nine years old and ungirdled.

These nymphs often tried to emulate Artemis – enjoying the hunt with their mistress and trying to remain chaste virgins.

However, many of the nymphs were unsuccessful in remaining virgin like their goddess, because the gods often amorously pursued these unwilling nymphs. Most of the nymphs couldn't avoid the lust of these powerful gods, yet Artemis was hardly sympathetic to their troubles. Callisto was once her favourite companion until the goddess' father Zeus raped poor Callisto. According to a couple of sources, the ruthless goddess either drove Callisto away or killed her former companion.

When Artemis was still young, she found a mighty herd of deer at the Parrhasian hills, near the bank of black-pebbled Anaurus. There were five of these deer, larger than bulls and horns of gold. Artemis managed to capture four of these deer which drew her golden chariot. The fifth deer escaped to the Ceryneian hill and became known as the Cerynitian Hind, sacred to the goddess. Heracles would later capture the Cerynitian Hind in his third labour for King Eurystheus in Tiryns.

According to another writer, Artemis received the hind from the Pleiad nymph Taÿgete because the goddess had aided her.

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Artemis was goddess of the moon and was sometimes confused with Selene and Hecate, who were also moon-goddesses.

Artemis was also confused with the Cretan goddess Britomartis ("Sweet Maiden"), who was one of Artemis' favourites, whenever the goddess went out hunting in Crete. Minos, king of Crete, lusted and pursued after the nymph. Britomartis leaped into the sea, where fishermen discovered and saved her in their net. Britomartis was transformed into a goddess by Artemis, and her name was changed to Dictynna which means the "Lady of the Nets". The confusion comes from the result that Artemis was sometimes named Artemis Diktynna, which she used in her many cults at Crete. Maybe Dictynna was just another name for Artemis since they almost have identical attributes.

In fact, Artemis had absorbed aspects or attributes of several Minoan goddesses. I already mentioned Britomartis/Dictynna, but there was also the Cretan goddess of childbirth, Eleuthia or Eileithyia.

Artemis was also known as the Roman goddess Diana. Artemis' name may have originated during the late Bronze Age, where the name, A-TI-MI-TE, was found in Linear B tablets in Pylos. Her epithets included Auge, Caryatis, Lucina (childbirth, Roman) and Phoebe (moon-goddess).

According to many non-Greek traditions, she was not a virgin goddess. Rather, she was the mother goddess. Some statues depicted her with more than two breasts, suggesting that she was a goddess of fertility and sexuality, like at Ephesus (see Artemis of Ephesus). She was probably of Asiatic origin, and she was sometimes identified with Cybele, a Phrgyian mother-goddess.

Artemis was sometimes depicted with a bow in hand, flanked by wild animals. Artemis was the mistress of the animal kingdom. In some other images like the one on the right, Artemis appeared to have a pair of large wings. These images of the winged goddess are quite common in archaic art.

The images showed Cretan influence from the Mistress of Wild Animals, a Bronze Age goddess of wild beasts. This Mistress of Wild Animals or Potnia theron was probably originally derived from the kingdoms of the Near East. Potnia was usually seen nude. Often she was depicted standing, flanked with wild animals, and at other times the goddess was holding an animal in each hand. The animals she sometimes holds ranged from stag, to lion, to sometimes even the mythical griffin.

Looking at Artemis as a whole, we find many of her functions and roles often conflicting and contradictory. We have the goddess seen as a virgin, yet she was the goddess of childbirth and fertility. She was the huntress, yet she was protectress of wild animals.

According to some authors, Artemis was the goddess of the Amazons. They worshipped her in a dance. It was said that it was the Amazons who erected the image of the goddess in the temple at Ephesus. Her temple at Ephesus was said to be the largest of its kind, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

She preferred the wild mountains and forests, but there were many cities of which she was patroness, and Callimachus named her the Watcher of Streets and the Watcher of Harbours. Other places sacred to the goddess included the island of Delos where she was worshipped with her brother; the city of Gortyn where she was possibly worshipped since Middle Bronze Age Crete; and Munychia, the harbour of Athens.