Python, in Greek mythology, a huge serpent that was killed by the god Apollo at Delphi either because it would not let him found his oracle, being accustomed itself to giving oracles, or because it had persecuted Apollo's mother, LetoLeto, Latin Latona, in classical mythology, a Titan, the daughter of Coeus and Phoebe, and mother of the god Apollo and the goddess Artemis. The chief places of her legend were Delos and Delphi. Leto, pregnant by Zeus, sought a place of refuge to be delivered.https://www.britannica.com › topic › Leto
PYTHON (Puthôn), the famous dragon who guarded the oracle of Delphi, is described as a son of Gaea. He lived in the caves of mount Parnassus, but was killed by Apollo, who then took possession of the oracle. (Apollod.
THE SANCTUARY OF APOLLO AT DELPHI
PARNASSUS [par-nas'sus], or PARNASSOS, where he laid out his temple. Then he slew a dragon named PYTHO [peye'thoh], or PYTHON, and thus the site was called Pytho, Apollo was given the epithet PYTHIAN [pith'ee-an], and a prophetess of Apollo received the name of PYTHIA [pith'ee-a].
Apollo angered his father Zeus and ended up being sent to Earth and is in the body of a 16 year-old boy named Lester Papadopolous. Zeus punishes Apollo for the role that he played in the battle between the gods in Gaea.
Agamemnon sends him rudely away, and Chryses prays to Apollo to punish the Greeks, which Apollo does by sending a plague upon them.
One day Apollo saw Coronis and became enamoured of her. He lay with her in her home, and consequently she became pregnant.
Apollo wasn't too pleased and killed both Python and Tityos. Some stories say it only took a single arrow each time to bring the two monsters down.
Apollo falls in love with Daphne, advancing on her so aggressively to the point where she is forced to plead to her father for help. The father, for some reason, turns her into a laurel bush. The fatal flaw, here, at least for Apollo, is that he was not able to control his love.
The dreaded curse dates all the way back to 1882, when Apollo won the Kentucky Derby by defeating 4-5 favorite Runnymede. Since then, no horse has won the race after not starting as a two-year-old.
Apollo was heart-broken at the loss of Daphne and to remember her for ever, he made the laurel the symbol of tribute to poets. The laurel became therefore the symbol of the god.
His attributes include the laurel wreath and lyre. He often appears in the company of the Muses. Animals sacred to Apollo include roe deer, swans, cicadas, hawks, ravens, crows, foxes, mice, and snakes.
A hecatomb of bulls and goats is offered to Apollo in an enacted sacrifice in Iliad I, which is uneaten (Iliad I 315), and another hecatomb for Apollo is consumed at a feast (Iliad I 468).
He was also often depicted with one or both of his two main attributes: a bow and a lyre. The bow symbolized distance, death, terror, and awe, while the lyre more gently proclaimed the joy of communion with Olympus through music, poetry, and dance.
In A.D. 393 or 394, the Byzantine emperor Theodosius outlawed the practice of ancient (pagan) religions and the pan-Hellenic games, putting an end to the power of the oracle. The temples and statues of Delphi were subsequently destroyed.
Apollo's Love Meets Daphne's Disgust: A Tragic Dead-End
The one that hit Apollo, was an arrow of love and intense passion. The moment he got hit by the arrow, Apollo spotted Daphne hunting in the wild and unable to contain his passion went after her.
Having fallen head over heels for the mortal man Hyacinthus, the god Apollo gives up his shrine at Delphi, his famous lyre, and his bow and arrow, to spend all his time with his new love. On one tragic day, while the couple is having a friendly competition of discus throwing, Apollo makes a throw that cuts the clouds.
Apollo is the god who affords help and wards off evil; various epithets call him the "averter of evil". Medicine and healing are associated with Apollo, whether through the god himself or mediated through his son Asclepius.
Thanks to a curse, all the children of Apollo have a terrible fear of snakes.
In The Heroes of Olympus Apollo is banished from Olympus by Zeus to Delos (Apollo and Artemis's birthplace) as punishment for revealing the Prophecy of Seven too early.
Strengths: Creative, handsome, supportive of all the arts of civilization. Weaknesses: Like his father Zeus, Apollo gets in trouble over love. Birthplace: On the sunny Greek island of Delos, where he was born along with his twin sister, Artemis.
Apollo bragged to Cupid that his bow was bigger than Cupid's. Angered by the insult, Cupid shot him with a golden love arrow causing Apollo to fall in love with the first person he saw. Cupid then shot Daphne with a lead-tipped arrow causing her to be impervious to love.
He had almost entirely given himself over to evil, being able to deceive his own father, the great god Zeus, who had tricked the ancient Titans, into squandering his power. Apollo had no remorse for his crimes; never being human, he never had any understanding of how the human mind worked.
Muses, the nine goddesses of arts, poetry, and song were all his lovers.
The legend about the fateful love of Orpheus, son of the god Apollo and the Muse Calliope, for Eurydice, a wood nymph, is one of the most beautiful and sad in Greek mythology, where lack of faith caused Orpheus to lose Eurydice forever.