GLOSSARY OF MYTHOLOGICAL WORDS AND PHRASES IN ENGLISH^765apollonian Apollo had as his pur-view the arts,
prophecy, and healing. At his chief shrine at Delphi
the watchword was "Know thyself," the beginning
and principal aim of human understanding. He is the
god of rationality, harmony, and balance, known by
the epithet Phoebus, "bright" or "shining," by which
he is equated with the Sun and more broadly the or-
der of the cosmos. The adjective apollonian describes
that which partakes of the rational and is marked by
a sense of order and harmony. Its opposite is
dionysian, which describes unbridled nature, the
frenzied and the irrational. These polarities, the apol-
lonian and the dionysian, were recognized by the
Greeks as twin aspects of the human psyche. See bac-
chanal.
apple of discord All the gods and goddesses
were invited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis,
save one, Eris or "Strife." To avenge this slight, this
goddess of discord tossed into the wedding hall a
golden apple with the inscription "For the Fairest."
It was immediately claimed by three rival goddesses:
Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite. Zeus refused to decide
the issue, but instead gave it to Paris, the son of
Priam, king of Troy, to settle. The Judgment of Paris,
as it has come to be known, bestowed the apple on
Aphrodite, who had promised to Paris the most
beautiful woman in the world, namely Helen, wife
of Menelaus, king of Sparta. The abduction of Helen
by Paris was the cause of the ten-year siege and de-
struction of Troy under the onslaught of the Greek
forces, pledged to wreak vengeance on the seducer.
The apple of discord describes any action or situa-
tion that causes dissension and turmoil and is more
trouble than it is worth.
arachnid Arachne was a common girl with a re-
markable skill in weaving. She won such fame that
Athena, slighted and envious, challenged Arachne to
a contest. Athena wove themes, including the fate of
foolish mortals who dared to vie with the gods.
Arachne depicted the gods' compromising love af-
fairs. Outraged, Athena struck the girl with her shut-
tle and, after Arachne hanged herself, in remorse
transformed Arachne into a spider, so that she and
her species might practice her art of weaving forever.
An arachnid refers to any of the various arthropods
of the class Arachnida, including the spider.
Arcadia/arcadian Arcadia is the central moun-
tainous region of the Péloponnèse. Often it is de-
scribed in idyllic terms: the ideal land of rustic sim-
plicity, especially dear to Hermes, the home of
Callisto (the favorite of Artemis), the usual play-
ground of Pan; for the bucolic poets, Arcadia is a
place where life is easy, where shepherds leisurely
tend their flocks and pursue romantic dalliances.
Thus Arcadia becomes that imagined primeval ter-
rain, where human beings lived in contentment and
harmony with the natural world. Arcadian refers to
any place or time signifying the simple, rustic, pas-
toral life of a golden age lost.
Argus/argus-eyed One of Zeus' sexual esca-
pades involved the maiden Io. In an attempt to keep
Hera from discovering the truth of his dalliance, Zeus
transformed Io into a cow. Hera, not easily thrown
off the scent of her husband's affairs, prevailed upon
Zeus to give her the cow as a present and an assur-
ance of his good faith, after which Hera enlisted the
aid of Argus, a giant with one hundred eyes, to keep
a close watch over the poor girl. In English one who
is ever-vigilant or watchful can be called an Argus
or be described as argus-eyed.
Atlas/Atlantic/atlantes/Atlantis Atlas was a titan
who opposed Zeus in the battle between the Olym-
pians and the earlier generation of Titans. The defeated
Titans were condemned to Tartarus, but Atlas was
punished with the task of supporting upon his shoul-
ders the vault of the heavens, thereby keeping the earth
and sky separate. Through a mistaken notion that this
vault, sometimes depicted as a sphere, was actually the
earth, Atlas has given his name to that particular kind
of book which contains a collection of geographical
maps. It was not until the Flemish cartographer Ger-
hardus Mercator (1512-1594) depicted on the fron-
tispiece of his atlas the titan carrying the earth that the
association became fixed. The plural of atlas has given
us the architectural term atlantes, which refer to sup-
port columns formed in the shape of men, correspon-
ding to the maiden columns known as caryatids. At-
las endured his torment at the western edge of the
world and so has given his name to the ocean beyond
the straits of Gibraltar, the Atlantic, as well as to the
Atlas mountains in northwest Africa. The mythical is-
land of Atlantis was located, according to Plato, in the
western ocean.
Augean Stables/Augean One of Heracles' Labors,
performed in service to King Eurystheus, was to
clean the stables of King Augeas of Elis. King Augeas
had not cleaned his stalls for some years and the filth
and stench had become unbearable. Heracles agreed
to the task and succeeded in diverting the course of
two rivers to achieve his aim. The term Augean Sta-
bles has since become a byword for squalor. Augean
describes anything that is extremely filthy or squalid.
aurora australis/borealis Aurora was the Roman
goddess of the dawn (the Greek Eos). The sons of
Aurora and the titan Astraeus were the four winds:
Boreas, who blows from the north; Notus, the south-
west; Eurus, the east; and Zephyrus, the west. The