The god Apollo had many functions. As a deity of light he helped to ripen crops, destroy pests, and heal illnesses. Yet he could also be deadly as he shot his terrible arrows and created plagues. A god of prophecy, he had many oracular shrines, the chief one being at Delphi. He was a shepherd god as well and protected flocks. The master of the lyre and song, Apollo was especially vain about his musical prowess, and kept the Muses as part of his retinue. Beyond this he was a builder and a god of colonies. In his representations he was depicted as a nude, beardless young man of handsome proportions, and he was often shown with a bow and quiver or a lyre.
Hera had sent the serpent Python to pursue Apollo's mother, Leto, during her pregnancy. Four days after he was born Apollo called for a bow and arrows. When Hephaestus had furnished these Apollo went in search of Python. At length he managed to trap the serpent in a gorge by Parnassus and promptly slew the monster with his arrows. Apollo then had to purify himself, going into temporary exile in Thessaly.
On two occasions Apollo aroused the anger of his father, Zeus. The first time he had acted in consort with Hera, Poseidon, and other gods to dethrone Zeus, who had been unusually high-handed. Zeus was captured and bound to his couch, where the rebels threatened to kill him. However, the nymph Thetis brought Briareus, the fifty-headed monster, to guard Zeus, and this effectively quashed the rebellion. In vengeance Zeus hung Hera by her heels from Olympus, and he sent Apollo and Poseidon to a year's servitude under King Laomedon. And when Laomedon refused to pay them their rightful wages for building Troy and tending the royal oxen, Apollo visited Laomedon's kingdom with the plague and Poseidon sent a sea-monster to ravage the land.
The other time Apollo angered Zeus occurred when Zeus killed Apollo's son, Asclepius, for resurrecting a dead man. In retaliation Apollo killed Zeus's armorers, the Cyclopes. Zeus would have sent Apollo to Tartarus except that Leto pleaded for her son. Apollo was then given a year's servitude under King Admetus, for whom he performed great services.
After defeating Marsyas in a music contest Apollo had another contest with Pan, the goat-god. Apollo again gained the victory, emerging as the undisputed master musician.
Such a comely, youthful god was usually quite successful with nymphs and women. A randy bachelor, he seduced Phthia, Thalia, Coronis, Aria, Cyrene, and the nymph Dryope, having children by each. But some of his pursuits were failures. Marpessa eluded him. The nymph Daphne was changed into a laurel tree by Mother Earth before Apollo could ravish her. To console himself Apollo made a laurel wreath from her. When the Trojan princess Cassandra rejected him after he gave her the gift of divination, he turned the gift into a curse by making it so that no one would believe her prophecies.
Apollo also fell in love with a handsome boy, Hyacinthus. Zephyrus, the West Wind, fell in love with the boy, too, and became very jealous of Apollo. One day as Apollo was instructing the boy in discus-throwing Zephyrus seized the missile in mid-air and hurled it against Hyacinthus' head. The boy was killed, but where his blood fell there sprang up the hyacinth flower bearing the boy's initials.
