A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

ARTEMIS.
A'RTEMIS ("AprEqIs), one of the great divinities of the Greeks. Her name is usually derived
from dpreJsAn, uninjured, healthy, vigorous; according to which she would be the goddess who is herself inviolate and vigorous, and also grants strength
and health to others. (Plat. Cratyl. p. 406, b.;
Strab. xiv. p. 635; Eustath. ad Iomn. pp. 32, 577,
1732.) According to the Homeric account and
Hesiod (Tlheog. 918) she was the daughter of Zeus
and Leto, whence Aeschylus (Sept. 148) calls her
ArcvwyEvseia. She was the sister,of Apollo, and
born with him at the same time in the island of
Delos. According to a tradition which Pausanias
(viii. 37. ~ 3) found in Aeschylus, Artemis was a
daughter of Demeter, and not of Leto, while according to an Egyptian story (Herod. ii. 156) she
was the daughter of Dionysus and Isis, and Leto
was only her nurse. But these and some other
legends are only the results of the identification of
the Greek Artemis with other local or foreign
divinities. The place of her birth is for the same
reason not the same in all traditions: some say
that it was the grove of Ortygia near Ephesus
(Tacit. Annal. iii. 61; Schol. ad Pind. Nenm. i. 1),
others that it was Crete (Diod. v. 72), and others
again, that she was the sister of Apollo, but born
somewhat earlier, so that she was able to assist
Leto in giving birth to Apollo. (Orph Hymn. 34.
5; Spanheim, ad Callim. p. 476, &c.) In the description of the nature and character of this goddess, it is necessary to distinguish between the
different points of view from which the Greeks
regarded her, and also between the really Greek
Artemis and certain foreign divinities, who for
some resemblance or another were identified by
the Greeks with their own Artemis,
1. Artemis as the sister of Apollo, is a kind of
female Apollo, that is, she as a female divinity represented the same idea that Apollo did as a male
divinity. This relation between the two is in
many other cases described as the relation of husband and wife, and there seems to have been a
tradition which actually described Artemis as the
wife of Apollo. (Eustath. ad Horn. p. 1197.)
In the character of sister of Apollo, Artemis is
like her brother armed with a bow, quiver, and
arrows, and sends plague and death among men
and animals: she is a Sea airo'AAovona. Sudden
deaths, but more especially those of women, are
described as the effect of her arrows. (Hom. II.
vi. 205, 427, &c., xix. 59, xxi. 483, &c.; Od. xi.
172, &c., 324, xv. 478, xviii. 202, xx. 61, &c., v.
124, &c.) She also acts sometimes in conjunction
with her brother. (Od. xv. 410; II. xxiv. 606.)
As Apollo was not only a destructive god, but also
averted the evils which it was in his power to inflict, so Artemis was at the same time a aSed crd"Teipa; that is, she cured and alleviated the sufferings of mortals. Thus, for instance, she healed
Aeneas, when he was wounded and carried into
the temple of Apollo. (II. v. 447.) In the
Trojan war she sided, like Apollo, with the
Trojans. The man whom she looked graciously
upon was prosperous in his fields and flocks, his
household was thriving, and he died in old age.
(Callim. Hymn. in Dian. 129, &c.) She was
more especially the protectress of the young,
whence the epithets raeSorpo'(os, Kovpoe'rpopos, and
LtAhopepaý (comp. Diod. v. 73); and Aeschylus
(Agam. 142) calls her the protectress of young
sucking-animals, and of the game ranging through

ARTEMIS. 375
the forests of the mountains. Artemis thus also
came to be regarded as the goddess of the flocks
and the chase: she is the huntress among the immortals; she is called the stag-killer (EAaq5nq@Aos),
the lover of the tumult connected with the chase
(KcsAetLV4), and adypdvepa. (II. xxi. 511, 485,
&c.; Hornm. Hymn. in Dian. 10.) Artemis is
moreover, like Apollo, unmarried; she is a maidendivinity never conquered by love. (Soph. Elect.
1220.) The priests and priestesses devoted to her
service were bound to live pure and chaste. and
trangressions of their vows of chastity were severely
punished. (Paus. vii. 19. ~ 1. viii. 13. ~ 1.) She
was worshipped in several places together with her
brother; and the worship of both divinities was
believed to have come from the Hyperboreans, and
Hyperborean maidens brought sacrifices to Delos.
(Herod. ii. 32, 35.) The laurel was sacred to
both divinities, and both were regarded as the
founders and protectors of towns and streets.
(Paus. i. 38. ~ 6, iii. 24. ~ 6, viii. 36, in fin.;
Aeschyl. Sept. 450; Callim. Hymn. in Dian. 34.)
There are, however, some points also, in which
there is no resemblance between Artemis and
Apollo: she has nothing to do with music or
poetry, nor is there any trace of her having been
regarded as an oracular divinity like Apollo. Respecting the real and original character of Artemis
as the sister of Apollo, we encounter the same
difficulties as those mentioned in the article
APOLLO, viz. as to whether she was a purely spiritual and ethical divinity, as MUller thinks, or
whether she was the representative of some power
in physical nature; and the question must be
decided here in the same manner as in the case of
Apollo. When Apollo was regarded as identical
with the sun or Helios, nothing was more natural
than that his sister should be regarded as Selene
or the moon, and accordingly the Greek Artemis
is, at least in later times, the goddess of the moon.
Buttmann and Hermann consider this idea of Artemis being the moon as the fundamental one from
which all the others are derived. But, at any
rate, the idea of Artemis being the goddess of the
moon, must be confined to Artemis the sister of
Apollo, and is not applicable to the Arcadian, Taurian, or Ephesian Artemis.
2. The Arcadian Artemis is a goddess of the
nymphs, and was worshipped as such in Arcadia
in very early times. Her sanctuaries and temples
were more numerous in this country than in any
other part of Greece. There was no connexion
between the Arcadian Artemis and Apollo, nor
are there any traces here of the ethical character
which is so prominent in Artemis, the sister of
Apollo. These circumstances, together with the
fact, that her surnames and epithets in Arcadia are
nearly all derived from the mountains, rivers, and
lakes, shew that here she was the representative of
some part or power of nature. In Arcadia she
hunted with her nymphs on Taygetus, Erymanthus, and Maenalus; twenty nymphs accompanied
her during the chase, and with sixty others, daughters of Oceanus, she held her dances in the forests
of the mountains. Her bow, quiver, and arrows,
were made by Hephaestus, and Pan provided her
with dogs. Her chariot was drawn by four stags
with golden antlers. (Callim. Hymn. in Dian.
13, 81, 90, &c.; Apollod. ii. 5. ~ 3; Pind. O1.
iii, 51.) Her temples and sanctuaries in Arcadia
were usually near lakes or rivers, whence she was