Apollo
Apollo,Greek god, son of Zeus and Leto, brother of Artemis, for many ‘the most Greek of Greek gods’ (W. F. Otto). Among his numerous and diverse functions, healing and purification, prophecy, care for young citizens, for poetry, and music are prominent (see Plato Cratylus 404d–405e). In iconography, he is always young, beardless, and of harmonious beauty, the ideal ephebe (see gymnasium) and young athlete; his weapon is the bow, and his plant the laurel.
His name is absent from Linear B (while Paean, his later epiclesis and hymn, appears as Paiawon in the pantheon of Mycenaean Cnossus). In Homer and Hesiod, his myth and cult are fully developed, and his main centres, Delos and Delphi, are well known (Delian altar of Apollo, Odyssey 6. 162; Delphic shrine, Iliad 9. 405 and...
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