Apeliotes
God of the east wind who brought warm rain beneficial to crops and was considered a gentle and favourable deity
The Myth of Apeliotes
Apeliotes was the divine personification of the east or southeast wind in Greek religion. Unlike some of the more violent wind gods, Apeliotes was generally considered beneficial, bringing warm, moist air that was good for growing crops. His name derives from the Greek word for the sun (helios) and the direction of its rising (apelion), marking him as the wind that came from where the sun emerged. On the Tower of the Winds in Athens, an octagonal marble horologion built by Andronicus of Cyrrhus around 50 BC, Apeliotes is depicted as a young man carrying a cloak or mantle full of fruits and grain, symbolising the agricultural abundance his warm rains produced. He was one of the eight principal wind deities (Anemoi) recognised in the Athenian system, each assigned a specific cardinal or intercardinal direction and associated with particular weather patterns.
Parents
Eos and Astraeus
Symbols
Fun Fact
Apeliotes is carved on the Tower of the Winds in Athens carrying a cloak full of grain, a monument still standing after two thousand years
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⚡ godWind, south-southeast
God of the south-southeast wind that brought warm humid air from the eastern Mediterranean and Egypt
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God of the east wind, the only one of the four Anemoi not given a specific seasonal role by Hesiod.
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⚡ godWind, west-northwest
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⚡ godWind, north
Alternative name for the god of the true north wind, sometimes distinguished from Boreas as a calmer northern breeze
Venti
🐉 creaturepersonifications
The four wind gods — Boreas, Notus, Eurus, and Zephyrus — each ruling a cardinal direction
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⚡ godWind, south-southwest
God of the south-southwest wind blowing from the direction of Libya, bringing warm air and occasional sandstorms
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⚡ godGod of the west wind
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Skiron
⚡ godWind, northwest
God of the northwest wind associated with the onset of winter and the cold dry air from the Adriatic
Zephyr
💭 conceptLanguage and meteorology
An English word meaning a gentle, mild breeze, derived from Zephyrus, the Greek god of the west wind who represented the mildest and most pleasant of the four directional winds
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⚡ godwind
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