God of Music
Apollo presides over music and the arts, wielding a golden lyre that can charm gods and mortals alike.
The Meaning of God of Music
Apollo received his first lyre from Hermes, who had crafted it from a tortoise shell on the day he was born. Apollo mastered it so completely that the Muses themselves fell silent when he played. When the satyr Marsyas challenged him to a musical contest — Marsyas on the aulos, Apollo on the lyre — the Muses judged Apollo the winner, and he flayed Marsyas alive as punishment for his hubris. Apollo also vanquished Pan in a similar competition, though King Midas foolishly declared Pan the winner and was cursed with donkey ears. At Delphi, Apollo slew the serpent Python and established his oracle, where the Pythia channeled his prophecies for over a thousand years.
Parents
Zeus and Leto
Symbols
Fun Fact
Apollo's lyre had only seven strings, yet ancient writers claimed its sound could move stones and calm storms at sea.
Words We Inherited
English words and phrases that trace back to this myth. See our full guide to English words from Greek mythology.
Explore Further
Lyre of Orpheus
💭 conceptArtefact
The enchanted stringed instrument whose music could charm all living things, trees, and stones
Birth of Hermes
💭 conceptNarrative
The precocious god who invented the lyre and stole Apollo's cattle on the very day he was born
Apollo
⚡ godGod of the sun, music, poetry, prophecy, healing, archery
God of light, music, poetry, and prophecy. Apollo embodied the Greek ideal of youthful masculine beauty and was patron of the Oracle at Delphi.
Marsyas
🐉 creatureSatyr who challenged Apollo
Marsyas was a satyr who found Athena's discarded double-flute, mastered it, and challenged Apollo to a music contest — losing and paying with his life.
Katabasis of Orpheus
💭 conceptunderworld, music
Orpheus's descent to the Underworld to retrieve Eurydice, whose loss at the threshold of return established the archetype of art's power and its limits.
God of Wine
💭 conceptWine, festivity, ecstasy, theatre, rebirth
Dionysus rules over wine, ritual madness, and the transformative power of theatre and celebration.
God of Prophecy
💭 conceptProphecy, oracles, divination, truth
Apollo speaks through oracles, revealing the will of the gods and the shape of things to come.
Bow of Apollo
💭 conceptArtefact
The silver bow of the god Apollo, bringer of both plague and healing through its far-reaching arrows
Orpheus and Eurydice
💭 conceptNarrative
The musician's descent to the underworld to reclaim his dead wife, undone by a single backward glance
God of Messengers
💭 conceptMessages, travel, boundaries, commerce, thieves
Hermes serves as divine messenger and psychopomp, escorting both words and souls between worlds.
Ophiuchus
💭 conceptastronomy, healing
The serpent-bearer constellation identified with Asclepius, who learned to resurrect the dead and was placed in the sky by Zeus after being struck down for overstepping mortal limits.
Bow of Odysseus
💭 conceptArtefact
The great composite bow that only Odysseus could string, the instrument of his revenge upon the suitors