雅思阅读材料：古希腊主神介绍（二）

　　阿波罗Apollo

　　阿波罗(希腊文 Απολλων;拉丁文 Apollo )古希腊神话中最著名的神祇之一，希腊神话中十二主神之一，是主神宙斯与暗夜女神勒托所生之子，阿尔忒弥斯的孪生哥哥，全名为福玻斯•阿波罗(Phoebus Apollo)，意思是“光明”或“光辉灿烂”。

　　Apollo (Attic, Ionic, and Homeric Greek: ?π?λλων, Apollōn (gen.: ?π?λλωνο?); Doric: ?π?λλων,Apellōn; Arcadocypriot: ?πε?λων, Apeilōn; Aeolic: ?πλουν, Aploun; Latin: Apollō) is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in ancient Greek and Roman religion, Greek and Roman mythology, and Greco–Roman Neopaganism. The ideal of the kouros (a beardless, athletic youth), Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the sun, truth and prophecy, healing, plague, music, poetry, and more. Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto, and has a twin sister, the chaste huntress Artemis. Apollo is known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu.

　　As the patron of Delphi (Pythian Apollo), Apollo was an oracular god—the prophetic deity of the Delphic Oracle. Medicine and healing are associated with Apollo, whether through the god himself or mediated through his son Asclepius, yet Apollo was also seen as a god who could bring ill-health and deadly plague. Amongst the god's custodial charges, Apollo became associated with dominion over colonists, and as the patron defender of herds and flocks. As the leader of the Muses (Apollon Musegetes) and director of their choir, Apollo functioned as the patron god of music and poetry. Hermes created the lyre for him, and the instrument became a common attribute of Apollo. Hymns sung to Apollo were called paeans.

　　In Hellenistic times, especially during the 3rd century BCE, as Apollo Helios he became identified among Greeks with Helios, Titan god of the sun, and his sister Artemis similarly equated with Selene, Titan goddess of the moon. In Latin texts, on the other hand, Joseph Fontenrose declared himself unable to find any conflation of Apollo with Sol among the Augustan poets of the 1st century, not even in the conjurations ofAeneas and Latinus in Aeneid XII (161–215). Apollo and Helios/Sol remained separate beings in literary and mythological texts until the 3rd century CE.

　　雅典娜Athena

　　雅典娜是希腊奥林匹斯十二主神之一，也是奥林匹斯三处女神之一，罗马名字弥涅耳瓦(Minerva)、密涅瓦(Minerva)。在远古的神话中，雅典娜是一位女天神，乌云和雷电的主宰者，丰产女神，和平劳动的庇护者，女战神。她教会人们驯养牛马、制造车船;她赐予世人犁和耙、纺锤和织布机，因此被认为是妇女劳动，尤其是织布技术的保护者。她有一个别名叫厄耳伽涅，意思是女工。她又是科学的庇护者、智慧女神;她赐予人间法律，维护社会秩序。

　　In Greek religion and mythology, Athena or Athene ( /??θi?n?/ or /??θi?ni?/; Attic: ?θην?, Athēnā or?θηνα?α, Athēnaia; Epic: ?θηνα?η, Athēnaiē; Ionic: ?θ?νη, Athēnē; Doric: ?θ?να, Athānā), also referred to as Pallas Athena/Athene ( /?p?l?s/; Παλλ?? ?θην?; Παλλ?? ?θ?νη), is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and justice, just warfare, mathematics, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, and skill. Minerva, Athena's Roman incarnation, embodies similar attributes.

　　Athena is also a shrewd companion of heroes and is the goddess of heroic endeavour. She is the virginpatroness of Athens. The Athenians founded the Parthenon on the Acropolis of her namesake city, Athens (Athena Parthenos), in her honour.

　　Athena's veneration as the patron of Athens seems to have existed from the earliest times, and was so persistent that archaic myths about her were recast to adapt to cultural changes. In her role as a protector of the city (polis), many people throughout the Greek world worshiped Athena as Athena Polias (?θην? Πολι?? "Athena of the city"). The city of Athens and the goddess Athena essentially bear the same name,"Athenai" meaning "[many] Athenas".

　　Birth

　　The Olympian version

　　Although Athena appears before Zeus at Knossos —in Linear B, as a-ta-na po-ti-ni-ja, "Mistress Athena"—in the Classical Olympian pantheon, Athena was remade as the favorite daughter of Zeus, born fully armed from his forehead. The story of her birth comes in several versions. In the one most commonly cited, Zeus lay with Metis, the goddess of crafty thought and wisdom, but he immediately feared the consequences. It had been prophesied that Metis would bear children more powerful than the sire, even Zeus himself. In order to forestall these dire consequences, after lying with Metis, Zeus "put her away inside his own belly;" he "swallowed her down all of a sudden." He was too late: Metis had already conceived.

　　Eventually Zeus experienced an enormous headache; Prometheus, Hephaestus, Hermes, Ares, or Palaemon[disambiguation needed](depending on the sources examined) cleaved Zeus's head with the double-headed Minoan axe, the labrys. Athena leaped from Zeus's head, fully grown and armed, with a shout— "and pealed to the broad sky her clarion cry of war. And Ouranos trembled to hear, and Mother Gaia..." (Pindar, Seventh Olympian Ode). Plato, in the Laws, attributes the cult of Athena to the culture of Crete, introduced, he thought, from Libya during the dawn of Greek culture.

　　Classical myths thereafter note that Hera was so annoyed at Zeus for having produced a child that she conceived and boreHephaestus by herself.

　　Plato, in Cratylus (407B) gave the etymology of her name as signifying "the mind of god", theou noesis. The Christian apologist of the 2nd century Justin Martyr takes issue with those pagans who erect at springs images of Kore, whom he interprets as Athena:

　　"They said that Athena was the daughter of Zeus not from intercourse, but when the god had in mind the making of a world through a word (logos) his first thought was Athena"