Before being christened "Apollo Helios" as to Helios Hyperion (the sun, above), this oracular god, Pythian Apollo, could also be involved in the very process of the disease, both ends as one who's cast it, or the one to cure, take it off from the devotee's body. Before Sun, there was a heir to Lord Wind, Nergal brought fire from the dry season, and with it: plague. Apalliunas with his silver bow inflicted disease. Once in Tenedos, Smintheus descended upon the Achaeans. From him follows the identifiable Paean, Hepius-Asclepius, linked through the story of Coronis, also to the reasons why ravens, once snow-white, became eerily black, dark as the night. His bow, which has never been left ever since he was gifted with it, was a silver one. His shooting skills are admirable, and despite the best in the skill second only to his own sister, there's an arrow which still can pierce him. Eros' arrows, who was easily offended by this same god, whose skills have been cause of much polemic and strife. The episode of Marsyas can become ellusive by those which prefer a kind of instrument to another. The exchange of the turtle shield carapace lyre, from Hermes, whilst handling to him the Kerikeyion-Caduceus, render the final seal for a long-lasting friendship, unshaken even in the unintended contest for Chione, who've beared mortals in the likeliness of the deities, as Autolycus king of thieves and Philammon who excels in song. Some say the generations descending from them are fighting one another still to this day.
What really brings this wolf (lycus) god out from his mouse (smintheus) character is in the mists of time, hints remain to our imagining of the stand of wilderness; but he's character to subjects both in Delphi (Pythia) and Didyma, christening the Delos which was once a marauding Phoenician stop-by, then a haven for Minos the original thalassocrat, and later a forced stop to all who've come to discuss peace treaties, until the Delian League would seize it under the aegis of the athenians. Lacking a well of it's own, there's where occur the settlement of disputes on his name, sworn on the island of the Cynthian mount.
As did he defeat the serpents Delphine, Python, setting the custom to vow to the establishment of those who've followed his office, as a god of the colonies (apoikias) far and wide. Swearing oath to stand-by in the cosmogony of Zeus-Dyaus Pater, he did fit the role of the heir, first-born male from his 6th hieros gamos. It's no surprise he's the one who organizes the Muses, in turn daughters of Mnemosyne, Zeus' 5th wife. This organization of life comes by the song, — Hesiod attests it, — but it doesn't end here.
The Apellai follow across all Hellas, but most figuratively in Laecedaemonia, which holds true to the oath of this god. Military Intelligence, the Arts, the Song and the Power of the word (logos) comes out of turn, until the divinity of the diseases, of the ancient extispicy, divination and the weather itself inherits from it's forefathers, the role of the flaming astral body that the ancients took for turning around the center, whereas it laid the omphalos navel of the world. It surely is the center of (zoé) life, for every being which qualify for the concept of foodchain will depend on the tiniest beings which came to be alive because of the sun. Even the ichthioi in the dankest depths of the benthic tartarus depend on it.
But the Sun isn't a figure of speech, it sure is the core of the solar system on the event it's gravitation set a course ("balance" if you would), it's also a potential for disease (heatstrokes), and it sets the tone of how we see things in daylight, so it still has much of the value to our lives in every level. Was there anything this deity could find, was there anything new under the sun? The ultraviolet, the infrared, colors we can't comprehend, are the roof on the "sky's the limit" for him. Deities defend the world not because of the sheer amusement, nor for megalomaniacal purposes to control human cattle alone. Perhaps there are things best left unsaid, better left to the dark. And in the end of the day, Apollo can live among us, so the hints of what doesn't belong show: the chaotes are in, they seethe within on an attempt to choke what's left of real in this world, even if unintended, he keeps their attention close to him, and in so doing, spare some of us. This is the protector of the uncanny valley between what there is and what there shouldn't be.
Mixed Media/animated GIF: Ink lineart over paper & digital colouring/animated edit.
Drawing, Illustration, Animation and Text by me — this is my participation for the 1 of 1 event.
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