Arachne

Arachne
Minerva and Arachne, by René-Antoine Houasse, 1706.
AbodeLydia or Attica
Genealogy
Parents
SiblingsPhalanx (brother)
ChildrenCloster

Arachne (/əˈrækn/ ; from Ancient Greek: Ἀράχνη, romanizedArákhnē, lit.'spider', cognate with Latin araneus)[1] is the protagonist of a tale in Greek mythology known primarily from the version told by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BCE–17 CE). In Book Six of his epic poem Metamorphoses, Ovid recounts how the talented mortal Arachne challenged the goddess Athena to a weaving contest. When Athena could find no flaws in the tapestry Arachne had woven for the contest, the goddess became enraged and beat the girl with her shuttle. After Arachne hanged herself out of shame, she was transformed into a spider. The myth both provided an etiology of spiders' web-spinning abilities and was a cautionary tale about hubris.

  1. ^ R. S. P. Beekes, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, Brill, 2009, p. 124.

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