Apollo as a Queer Deity
The Death of Hyacinthos (1801) by Jean Broc
Apollo has had many male lovers in Greek mythology. Most famously, he loved the young mortal Hyacinthus, the namesake for the hyacinth. But the list doesn’t stop there.
Admentus of Pherae was the mortal king Lord Apollo was sentenced to serve for a year as punishment for slaying the Python at Delphi. Writers such as Plutarch, Callimachus, Tibullus, and Ovid described Apollo’s affection for Adementus with homoerotic overtones. Callimachus wrote that Apollo was “fired with love” for Admentus. In addition to his servitude, Apollo helped Admentus prolong his life by getting the Fates drunk and persuading them to let Admentus live, so long as he could find someone else to die in his place. When his parents would not die for him, Alecstis, Admentus’s wife, died for him instead. After realizing he didn’t want to live without his wife, Heracles - who was impressed with Admentus’s kind treatment of guests - descended into the Underworld and fought Thanatos, ultimately winning and returning Alecstis to the Land of the Living.
Adonis was loved by many deities, Apollo included. Adonis was said to “act as a man with Aphrodite and act as a woman with Apollo.”
Branchus was a seer of Apollo and in some traditions, is his lover. Sometimes Branchus was born with his seer abilities and other times his abilities are a gift from the god he received later in life. In his adulthood, Branchus worked in animal husbandry. Apollo, enamored with Branchus’s beauty, disguised himself as a goatherd. Apollo revealed his divinity by milking a male goat. After revealing his divinity, Branchus and Apollo became lovers and Branchus established a temple for Apollo at Didyma.
Cyparissus was a boy whom Apollo loved. He gifted the boy a stag, but Cyparissus accidentally killed his beloved stag in a hunting accident. He prayed to Apollo for his grief to be immortalized, so Apollo changed him into a Cypress tree, which became sacred to Apollo.
Hyacinthus was a mortal youth whom both Apollo and Zephyrus loved. One day, while Apollo and Hyacinthus played discus a jealous Zephyrus looked on. Zephyrus, god of the west wind, decided to punish the couple by manipulating the winds, causing the discus to strike Hyacinthus in the head and killing him. Apollo, overcome with grief, immortalized his beloved by turning him into a hyacinth.
Some scholars interpret this myth as the hot sun killing crops in the summertime, as Hyacinthus was a minor Cthonic vegetation deity.
Iapyx was a favorite of Apollo and they were potentially lovers. Apollo wanted to bestow a gift on Iapyx. Iapyx elected to receive a longer life and skilled healing abilities.
When I was 14, I cut all of my long, dark hair off which marked the beginning of my physical transition. I spent my teen years exploring my identity and coming into myself. The same time I overcame some prominent internalized transphobia was around the time I became a Hellenic polytheist. In an act of societal defiance, I decided to grow my hair back out.
I was 19 and completely on my own for the first time, and that year was one of the most transformational years of my life (so far). I learned about manhood, adulthood, and what masculinity means to me. Eventually though, it was time for me to cut all of my hair off. I had learned a lot about myself, one of them being I hate having long hair.
So again, I cut off my long, dark hair, this time with a better understanding of who I was and where I was going. In ancient times, boys would cut off their hair in the name of Apollo to signify their transition to manhood, and that is exactly what I did. Now, my last lock of long hair sits in an envelope, next to another labeled "First haircut, 2004" on my Apollo altar.
I don't know if many people turn to Apollo as a queer god, especially for transness. But with the journey I've been on, it only felt right.
