Arachne, a skilled weaver, challenges Athena to a contest of skill and insults her. Athena reveals herself and they both weave tapestries, but Arachne’s portrays the gods in a negative light. Athena becomes angry and strikes Arachne, who hangs herself and is condemned to weave forever as a spider.
In the Roman poet Ovid’s account of Greek mythology in his work Metamorphoses, Arachne is the daughter of a dyer of clothes, Idmon, of the city of Colophon in Lydia. In chapter 6, Ovid tells the story of Arachne’s fateful meeting with the goddess Pallas Athena.
Arachne, explains Ovid, is a young woman who has recently lost her mother. Although she is of low birth, she has achieved fame due to her skills at the loom. She is so skilled that nymphs would leave the countryside and naiads their aquatic homes to come and watch her work, which radiates a talent that can only come from Athena, goddess of weaving.
Filled with pride, Arachne condemns the connection: even while in the act of weaving – when her every move and choice is empowered and aided by the goddess – she claims to be the source of her own talent. Brazen in her defiance of her, she even challenges Athena to a contest of skill.
Suddenly, an elderly woman appears on the scene. She being old, she tells Arachne, she is wise and comes bearing good advice. She admonishes Arachne to stop being so conceited and ask Athena for forgiveness. She assures her that Athena will forgive her transgression, while Arachne’s fame and genius will still be recognized.
Arachne responds with an insult. He attacks the old woman for stammering, rejects her advice, and again challenges Athena to a showdown. Upon this, the old woman is revealed to be Athena in disguise, and now she stands in her natural form as a goddess. Everyone is stunned except Arachne, who blushes only slightly and renews her insistence on a contest. This time, Athena tacitly agrees.
They each go to a loom and begin weaving, using a panoply of colors including Tyrian purple and gold thread to create scenes from the history of the gods. Athena chooses to portray the 12 Olympians, with Zeus in the centre, discussing what the city that would become Athens would be named, and the competition between Athena and Poseidon for that honour. Athena displays Poseidon’s gift of horses in competition with her own gift of olive trees.
At each corner of her tapestry, Athena places a human being who acted in contempt for the gods and was punished. In one, she depicts Emo and Rodope who defied the gods and were turned into mountains. In another, she shows a pygmy woman who insulted Hera and was transformed into a crane. Antigone is also shown who vied with Hera for beauty and was turned into a stork, as is Cinyras, whose daughters were turned into marble.
Arachne, in contrast, chooses stories in which the gods were defeated or humiliated by mortals or behaved reprehensible. He showed Zeus transformed into a bull to woo Europa; like a swan courting Leda; as a satyr courting Antiope; impersonating Amphitryon to woo Alcmene; turn to gold to woo Danae; like a flame with Aegina, a shepherd with Mnemosyne and a snake with Deois. He treated Poseidon, Apollo, Dionysus and other gods equally.
Athena, looking at the tapestry, becomes furious and strikes Arachne, who hangs herself in response. Athena prevents her death, but condemns her both to hang herself and to weave forever… like a spider.
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