The ancient Greeks may not have seemed like the most romantic bunch, what with the epic tales of war and conquest over their enemies. Romantic, yes, but not lovey-dovey, love conquers all type of romantic.
Mythology is riddled with violence, betrayal, and unspeakable acts of degradation between so-called couples. The gods weren’t particularly warm or loving beings, they were typically fueled by jealousy and vengeance.
But let’s not let all the bad apples of Mythology spoil the truly beautiful romantic tales that spouted from the ancient Greeks’ collective psyche. There were some fiery romances that rival any of the great love stories in history and no doubt most of the better-known romance tales were influenced by Greek storytellers.
Here, we’ll look at the top 5 Greek Mythology love stories ever.
Apollo & Hyacinth
Time for a love triangle.
Hyacinth was the son of the Muse Clio and King Pierus of Macedonia. He was a beautiful young boy and the object of both Apollo and Zypher’s affection.
One fateful day, Apollo and Hyacinth were tossing the discus around when Zephyr got jealous and jumped in, causing the discus to strike and kill Hyacinth.
Devastated by the death of his young love, Apollo used the blood from Hyacinth’s wound to craft a flower into the ground and used his own tears to stain the petals. Thus, the Hyacinth flower… Heartbreaking!
Alcyone & Ceyx
Ceyx, the king of Trachis and Alcyone the daughter of wind god, Aeolus were married. They were the most beautiful couple in all the land, and often jokingly referred to each other as Zeus and Hera.
This was a bad idea, as the gods are very spiteful and violent.
Ceyx was in mourning over the death of his brother and decided to voyage over the sea to talk to the oracle of Apollo at Carlos in Ionia. His beautiful wife advised against this, but he went anyways.
Still irritated, Zeus threw a lightning bolt into the sea, causing a huge storm. Before he drowned, Ceyx prayed to the gods for his wife to find his body so that she could perform his funeral rites, then he died.
Alcyone waited and waited, and eventually, Hera felt sympathy for her. She sent messages to other gods to comfort her, and eventually, the god Morpheus created an apparition in the form of Ceyx.
This apparition appeared in front of Alcyone and told her what happened to her love. Distraught, she ran to the coastline. When she arrived she found her husband washed up on the beach, and threw herself on him.
Feeling a tinge of guilt, Zeus decided that this couple wasn’t worth tearing apart, and transformed them into Halcyon birds.
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Paris & Helen
Everyone knows the story of the Trojan war. But at the heart of that golden age tale was the abduction of Helen of Sparta by Paris.
One day, after a wedding feast, the goddesses Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena asked Zeus to decide which of them was the most beautiful. Not wanting to choose himself, Zeus appointed Paris to make the decision for him.
Since Paris found all three of the goddesses equally beautiful, they resorted to bribery for his affection. Hera offered ownership of all of Europe and Asia, Athena offered great skill in battle, and Aphrodite offered the affection of the most beautiful woman in the world.
Paris chose option number three, but the problem was that Helen was already married to Menelaus of Sparta. Nothing a small kidnapping couldn’t handle. It’s written that Helen fell in love with Paris at first sight, and the two of them were the catalyst for the most famous war of antiquity.
Orpheus & Eurydice
Would you go to hell and back for your lover? Orpheus would, quite literally. The story goes like this:
Orpheus, the child of Apollo and the Muse Calliope was a gifted musician. When he was a young boy, his father gave him a Lyre and he moved everyone and everything with his playing.
As an older man, Orpheus fell in love with Eurydice, and they were married. The couple lived happily for a short time when one day Eurydice was dancing with the tree spirits and was bitten by a poisonous snake and immediately died.
Heartbroken, Orpheus played a song of sorrow, and gods and humans alike were moved by his sadness.
Apollo was so moved that he talked Orpheus into going into the caves of the underworld to find Eurydice. This was dangerous and any mortal man would have died if he tried to go to the underworld, but because Orpheus was the son of Apollo, he could go in unscathed.
He arrived at the Stygian realm, passing by all of the unknown souls and using his lyre to pass by the 3-headed monster, Cerberus. Eventually, he ended up in front of the god and goddess of the underworld, Hades and Persephone.
Using his lyre, Orpheus was able to melt the hearts of both Hades Persephone with his beautiful music.
Hades consented to allow Orpheus to have his wife back, under one condition. Eurydice would have to walk behind him in the caves and Orpheus could not look back for her, or she would be trapped in Hades forever.
Of course, Orpheus agreed and they made their way to the cave entrance. With just a short distance left, however, Orpheus couldn’t hear Eurydice’s footsteps and couldn’t help but look back.
She was there, but her soul was pulled away, back into the underworld for the rest of time. Orpheus lived unhappily ever after until his death.
Pygmalion & Galatea
Last and least romantic was the love story of the sculptor Pygmalion and his sculpture Galatea. Yes, his sculpture.
Pygmalion wasn’t the best guy. He hated women and found flaws in even the most beautiful women around. Since he was a great sculptor, he went to work trying to create the model of his idea of beauty.
The results were staggering, Pygmalion had made a sculpture that even he found to be beautiful and he named her Galatea. She was so beautiful that he actually fell in love with her, dressing her, and staying with her at all hours of the day.
Aphrodite noticed Pygmalion’s doomed love and was touched. She rewarded Pygmalion’s adoration by bringing life to Galatea. Love can come to even the biggest jerks in Greek mythology.
Greek Mythology Love Stories & You
We hope this has inspired you to keep faith in love in even the hardest times. Despite all the death, tragedy, betrayal and blood, Greek Mythology love stories do provide a sense that love really can conquer anything. Just don’t anger the gods, and love should come much easier to you.
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