Editing Helios (section)

==== Leucothoe and Clytie ====
[[File:The nymph klytie transforming into a sunflower as the sun god drives his chariot above, engraving by abraham diepenbeeck for the metamorphoses book by ovid, in a greek language copy.jpg|thumb|left|240px|Clytie turns into a sunflower as the Sun refuses to look at her, engraving by [[Abraham van Diepenbeeck]].]]

Aphrodite aims to enact her revenge by making Helios fall for a mortal princess named [[Leucothoe (daughter of Orchamus)|Leucothoe]], forgetting his previous lover the [[Oceanid]] [[Clytie (Oceanid)|Clytie]] for her sake. Helios watches her from above, even making the winter days longer so he can have more time looking at her. Taking the form of her mother [[Eurynome]], Helios enters their palace, entering the girl's room before revealing himself to her.

However, Clytie informs Leucothoe's father [[Orchamus]] of this affair, and he buries Leucothoe alive in the earth. Helios comes too late to rescue her, so instead he pours [[nectar]] into the earth, and turns the dead Leucothoe into a [[Boswellia sacra|frankincense tree]]. Clytie, spurned by Helios for her role in his lover's death, strips herself naked, accepting no food or drink, and sits on a rock for nine days, pining after him, until eventually turning into a purple, sun-gazing flower, the [[Heliotropium|heliotrope]].<ref name=":1">[[Ovid]], ''[[Metamorphoses]]'' [https://topostext.org/work/141#4.190 4.167]–[https://topostext.org/work/141#4.256 273]; [[Lactantius Placidus]], ''Argumenta'' [https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=oDRdAAAAcAAJ&pg=GBS.PA18&hl=el 4.5]; Paradoxographers anonymous, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=eTUOAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA222 222]</ref><ref>Hard, [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA45 p. 45]; Gantz, p. 34; Berens, [https://books.google.com/books?id=_NcDAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA63 p. 63]; Grimal, s. v. [https://archive.org/details/concisedictionar00grim/page/102/mode/2up?view=theater Clytia]</ref> This myth, it has been theorized, might have been used to explain the use of [[frankincense]] [[aroma]]tic resin in Helios' worship.{{sfn|Κακριδής|Ρούσσος|Παπαχατζής|Καμαρέττα|1986|page=228}} Leucothoe being buried alive as punishment by a male guardian, which is not too unlike [[Antigone]]'s own fate, may also indicate an ancient tradition involving [[human sacrifice]] in a vegetation cult.{{sfn|Κακριδής|Ρούσσος|Παπαχατζής|Καμαρέττα|1986|page=228}} At first the stories of Leucothoe and Clytie might have been two distinct myths concerning Helios which were later combined along with a third story, that of Helios discovering Ares and Aphrodite's affair and then informing Hephaestus, into a single tale either by Ovid himself or his source.<ref name="20–38">[[Joseph Fontenrose|Fontenrose, Joseph]]. ''The Gods Invoked in Epic Oaths: [[Aeneid]], XII, 175-215.'' [[The American Journal of Philology]] 89, no. 1 (1968): pp [https://doi.org/10.2307/293372 20–38].</ref>