Leda and the Swan: Bestiality in the Ancient World
Leda and the Swan is a story and subject in art from Greek mythology in which the god Zeus, in the form of a swan, seduces or rapes Leda on the same night she slept with her husband King Tyndareus of Sparta. She subsequently bears two children from Zeus, Helen (who later becomes Helen of Troy) and Polydeuces (Pollux, one of the Dioscuri) and two children from Tyndareus, Castor (the other Dioscuri) and Clytemnestra. Castor, being the son of a human male, was mortal while Pollux, being a son of Zeus, was immortal. But Pollux asked to share his immortality with his half brother so each spent half their time in Hades while the other communed with gods on Olympus. Their unusual conception was just one of several Greek myths in which Zeus seduced or abducted favored mortals while in the form of an animal. These other tales included Europa and the bull and Ganymede and the eagle. Various classical writers recorded that bestiality was common in "other" cultures. Herodotu...