goddess to do with spiders

[louise_holm]

hi i have decided to worship a goddess to do with spiders or a celtic one so if you know any please tell me all you know about them!
blessed be!

[VelvetBlade]

The scientific name for spiders is "Arachnid" (uh-rack-nid). That name comes from an old Greek story. In this story, a girl named Arachne loved to weave. Her weaving was so beautiful and perfect that the goddess Athena got jealous. To punish Arachne, the goddess turned her into a spider.

Spider Symbolism
Spiders are weavers and tricksters. They symbolize fate, female energy, creative energy, female energy, wisdom, creativity, new life, entanglement, caution, divine inspiration, starting a project, becoming pregnant, being industrious, warning signals, illusions. They are connected to Ishtar, Atargatis, Athene, the Fates, the Norns, Holda, Inktomi, Kokyangwuti, Tsitsicnako and Sussistanako and Neith.
http://www.crystalinks.com/scorpio.html (about halfway down the page)

Try here too....

http://www.angelfire.com/realm2/amethystbt/arachne.html

[Paracelsus]

There is also the African / West Indian God, Anansi - the trickster.
Both a spider & a man.
I've a beautiful hunting spider who has lived in Kitchen window for about six months now - she is huge, and very lovely, spinning the most ornate webs. For me Spiders are important for representing the webs of relationship in which we exist - a potent image

[Scarlettvixen]

isnt spiderwoman big in native american mythology?

[louise_holm]

thank you!!!

[Agaliha]

Grandmother Spider -- she's in many NA traditions. I found some info on her, but not much.

[Theres]

The scientific name for spiders is "Arachnid" (uh-rack-nid). That name comes from an old Greek story. In this story, a girl named Arachne loved to weave. Her weaving was so beautiful and perfect that the goddess Athena got jealous. To punish Arachne, the goddess turned her into a spider.
she actually claimed that her weaving was more beautiful than Athena's... silly girl!

[Agaliha]

she actually claimed that her weaving was more beautiful than Athena's... silly girl!

Yeah...
Here is a better version of that story:
ARACHNE (http://www.pantheon.org/articles/a/arachne.html)

PS: If you are interested in the NA Spider Goddess, I can scrounge up those links of mine...

[Seshata]

The scientific name for spiders is "Arachnid" (uh-rack-nid). That name comes from an old Greek story. In this story, a girl named Arachne loved to weave. Her weaving was so beautiful and perfect that the goddess Athena got jealous. To punish Arachne, the goddess turned her into a spider.[/url]

I also think that it didn't help ARachne that she boasted about her skills being better than Athene's. I believe that there was a competition involved and then Athene turned her into a spider. :)

BB

Seshata

[Seshata]

she actually claimed that her weaving was more beautiful than Athena's... silly girl!

That'll teach me to post before reading further down in the thread!

BB

Seshata