This constellation is of the Greek Discouri ("striplings of Zeus") brothers, known as Castor and Pollux in Latin, and Polydeuces in Greek. They were the most loving of brothers, and never fought against each other, whether it was over kingship or anything else. They never did anything without the other’s consent. They were among the most popular of the ancient cult divinities, and their worship spread all over Greece and even to Sicily.

They are the brothers of Helen, the wife of Menelaus who ran off with Paris to Troy, precipitating the Trojan War that wiped out the age of heroes.

The boys and Helen are often said to be born of Leda to whom Zeus appeared as a swan, a frequent image in the history of art.

However, there is a more profound story relating to their birth. Of the various forms of Necessity (Adrasteia, Tyche, Moira, Ananke, Ate, Aisa, Dike, Erinyes, Heimarmene, all of whom are female and against whom no one, not even the gods may rebel), Nemesis, the daughter Nyx or night, is the most beautiful. She is that horrible force that brings down vengeance on the impious and the evil, while the other forms of Necessity, like chance, push us and everything in the world. They are from the time of Kronos.

Nemesis has long dark hair and wears white clothes. She is accompanied by her friend, Aidos, shame, everywhere she goes. Aidos keeps people from offending, while Nemesis punishes those who do. One day Zeus was watching Nemesis and he felt that tinge inside him. He never felt any desire for any form of necessity, but he suddenly felt a deep desire for Nemesis and he pursued her. She fled from one country to the next, into the waters of the earth, and in the skies. Nemesis changed into various shapes into every form of animal. Exhausted, Zeus caught her when she was a swan and he coupled with her as birds, passionately. It is Zeus’s greatest moment, for he has overcome necessity itself. Nemesis and her friend Aidos are torn against by necessity and shame—torn apart by herself.

From that night’s adventure came the egg from which Castor and Polydeuces, as well as Helen, who combines both beauty and necessity, were born.

The twin boys were model young men. When Helen was twelve and abducted and willingly, happily, sodomized byTheseus on one of his many adventures, the twins went and recovered her, capturing Athens in the process.  Moreover, they made Menstheus king of that city. They were part of the great hunt for the boar killed by Meleager. Castor is credited with teaching Heracles to fence. Together with Peleus, Achilles’s father, and with Jason, the Dioscuri laid waste to Iolcus. They were famous for the boxing and fighting skills. They carried off the daughters of Leucippus and wedded them (Castor had Anogon by Hilaria, while Polydeuces had Mnesileus by Phoebe).

But their glory rests in the sadness of the death of Castor, the mortal of the twins. In a war between Sparta and Athens, Castor was killed in Aphidnae. Grief-stricken, Polydeuces, Homer tells us, gave his brother half-of-his life. Thus, part of the year, Castor goes beneath the earth, as the constellation sets.

They symbolize the dual night/day character of the sky, evening and morning star. They were believed to come to the aid of mariners in distress, and they were associated with what later became known as St. Elmo’s fire, a favorable omen when it appeared in two flames, unlucky as one.

Twins were considered a great problem in the ancient world. But if we are to examine the problem with some care it is obvious that they represent the problem of the copy or image and its relationship to the original. The image and the original are like the Dioscuri brothers, who cannot do without each other, even though one is immortal, the original, and the other is mortal, the perfect copy.


By Kalev Pehme
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