Castor and Pollux
deity figure · 6 works · 8 mentions · 14 anchored passages
sons of Tyndareus · the Castors · Anactes · Castor · Pollux · her brothers · the Dioscuri
in the texts
On the Nature of the Gods
Divine twin sons of Tyndareus (the Dioscuri), said to have appeared in battle and to have announced military news.
and this comes about neither by chance nor at random, but because the gods often manifest their power by their presence, as at Lake Regillus in the war with the Latins, when the dictator Aulus Postumius was fighting Octavius Mamilius of Tusculum, Castor and Pollux were seen fighting on horseback in our line;
Hence Hercules, hence Castor and Pollux, hence Aesculapius, hence Liber too (I mean the Liber born of Semele, not him whom our forefathers solemnly and reverently consecrated as Liber with Ceres and Libera, the nature of which may be understood from the mysteries;
the second, born of the third Jove and Leda, Castor and Pollux;
Against Stephanus I
The divine twins whose temple is mentioned as part of Phormio's past.
He is a knave, men of Athens, a knave and a villain, and has been such from of old, ever since he left the temple of Castor and Pollux.
The Erotic Essay
The mythological twin brothers cited together as examples of those beloved by the gods for their courage.
we shall find that Aeacus and Rhadamanthys were beloved by the gods for their discretion, Heracles, Castor and Pollux for their courage, and Ganymedes, Adonis, and others like them for their beauty, so that I at any rate am not astonished at those who covet your friendship but at those who are not so disposed.
Helen
Helen's twin brothers, the Dioscuri, whom Helen is said to have raised to divine, sailor-saving status.
for even to the present day at Therapne in Laconia the people offer holy and traditional sacrifices to them both, not as to heroes, but as to gods.
And when he was unable to obtain her from her guardians—for they were awaiting her maturity and the fulfilment of the oracle which the Pythian priestess had given—scorning the royal power of Tyndareus, disdaining the might of Castor and Pollux, and belittling all the hazards in Lacedaemon, he seized her by force and established her at Aphidna in Attica.
For not only did she attain immortality but, having won power equalling that of a god, she first raised to divine station her brothers, who were already in the grip of Fate, and wishing to make their transformation believed by men, she gave to them honors so manifest that they have power to save when they are seen by sailors in peril on the sea, if they but piously invoke them.
Ad Nationes
Twin figures deified and placed among the stars.
It would be long to review also those whom you have buried among the stars and boldly attended upon as gods.
De Spectaculis
Twin deities (Castor and Pollux), honored by the circus's egg ornaments and patrons of horsemanship.
But the gymnastic arts too the disciplines of the Castors and the Herculeses and the Mercurys put forth.
Therefore this kind is reckoned to Castor and Pollux, to whom Stesichorus teaches that horses were distributed by Mercury.
The eggs they ascribe to the honour of the Castors, who do not blush to believe them brought forth from an egg, by Jupiter the swan.