ABSTRACT
The pair then fell in love with two goddesses, Artemis and Hera, and planned how to capture them. Though not yet fully grown, they determined to assault heaven by piling up mountains, Ossa upon Olympus and then Pelion on Ossa, until they could scale the sky itself. But Apollo and Artemis brought about their destruction, either by shooting them down with arrows, or by letting a deer (which according to some accounts was Artemis herself) run between them: each of the twins aimed his spear at it, but instead hit his brother. This was said to have occurred in Naxos, but tradition maintained that the bodies were conveyed to Anthedon in Boeotia and buried there. Although Otus and Ephialtes are sometimes said to have introduced the cult of the Muses and founded the city of Ascra, where they received worship, they were punished in Tartarus for their insolent behaviour, being bound with writhing serpents back to back against a column.
