A selection from The History of the Moon.

Mawu is the supreme creator god according to the Fon people of Abomey (Republic of Benin). Mawu represented the Moon that brings the night and cooler temperature in the African world. Mawu is depicted as an old mother who dwells in the West. Coolness is an expression of wisdom and age for the Fon people.

Mawu has a partner called Liza that is associated with the Sun. Mawu and Liza are regarded as an unseparable unity at the basis of the universal order. Together they created the universe. They used their son Gu, the divine tool, to shape the world. They were also aided by the cosmic serpent, Da. Mawu and Liza were twins.

When there is an eclipse of the Sun or the Moon, the Fon people think that Mawu and Liza are making love. Mawu and Liza are the parents of seven pairs of twins. These twins are gods with different domains. Mawu is the goddess of fertility, joy and rest. Liza is the god of day, heat and strength.

Coyolxauhqui represents the Moon in the Aztec mythology. Her name means "Golden Bells." She was slain and dismembered by her brother, the Sun god Huitzilopochtli because she instigated their other four hundred sisters and brothers to kill their mother, Coatlicue.

Coatlicue was magically impregnated with Huitzilopochtli after a ball of white feathers fell from the heavens and touched her breast. Coatlicue's children thought that their mother had disgraced them with her mysterious pregnancy. Huitzilopochtli, born fully clothed in a blue armor from his mother, killed Coyolxauhqui and his other four hundred star sisters and brothers.

Coatlicue regretted such violence. Thus, Huitzilopochtli cut off Coyolxauhqui's head and threw it into the sky to form the Moon, aglow with the golden color of her bells. Huitzilopochtli was also known as the god of war and the chief god of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital city.

According to Hinduism, every part of the cosmos is seen as being a manifestation of an underlying divinity. Time is conceived as the endless repetition of the same long cycle where gods, demons, and heroes repeat their mythological actions. In Hindu mythology, Soma represents the god of the Moon.

He is depicted riding through the sky in a chariot drawn by white horses. Soma was also the name of the elixir of immortality that only the gods can drink. The Moon was thought to be the divine storehouse of the elixir. Since the elixir was an intoxicating drink, the god Soma was also associated with drunkenness.

When the gods drink soma, it is said that the Moon wanes because the gods are consuming its immortal properties. Some people think that the Moon is inhabited by a hare. That is why all hares are viewed as incarnations of Soma.

Diana was an ancient Italian goddess of woodland. In Capua and in Aricia, a locality near Rome, there are still shrines dedicated to the old Italian goddess. Her shrine in Aricia was on the shores of the lake Nemi. For that reason, she was named Diana Nemorensis, Diana of the Woods. The rites dedicated to her were particularly brutal.

Human sacrifices were offered to the indigenous goddess. Diana's priest was an escaped slave. Every new priest had to kill their predecessors to obtain their offices. At Capua, people believed that the preservation of the city depended on the fate of a long-lived hind sacred to the goddess.

As the result of the influence of the Greek colonies in southern Italy around the sixth century BC, Diana became identified with the Greek goddess of woodland Artemis acquiring the attributes of this latter. For the Greeks, Artemis was also the personification of the Moon and her twin brother Apollo was associated with the Sun. Her father and mother were Jupiter and Latona.

Diana believed her virgin body was very sacred and not for a male's eyes. One day the hunter, Actaeon, was wandering around and stumbled upon Diana bathing. Diana became so angry, she turned Actaeon into a stag. Now he was unable to speak, and so no one would ever hear about Diana's naked body. Actaeon was killed by his own hunting dogs, because he couldn't tell them he was their master.

In Greek mythology, Artemis was born with her twin brother Apollo in the island of Delos. Their parents were Zeus and Leto. Artemis was the goddess of woodland and the personification of the Moon. She was also known as the goddess of the hunt.

She was depicted as a eternally young and skilled huntress. She was always accompanied by a group of her attendants, the beautiful virgins the Amazons, who were warriors and huntresses like her. Artemis was the symbol of virginity. She punished those who would violate her virginity or that of her attendants.

Artemis and her brother Apollo had vindictive tempers. According to a Greek legend, they killed most of the children of Niobe, who had insulted her mother Leto comparing favorably his children with the twins Artemis and Apollo. In another occasion, furthermore, they were said to have killed Tityius for attempting to rape their mother Leto. Romans identified Artemis with their goddess Diana.