A northwest wind blows through the little household of Sixto and Sofia. What will Skiron bring?



Skiron (or Skeiron) is not an invention of mine. He was a minor wind deity in Greek mythology, identified with the storm-bringing northwest wind. He was equated in Roman mythology with the god Corus (or Caurus), whom Seneca the Younger (1 BC - 65 AD) calls “cloud-collecting” and “rain-fraught” in his play Phaedra.



On the freize of Athens’ octagonal Tower of the Winds, built perhaps in the 2nd century BC, Skiron is depicted with a shaggy beard and wielding a bronze cauldron, out of which glowing ashes were said to flow, representing the coming of winter.



Skiron does not figure prominently in Greek mythology, but may come to figure prominently in my own.