One of my mom’s favorite Halloween decorations used to be Spiders and Spiderwebs. I often wondered if it was because she was a seamstress. According to legend the first spider was Arachne the spinner of fate. The myth has it that the goddess Athene became so jealous of Arachne that she turned her into a spider. When Athena saw the wonderful tapestries woven by Arachne. She challenged her to a contest one version of story has it that Arachne made a cloth depicting the gods in vulgar positions and the like. This angered Athena that she cast a curse on Arachne. Arachne shrank and sprouted extra legs becoming. In other versions Arachne hangs herself and Athena has sympathy for her changing her into a spider and noose into a web giving her a 2nd life. At any rate Arachne became connected to weaving and fate.
