Apollo, god of arts and music, was punished by the young Eros after he mocked him for playing with a bow and arrows. The irascible Eros took two arrows, one gold with a diamond tip and one iron with the tip lined with lead. The gold one incited love, the iron one incited hate. With the iron arrow he shot the nymph Daphne and with the golden one he shot Apollo in the heart. Apollo was inflamed with passion for Daphne and in return she hated him. In the past, Daphne had rejected many potential lovers, instead showing a preference for hunting and exploring the woods. His father, a river-god who one tradition considers to be Ladon and another, on the other hand, to be Peneus, asked him to marry him so that he would give him grandchildren. However, she begged her father to leave her unmarried, like Apollo's twin sister, Artemis. Despite this, her father warned her that she was too beautiful to keep all her suitors away forever.

Apollo harassed her constantly, begging her to stay with him, but the nymph kept running away until the gods intervened and helped Apollo catch up with her. Seeing that Apollo would catch her, Daphne summoned her father. Suddenly, her skin turned into tree bark (a laurel), her hair into leaves and branches. She stopped running as his feet rooted in the ground. Apollo hugged the branches, but even they shrank and contracted. Since he could no longer take her as his wife, he promised her that he would love her eternally as his tree and that its branches would crown the heads of the heroes and champions of the Olympic Games.