Niobe, queen of Thebes, enters in the midst of the worship and insults the goddess, claiming that having beauty, better parentage and more children than Latona, she is more fit to be worshipped than the goddess.

Niobe is unable to move from grief and seemingly turns to marble, though she continues to weep, and her body is transported to a high mountain peak in her native land.

In the Homeric story, Orestes was a member of the doomed house of Atreus which is descended from Tantalus and Niobe.

In Argive culture, Niobe is associated with Phoroneus, sometimes as his mother, sometimes as his daughter, or else, likely, as his consort ( Kerenyi ).

The story of Niobe, and especially her sorrows, is an ancient one.

Priam is not unlike Niobe in the sense that he was also grieving for his son Hector, who was killed and not buried for several days.

Sophocles is said to have also contributed a play titled Niobe that is lost.

Furthermore, the conflict between Niobe and Leto is mentioned in one of Sappho's poetic fragments (" Before they were mothers, Leto and Niobe had been the most devoted of friends.

Parthenius of Nicaea records a rare version of the story of Niobe, in which her father is called Assaon and her husband Philottus.

The choice of " Niobe " simply as a name in works of art and literature is not uncommon either.

A mountain in British Columbia, Canada is named Mount Niobe.

Niobe is the Captain of the Logos, the fastest ship in the rebel fleet.

Ultimately, the Merovingian destroys the key, but Niobe and Ghost are able to escape, when the Keymaker realizes that it is too early for the key to be given to Neo.

* Vlad — the black-clad, pale-skinned leader of the Merovingian's vampires ; he is killed by Niobe, who stabs him through the heart with a wooden stake.

The player learns that Neo is not the only target of Persephone's predilection for trading kisses for esoteric information ; Niobe and Ghost are both put into positions where they must submit to her whims in order to gain critical information.

Perhaps her best-known role to date is the part of human rebel Niobe in the films The Matrix Reloaded ( 2003 ) and The Matrix Revolutions ( 2003 ), sequels to 1999's The Matrix.

The crew is rescued by the hovercraft Mjolnir commanded by Captain Roland, who joins forces with the craft Logos commanded by Niobe.

Niobium is nearly always found together with tantalum, and was named after Niobe, the daughter of the mythical Greek king Tantalus for whom tantalum was named.

The circumstances in which Niobe loses her children are also different, see Niobids # Variant myth.

Niobe's iconic tears were also mentioned in Hamlet's soliloquy ( Act 1, Scene 2 ), in which he contrasts his mother's grief over the dead King, Hamlet's father-" like Niobe, all tears "-to her unseemly hasty marriage to Claudius.

A notable abstract work of the 20th century, titled, simply, " Niobe " was painted by Károly Patkó who also produced at the same time a sketch.

More recently, one of the characters in the films The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions was also named Niobe.

They are also known from figurative sculpture, examples of which are to be found at the Palazzo Massimo in Rome and in the group of Niobids ( including Niobe sheltering one of her daughters ) found in Rome in 1583 along with the Wrestlers and brought to the Uffizi in Florence in 1775.

The early part of the war also saw HMCS Niobe actively patrolling off the coast of New York City as part of British blockading forces, but she returned to Halifax permanently in July 1915 when she was declared no longer fit for service and was converted to a depot ship.

This play, along with the also lost Niobe, are two famous examples cited in antiquity of the often-discussed theme of the " Aeschylean silence ".

Niobe also appears in the MMORPG The Matrix Online.

Alternatively Niobe was a play by Aeschylus, mentioned again later in The Frogs.

The Niobe narrative appears in Ovid's Metamorphoses, ( Book VI ) where Latona ( Leto ) has demanded the women of Thebes to go to her temple and burn incense.

Later writers asserted that Niobe was wedded to Amphion, one of the twin founders of Thebes, where there was a single sanctuary where the twin founders were venerated, but in fact no shrine to Niobe.

A lifesize group of marble Niobids, including one of Niobe sheltering one of her daughters, found in Rome in 1583 at the same time as the Wrestlers, were taken in 1775 to the Uffizi in Florence where, in a gallery devoted to them, they remain some of the most prominent surviving sculptures of Classical antiquity ( see below ).

Such semi-legendary figures like the local ruler Tantalus, his son Pelops, his daughter Niobe, the departure of a sizable part of the region's population from their shores to found, according to one account, the future Etruscan civilization in present-day Italy, are all centered around Mount Sipylus, where the first urban settlement was probably located, and date from the period prior to the emergence of the Lydian Mermnad dynasty.

Niobe, the queen of Thebes and wife of Amphion, boasted of her superiority to Leto because she had fourteen children ( Niobids ), seven male and seven female, while Leto had only two.

A Queen of Thebes and wife of Amphion, Niobe boasted of her superiority to Leto because while she had fourteen children ( Niobids ), seven boys and seven girls, Leto had only one of each.

A devastated Niobe and her remaining children were turned to stone by Artemis as they wept.

To punish this insolence, Latona begs Apollo and Artemis to avenge her against Niobe and to uphold her honor.

In another mythic context, the Achelous was said to be formed by the tears of Niobe, who fled to Mount Sipylus after the deaths of her husband and children.

Envious of Niobe, the wife of her husband's brother Amphion, who had six sons and six daughters, she formed the plan of killing the eldest of Niobe's sons, but by mistake slew her own son Itylus.

A 1772 painting by Jacques Louis David depicting Niobe attempting to shield her children from Artemis and Apollo.

Niobe boasted of her fourteen children, seven male and seven female ( the Niobids ), to Leto who only had two children, the twins Apollo and Artemis.

Devastated, Niobe fled back to Mount Sipylus and was turned into stone, and, as she wept unceasingly, waters started to pour from her petrified complexion.

Three notable works, all dating from the 1770s, " Apollo and Diana Attacking Niobe and her Children " by Anicet-Charles-Gabriel Lemonnier, " The Children of Niobe Killed by Apollo and Diana " by Pierre-Charles Jombert and " Diana and Apollo Piercing Niobe ’ s Children with their Arrows " by Jacques-Louis David belong to the tradition of French Baroque and Classicism.