Ganymede was a young man (late teens- early twenties) and was a slave boy for a wealthy Greek family on a high mountain. His main jobs were bringing buckets of fresh water from the bottom of the mountain all the way to the top and then using some to clean their feet, some to water plants, some for cooking water, some to drink and the mother of the family was a seer and required some water for her scrying bowl. As one can imagine, one bucket cannot accomplish all of this, so Ganymede made nearly fifty to seventy round trips carrying this bucket of water. He had done this most of his life and even though it had made him strong, it also made him weak and exhausted. 

One day Ganymede had schemed to rebel and attempt to escape, but first he insisted he make a point to his masters. He got up at midnight and made round trips using four buckets each time, filled all of them and brought them up and emptied them into a large decorative vase that stood nearly twelve feet tall by eight feet in diameter. They had kept it as a centerpiece in their large courtyard by some olive trees. Ganymede had filled the entire vase to the brim by the time his masters had found him around one in the afternoon. "You do not appreciate anything I do for you. You never have! I am NOT your servant anymore." This enraged the whole family and as they ran at him he used all his strength and pushed over the vase of water. It had washed them all down the mountain in a great tidal wave. 

Zeus had been watching the whole time and his interest was peaked when Ganymede began his plotting. He had found great respect and honor within the young Ganymede so he descended Mt. Olympus on the back of a mighty winged stallion with golden hooves. He approached the boy who was fearful of the god. Ganymede had over heard many stories of the Great and Powerful Zeus as a child. "Have no fear Ganymede. I offer you a place above this world." 

Ganymede had thought about his offer and accepted. Zeus took him in his arms and carried him over to the abnormally tall stallion and helped him climb aboard. The two of them flew up to Mt. Olympus and had conference with the other gods. They had agreed to reward him for such courage to take himself out of slavery and to stand up for his liberty by bestowing him with a large gold and silver watering jug. They had explained that because he had never known creativity or spirituality only back breaking labor that if he were to drink from this he would have understanding of all things and would become creative, spiritually aware, and knowledgeable of all things of both men and gods. There was one condition, to remind himself of how he had pulled himself from slavery and into such higher positions he must empty his jug over the earth many times throughout the year, that once it is emptied it will magically be restored with FRESH water containing these same magical properties for him. He had obeyed the gods and went three centuries obeying their wishes and the gods unanimously decided to grant his soul eternal life among the stars.  When Ganymede died at 500 years old, the gods kept their promise and split his soul into multiple slivers and then placed them in the sky to represent Ganymede and his life story.