Persephone

This article is about the Greek goddess. For other uses, see Persephone (disambiguation).

Persephone

In Greek mythology, Persephone ( /ərˈsɛfəniː/, per-SEH-fə-nee; Greek: Περσεφόνη), also called Kore (/ˈkɔːriː/; "the maiden"), is the daughter of Zeus and the harvest-goddess Demeter, and queen of the underworld. Homer describes her as the formidable, venerable majestic queen of the shades, who carries into effect the curses of men upon the souls of the dead. Persephone was abducted by Hades, the god-king of the underworld. The myth of her abduction represents her function as the personification of vegetation which shoots forth in spring and withdraws into the earth after harvest; hence she is also associated with spring and with the seeds of the fruits of the fields. Similar myths appear in the Orient, in the cults of male gods like Attis, Adonis and Osiris, and in Minoan Crete.

Persephone as a vegetation goddess (Kore) and her mother Demeter were the central figures of the Eleusinian mysteries that predated the Olympian pantheon, and promised to the initiated a more enjoyable prospect after death. The mystic Persephone is further said to have become by Zeus the mother of Dionysus, Iacchus, or Zagreus. The origins of her cult are uncertain, but it was based on very old agrarian cults of agricultural communities.

Persephone was commonly worshiped along with Demeter, and with the same mysteries. To her alone were dedicated the mysteries celebrated at Athens in the month of Anthesterion. In Classical Greek art, Persephone is invariably portrayed robed; often carrying a sheaf of grain. She may appear as a mystical divinity with a scepter and a little box, but she was mostly represented in the act of being carried off by Hades.

In Roman mythology, she is called Proserpina, and her mother Ceres.

Her name

Etymology

Persephone /the deceased woman holding a pomegranate. Etruscan vase. National archaeological museum in Palermo, Italy

In a Linear B (Mycenean Greek) inscription on a tablet found at Pylos dated 1400–1200 BC, John Chadwick reconstructs the name of a goddess *Preswa who could be identified with Persa, daughter of Oceanus and finds speculative the further identification with the first element of Persephone. Persephonē (Greek: Περσεφόνη) is her name in the Ionic Greek of epic literature. The Homeric form of her name is Persephoneia (Περσεφονεία, Persephonēia). In other dialects she was known under variant names: Persephassa (Περσεφάσσα), Persephatta (Περσεφάττα), or simply Korē (Κόρη, "girl, maiden"). Plato calls her Pherepapha (Φερέπαφα) in his Cratylus, "because she is wise and touches that which is in motion". There also the forms Perifona (Πηριφόνα) and Phersephassa (Φερσέφασσα). The existence of so many different forms shows how difficult it was for the Greeks to pronounce the word in their own language and suggests that the name has probably a pre-Greek origin.

An alternative etymology is from φέρειν φόνον, pherein phonon, "to bring (or cause) death".

Another mythical personage of the name of Persephione is called a daughter of Minyas and the mother of Chloris, a nymph of spring, flower and new growth. The Minyans were a group considered autochthonous, but some scholars assert that they were the first wave of Proto-Greek speakers in the second milemnium BC.

The Roman Proserpina

Cinerary altar with tabula representing the rape of Proserpina. White marble, Antonine Era, 2nd century CE. Rome, Baths of Diocletian

The Romans first heard of her from the Aeolian and Dorian cities of Magna Graecia, who used the dialectal variant Proserpinē (Προσερπίνη). Hence, in Roman mythology she was called Proserpina, a name erroneously derived by the Romans from proserpere, "to shoot forth" and as such became an emblematic figure of the Renaissance.

At Locri, perhaps uniquely, Persephone was the protector of marriage, a role usually assumed by Hera; in the iconography of votive plaques at Locri, her abduction and marriage to Hades served as an emblem of the marital state, children at Locri were dedicated to Proserpina, and maidens about to be wed brought their peplos to be blessed.

Nestis

In a Classical period text ascribed to Empedocles, c. 490–430 BC, describing a correspondence among four deities and the classical elements, the name Nestis for water apparently refers to Persephone: "Now hear the fourfold roots of everything: enlivening Hera, Hades, shining Zeus. And Nestis, moistening mortal springs with tears."

Of the four deities of Empedocles's elements, it is the name of Persephone alone that is taboo—Nestis is a euphemistic cult title—for she was also the terrible Queen of the Dead, whose name was not safe to speak aloud, who was euphemistically named simply as Kore or "the Maiden", a vestige of her archaic role as the deity ruling the underworld.

Statue of Isis-Persephone with a sistrum. Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete

Titles and functions

The epithets of Persephone reveal her double function as chthonic and vegetation goddess. The surnames given to her by the poets refer to her character as Queen of the lower world and the dead, or her symbolic meaning of the power that shoots forth and withdraws into the earth. Her common name as a vegetation goddess is Kore and in Arcadia she was worshipped under the title Despoina "the mistress", a very old chthonic divinity. Plutarch identifies her with spring and Cicero calls her the seed of the fruits of the fields. In the Eleusinian mysteries her return is the symbol of immortality and hence she was frequently represented on sarcophagi.

In the mystical theories of the Orphics and the Platonists, Kore is described as the all-pervading goddess of nature who both produces and destroys everything and she is therefore mentioned along or identified with other mystic divinities such as Isis, Rhea, Ge, Hestia, Pandora, Artemis, and Hecate. The mystic Persephone is further said to have become by Zeus the mother of Dionysos, Iacchus, or Zagreus.

Epithets

As a goddess of the underworld, Persephone was given euphemistically friendly names. However it is possible that some of them were the names of original goddesses:

• Despoina (dems-potnia) "the mistress", (literally "the mistress of the house" ) in Arcadia.
• Hagne, "pure", originally a goddess of the springs in Messenia.
• Melindia or Melinoia ( meli, "honey"), as the consort of Hades, in Hermione. ( Compare Hecate, Melinoe )
• Melivia
• Melitodes
• Aristi cthonia, "the best chthonic".

As a vegetation goddess she was called:

• Kore, "the maiden".
• Kore Soteira, "the savior maiden" in Megalopolis.
• Neotera, "the younger " in Eleusis.
• Kore of Demeter Hagne, in the Homeric hymn.
• Kore memagmeni, "the mixed daughter" ( bread).

Demeter and her daughter Persephone were usually called:

• The goddesses, often distinguished as "the older" and "the younger" in Eleusis.
• Demeters, in Rhodes and Sparta
• The thesmophoroi, "the legislators" in the Thesmophoria.
• The Great Goddesses, in Arcadia.
• The mistresses in Arcadia.
• Karpophoroi, "the bringers of fruit", in Tegea of Arcadia.

Origins of the cult

Ring of Isopata, 1400-1500BC. Heraklion Archaeological Museum

The myth of the rape of the vegetation goddess is probably Pre-Greek. The place of the abduction is different in each local cult. The Homeric hymn mentions the Nysion (or Mysion), probably a mythical place which didn’t exist in the map. The locations of this mythical place may simply be conventions to show that a magically distant chthonic land of myth was intended in the remote past. Demeter found and met her daughter in Eleusis, and this is the mythical disguise of what happened in the mysteries.

Persephone is an old chthonic deity of the agricultural communities, who received the souls of the dead into the earth, and acquired powers on the fertility of the soil under which she reigned. The earliest depiction of a goddess who may be identified with Persephone growing out of the ground, is on a plate from the Old-Palace period in Phaistos. The goddess has a vegetable-like appearance, and she is surrounded by dancing girls between blossoming flowers. The asocciation with the flower-picking Persephone and her companions is compelling. On the Minoan ring of Isopata, four women are performing a dance between flowers in a field, and a smaller figure, the goddess herself appears floating in the air.

Rape of Persephone. Hades with his horses and Persephone (down). An Apulian red-figure volute krater, ca 340 BC. Antikensammlung Berlin

In the Homeric poems Persephone is the real ruler of the underworld, the terrible "Queen of the Shades", and Hades doesn't have authorities on the souls of the dead. In some forms Hades appears with his chthonic horses. The myth of the rape of Kore was deriven from the idea that Hades catches the souls of the dead like his booty, and then carries them with his horses into his kingdom. This idea is vague in Homer, but appears in later Greek depictions, and in Greek folklore. "Charos" appears with his horse and carries the dead into the underworld.

The cults of Persephone and Demeter in the Eleusinian mysteries and in the Thesmophoria were based on very old agrarian cults. An earlier agrarian procession leaded by a priest, is depicted on a Minoan vase from the end of the New-Palace period. Ancient cults like age-old cults of the dead, worship of animal headed gods, and rituals for the new crop, had their position in Greek religion because they were connected with daily or seasonal tasks and concecrated by immemorial practices. The powers of animal nature fostered a belief in nymphs, and in gods with human forms and the heads or tails of animals. In the Arcadian cults, it seems that Demeter and Persephone were the first from a series of daemons with the same nature. Teraccota figures with animal-headed gods or daemons and a procession of women with animal masks have been discovered at the temple of Despoina at Lycosura. These cults seem to go back to the Mycenean period. The cult center of Mycenea dated from the 13th century BC, contained numerous big idols with faces painted in a terrifying mask-like manner, and a fresco represented a priestess or goddess with ears of corn in her hand.

A lot of ancient beliefs were based on initiation in jealously guided mysteries (secret rites) because they oferred prospects after death more enjoyable than the final end at the gloomy space of the Greek Hades. It seems that such religious practices were introduced from Minoan Crete, Similar practices appear also in the Orient. However the idea of immortality which appears in the syncretistic religions of Near East did not exist in the Eleusinian mysteries at the very beginning.

Orient-Minoan Crete

Lady of Auxerre Louvre-An Archaic (640 BC) image from Crete. A version of a Minoan Goddess who may be identified with Kore

In the Near eastern myth of the primitive agricultural societies, every year the fertility goddess bore the "god of the new year", who then became her lover, and died immediately in order to be reborn and face the same destiny. Similar cults of resurrected gods appear in the Orient in the cults of Attis, Adonis and Osiris, In Minoan Crete, the "divine child" was related with the female vegetation divinity Ariadne who died every year. The Minoan religion had its own characteristics. The cult was aniconic, the principal deities were female, and they appeared in epiphany called chiefly by ecstatic sacral dances, by tree–shaking and by baetylic rites.

The daemons were a part of the religious system. They were considered divine, and they were connected with gods or goddesses of hunting. In the Minoan seals or jewellerry, are depicted animal-headed daemons or hybrid-creatures. Some of these depictions seem similar with Oriental depictions, especially with the well-known Babylonian daemons. A young Minotaur is depicted on a seal from Knossos. Depictions of daemons between lions, of men between daemons, and processions of daemons, appear also in Mycenean seals and jewllerry, and in Phigalia of Arcadia.

The "Harvesters vase" from Agia Triada ( 1600-1500 BC). Heraklion Archaeological Museum

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The most peculiar feature of the Minoan belief for the divine, is the appearance of the goddess from above in the dance. Dancing floors have been discovered besides "vaulted tombs", and it seems that the dance was ecstatic. Homer keeps in memory the dancing floor which Daedalus built for Ariadne in the remote past. On the gold ring from Isopata, four women in a festal attire are performing a dance between blossoming flowers. Above a much smaller and differently dressed figure floating in the air seems to be the goddess herself, appearing amid the whirling dance. An image plate from the first palace of Phaistos, seems to be very close to the mythical image of the Anodos (ascent) of Persephone. Two girls dance between blossoming flowers, on other side of a similar but armless and legless figure which seems to grow out of the ground. The goddess is bordered by snake lines which give her a vegetable like appearance and also recall the arrangement of snake tubes which have been found in Minoan and Mycenean sunctuaries. She has a large stylized flower turned over her head, and the resemblance with the flower picking Persephone and her companions is compelling The depiction of the goddess is similar with later images of "Anodos of Pherephata". On the Dresden vase Persephone is growing out of the ground, and she is surrounded by the animal-tailed agricultural gods Silenoi. It seems that in Crete there were festivals designated in a way corresponding to the later Greek types of festival names. An agrarian procession is depicted on the "Harversters Vase" or Vase of the Winnowers' from the last phase of the New-palace period, (LM II), which was found in Hagia Triada. Men are walking by two with their tools-rods on their shoulders. The leader is probably a priest with long hair carrying a stick, and dressed in a priestly robe with a fringe. A group of musicians participate singing, and one of them holds the Egyptian instrument sistrum.

The so called "Ring of Minos" from Knossos. (1500-1400 BC). A male and two female figures, in the "cult of the tree". Heraklion Archaeological Museum

The Minoan vegetation goddess Ariadne was closely connected with the cult of the divine child, and with the "cult of the tree". This was an exstatic and orgiastic cult, which seems to be similar with the relative in the Syrian cult of Adonis,. Kerenyi suggests that the name Ariadne (derived from ἁγνή, hagne, "pure"), was an euphemistical name given by the Greeks to the nameless "Mistress of the labyrinth" who appears in a Mycenean Greek inscription from Knossos in Crete. The Greeks used to give friendly names to the deities of the underworld. Cthonic Zeus was called Eubuleus, "the good councelor", and the ferryman of the river of the underworld Charon, "glad" . Despoina and "Hagne" were probably euphimistic surnames of Persephone, therefore he theorizes that the cult of Persephone was the continuation of the worship of a Minoan Great goddess. The labyrinth was both a winding dance-ground and in the Greek view a prison with the dreaded Minotaur at its centre. It is possible that some religious practices, especially the mysteries were transferred from a Cretan priesthood to Eleusis, where Demeter brought the poppy from Crete. Besides these similarities, Burkert notifies that up to now we don’t know to what extent one can and must differentiate between Minoan and Mycenean religion. It seems that the Minoan vegetation goddess Ariadne was absorbed by more powerful divinities. She survived in Greek folklore as the consort of Dionysos, with whom she was worshiped in some local cults. In the Anthesteria Dionysos is the "divine child".

In the historical times the Minoan "cult of the tree", was almost forgotten. It existed in some local cults like the cult of the vegetation goddess Helena Dendritēs (dendron, "tree") in Rhodes, and a cult of Artemis in Peloponnese. In this cult Artemis is hanged from a tree, just like Ariadne in Greek mythology, who was hanged from a tree when she was abandoned by Theseus.

Mycenean Greece

Two women or goddesses on a chariot. Fresco from Tiryns, 1200 BC. National Archaeological Museum of Athens

Procession of women with animal-masks, or of hybrid creatures. Detail from the marble veil of Despoina at Lycosura

It seems that the Greek deities began their career as powers of nature, but then they were given other functions and attributes by the worshippers. The powers of animal nature fostered a belief in nymphs, whose existence was bound to the trees or the waters which they haunted, and in gods with human forms and the heads or tails of animals. The ancient gods with tails of animals who stood for primitive bodily insticts, were considered to protect the flocks and herds, and some of them survived in the cult of Dionysos (Satyrs and Seilinoi) and Pan (the goat-god). Such figures were believed to give help to men who watched over crops and herds, and later they were below the Olympians.

There is evidence of a cult in Eleusis from the Mycenean period, however there are not sacral finds from this period. The cult was private and we don’t have any information about it. Besides the names of some Greek gods in the Mycenean Greek inscriptions, appear also names of goddesses, like "the divine Mother" ( the mother of the gods) or "the Goddess (or priestess) of the winds", who don’t have Mycenean origin. In historical times Demeter and Kore were usually referred to as "the goddesses" or "the mistresses" ( Arcadia) in the mysteries. In the Mycenean Greek tablets dated 1400-1200 BC, the "two mistresses ( potniai ) and the king" are mentioned. John Chadwick believes that these were the precursor divinities of Demeter, Persephone and Poseidon. In the discovered cult centre of Mycenea, the inner room contained a fresco depicting a goddess wearing a boar’s tusk. The subterranean House of the Idols, contained clay figures of coiled snakes, and numerous big and strange idols with faces painted in a terrifying mask-like manner. Close stands the House of Frescoes, and the fresco in the main room represented a priestess or goddess with ears of corn in her hand.

Persephone was conflated with Despoina, "the mistress", a chthonic divinity in West- Arcadia. The megaron of Eleusis, is quite similar with the "megaron" of Despoina at Lycosura. The names Demeter and Kore are Greek, and this probably indicates that the Greeks adopted these divinities during their wandering, and that they were later fused with local divinities in the ancient cults. The Arcadian cults come from a more primitive religion, and evidently the religious beliefs of the first Greek-speaking people who entered the region, were mixed with the beliefs of the indigenous population. Most of the temples were built near springs, and in some of them there is evidence of the existence of a fire, which was always burning. At Lycosura, a fire was burning in front of the temple of Pan (the goat-god). In Eleusis in a ritual one child "pais" initiated from the herth. The name pais (the divine child) appears in the Mycenean inscriptions., and the ritual indicates the transition from the old funerary practices to the Greek cremation.

Perspective reconstruction of the temple of Despoina at Lycosura: The acrolithic statues of Demeter (L) and Despoina (R) are visible at the scale in the cella

The two goddesses, were closely related with the springs and the animals. At Lycosura on a marble relief on the veil of Despoina appear figures with the heads of different animals obviously in a ritual dance, and some of them hold a flute. These could be hybrid creatures or a procession of women with animal-masks. Similar processions of daemons, or human figures with animal-masks appear on Mycenean frescoes and goldrings . It seems that Demeter and Kore, were the first from a series of daemons with the same nature, just as Artemis was the first of the nymphs.

Demeter and Persephone, were the two Great Goddesses of the Arcadian mysteries. Despoine was one of her surnames just as the surname of Persephone Kore. Her name was not allowed to be revealed to the not initiated, and she was daughter of Demeter, who was united with the god of the storms and rivers Poseidon Hippios (horse). In northern European folklore, the river spirit of the underworld appears frequently as a horse. The union of the fertility goddess with the beast which represents the masculine fertility, is an old Near Eastern myth, which appears in many primitive agricultural societies. The ritual copulation in Minoan Crete was related with moon-goddesses like Europa and Pasiphae, but this cult was almost forgotten by the Greeks. It survived in the myths of the hybrid-creature Minotaur, and of the abduction of the Phoenecian princess Europa by the white bull. (Zeus) The animal-headed gods were depicted in the local cults of isolated Arcadia, or in Crete in the depiction of the dog-headed Hecate. The animal masks were substituted by masks representing human faces, as it appears in the temple of Artemis Orthia at Sparta. Dancing girls used these masks during the annual "vegetation ritual ".

Triptolemus, Demeter, and Persephone by the Triptolemos Painter,ca 470BC

The Minoan "cult of the tree" appears also in Mycenean seals and jewellerry, however we don’t know if this cult in Greece was similar with the Minoan. A dinstinctive feature on Minoan gold rings is a large imposed tree, set apart as sacred. The deity appears in dance beneath the tree. Generally it is fig and olive trees which seem to be depicted Later the cult of Dionysos was closely associated with trees, specifically the fig tree, and some of his bynames exhibit this, such as Endendros or Dendritēs ( dendron, "tree"). According to Pherecydes of Syros, the second element of his name is derived from nũsa, an archaic word for "tree". It is possible that the meaning of tree was re-interpreted to the name of the mountain Nysa, the birthplace of Dionysos, according to the axis mundi of Indo-European mythology . In Greek mythology Nysa is a mythical mountain with unknown location. Nysion (or Mysion), the place of the abduction of Persephone was also probably a mythical place which didn’t exist in the map, a magically distant chthonic land of myth which was intended in the remote past.

Greek mythology

Abduction myth

See also: Rape of Persephone

Sarcophagus with the abduction of Persephone. Walters Art Museum. Baltimore, Maryland

Persephone used to live far away from the other deities, a goddess within Nature herself before the days of planting seeds and nurturing plants. In the Olympian telling, the gods Hermes, Ares, Apollo, and Hephaestus had all wooed Persephone; but Demeter rejected all their gifts and hid her daughter away from the company of the Olympian deities. The story of her abduction by Pluto against her will, is traditionally referred to as the Rape of Persephone. It is first mentioned in Hesiod's Theogony. Zeus, it is said, advised Pluto (Hades) who was in love with the beautiful Persephone, to carry her off, as her mother Demeter, was not likely to allow her daughter to go down to Hades. Persephone was gathering flowers with Artemis and Athena, the Homeric hymn says—or Leucippe, or Oceanids—in a field when Hades came to abduct her, bursting through a cleft in the earth. Demeter, when she found her daughter had disappeared, searched for her all over the earth with torches. In most versions she forbids the earth to produce, or she neglects the earth and in the depth of her despair she causes nothing to grow. Helios, the sun, who sees everything, eventually told Demeter what had happened and at length she discovered the place of her abode. Finally, Zeus, pressed by the cries of the hungry people and by the other deities who also heard their anguish, forced Hades to return Persephone.

Hades abducting Persephone, wall painting in the small royal tomb at Vergina. Macedonia, Greece

Hades indeed complied with the request, but first he tricked her giving her a kernel of a pomegranate to eat. She ate four seeds, which correspond to the dry summer months in Greece. It was a rule of the Fates that whoever consumed food or drink in the Underworld was doomed to spend eternity there. Persephone was released by Hermes, who had been sent to retrieve her, but she was obliged to spend four months of a year in the underworld, and the remaining two thirds with the gods above. The various local traditions place Persephone's abduction in a different location. The Sicilians, among whom her worship was probably introduced by the Corinthian and Megarian colonists, believed that Hades found her in the meadows near Enna, and that a well arose on the spot where he descended with her into the lower world. The Cretans thought that their own island had been the scene of the rape, and the Eleusinians mentioned the Nysian plain in Boeotia, and said that Persephone had descended with Hades into the lower world at the entrance of the western Oceanus. Later accounts place the rape in Attica, near Athens, or near Eleusis.

The return of Persephone, by Frederic Leighton (1891)

The Homeric hymn mentions the Nysion (or Mysion), probably a mythical place which didn’t exist in the map. The locations of this mythical place may simply be conventions to show that a magically distant chthonic land of myth was intended in the remote past. Before Persephone was abducted by Hades, the shepherd Eumolpus and the swineherd Eubuleus, saw a girl being carried of into the earth which had violently opened up, in a black chariot, driven by an invisible driver. Eubuleus was feeding his pigs at the opening to the underworld when Persephone was abducted by Plouton. His swine were swallowed by the earth along with her, and the myth is an etiology for the relation of pigs with the ancient rites in Thesmophoria, and in Eleusis.

In the hymn, Persephone returns and she is reunited with her mother near Eleusis. Demeter as she has been promised established her mysteries (orgies) when the Eleusinians built for her a temple near the spring of Callichorus. These were awful mysteries, which were not allowed to be uttered. The uninitiated would spent a miserable existence in the gloomy space of Hades, after death.

In some versions, Ascalaphus informed the other deities that Persephone had eaten the pomegranate seeds. When Demeter and her daughter were reunited, the Earth flourished with vegetation and color, but for some months each year, when Persephone returned to the underworld, the earth once again became a barren realm. This is an origin story to explain the seasons.

In an earlier version, Hecate rescued Persephone. On an Attic red-figured bell krater of ca 440 BC in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Persephone is rising as if up stairs from a cleft in the earth, while Hermes stands aside; Hecate, holding two torches, looks back as she leads her to the enthroned Demeter.

The tenth-century Byzantine encyclopedia Suda introduces a goddess of a blessed afterlife assured to Orphic mystery initiates. This Macaria is asserted to be the daughter of Hades, but no mother is mentioned.

Pluto-Interpretetion of the myth

Pinax of Persephone and Hades from Locri . Reggio Calabria, National Museum of Magna Graecia.

In the myth Pluto abducts Persephone to be his wife and the queen of his realm. Pluto ( Πλούτων, Ploutōn) was a name for the ruler of the underworld; the god was also known as Hades, a name for the underworld itself. The name Pluton was conflated with that of Ploutos ( Πλούτος Ploutos, "wealth"), a god of wealth, because mineral wealth was found underground, and because Pluto as a chthonic god ruled the deep earth that contained the seeds necessary for a bountiful harvest. Plouton is lord of the dead, but as Persephone's husband he has serious claims to the powers of fertility.

In the Theogony of Hesiod Demeter was united with the hero Iasion in Crete and she bore Ploutos, who can make everyone rich. This union seems to be a reference to a hieros gamos (ritual copulation) to ensure the earth's fertility. This ritual copulation appears in Minoan Crete, in many Near Eastern agricultural societies, and also in the Anthesteria

Nilsson believes that the original cult of Ploutos ( or Pluto) in Eleusis was similar with the Minoan cult of the "divine child", who died in order to be reborn. The child was abandoned by his mother and then it was brought up by the powers of nature. Similar myths appear in the cults of Hyakinthos (Amyklai), Erichthonios (Athens), and later in the cult of Dionysos.

The Greek version of the abduction myth, is related with the corn which was the most important and rare in the Greek environment, and the return (ascent) of Persephone was celebrated at the autumn sowing. Pluto (Ploutos) represents the wealth of the corn that was stored in underground silos or ceramic jars (pithoi), during summer months. Similar subterranean pithoi were used in ancient times for burials and Pluto is fused with Hades, the King of the realm of the dead. During summer months, the Greek Corn-Maiden (Kore) is lying in the corn of the underground silos, in the realm of Hades and she is fused with Persephone, the Queen of the underworld. At the beginning of the autumn, when the seeds of the old crop are laid on the fields, she ascends and is reunited with her mother Demeter, for at that time the old crop and the new meet each other. For the initiated this union was the symbol of the eternity of human life that flows from the generations which spring from each other.

Elysion

Hesiod refers to the island of the "happy dead" and it is the Elysion, where according to an old Minoan belief, the departed could have a different, but happier existence. Elysion is probably counterpart with Eleusis, the city of the Eleusinian mysteries, and it may have been oferred like a reward to the initiated. The Greeks believed that only the beloved of the gods could exist there. Pindar in some fragments speeks for the immortality of the souls, which may spent in Elysion a happy eternity. In Odyssey Homer carries the old belief to the ideal island for mortals Scheria, the imaginary perfect world that was offered to the future emigrants. This island, which the tradition relates with Elysion, became the lost dream of the Greek world.

The Arcadian myths

From L-R,Artemis,Demeter,Veil of Despoina,Anytus,Tritoness from the throne of Despoina at Lycosura. National Archaeological Museum of Athens

The primitive myths of isolated Arcadia seem to be related with the first Greek-speaking people who came from the north-east during the bronze age. Despoina, (the mistress) the goddess of the Arcadian mysteries, is the daughter of Demeter and Poseidon Hippios (horse), who represents the river spirit of the underworld that appears as a horse as often happens in northern-European folklore. He pursues the mare-Demeter and from the union she bears the horse Arion and a daughter who originally had the form or the shape of a mare. The two goddesses were not clearly separated and they were closely connected with the springs and the animals. They were related with the god of rivers and springs; Poseidon and especially with Artemis, the Mistress of the Animals who was the first nymph. According to the Greek tradition a hunt-goddess preceded the harvest goddess. In Arcadia Demeter and Persephone were often called Despoinai (Δέσποιναι, "the mistresses") in historical times. They are the two Great Goddesses of the Arcadian cults, and evidently they come from a more primitive religion. The Greek god Poseidon probably substituted the companion (Paredros, Πάρεδρος) of the Minoan Great goddess . in the Arcadian mysteries.

Queen of the Underworld

Seated goddess, probably Persephone on her throne in the underworld, Severe style ca 480–60, found at Tarentum, Magna Graecia (Pergamon Museum, Berlin)

Persephone held an ancient role as the dread queen of the Underworld, within which tradition it was forbidden to speak her name. This tradition comes from her conflation with the very old chthonic divinity Despoina (the mistress), whose real name could not be revealed to anyone except those initiated to her mysteries. As goddess of death she was also called a daughter of Zeus and Styx, the river that formed the boundary between Earth and the underworld. Homer describes her as the formidable, venerable majestic queen of the shades, who carries into effect the curses of men upon the souls of the dead, along with her husband Hades. In the reformulation of Greek mythology expressed in the Orphic Hymns, Dionysus and Melinoe are separately called children of Zeus and Persephone. Groves sacred to her stood at the western extremity of the earth on the frontiers of the lower world, which itself was called "house of Persephone".

Her central myth served as the context for the secret rites of regeneration at Eleusis, which promised immortality to initiates.

Cult of Persephone

Persephone was worshipped along with her mother Demeter and in the same mysteries. Her cults included agrarian magic, dancing, and rituals. The priests used special vessels and holy symbols, and the people participated with rhymes. In Eleusis there is evidence of sacred laws and other inscriptios

Cult of Demeter and the Maiden is found at Attica, in the main festivals Thesmophoria and Eleusinian mysteries and in a lot of local cults. These festivals were almost always celebrated at the autunn showing, and at full-moon according to the Greek tradition. In some local cults the fests were dedicated to Demeter.

Thesmophoria

Main article: Thesmophoria

Kore, daughter of Demeter, celebrated with her mother by the Thesmophoriazusae (women of the festival). Acropolis Museum, Athens

Thesmophoria, were celebrated in Athens, and the festival was widely spread in Greece. This was a festival of secret women-only rituals connected with marriage customs and commemorated the third of the year, in the month Pyanepsion, when Kore was abducted and Demeter abstained from her role as goddess of harvest and growth. The ceremony involved sinking sacrifices into the earth by night and retrieving the decaying remains of pigs that had been placed in the megara of Demeter, ( trenches and pits or natural clefts in rock), the previous year. These were placed on altars, mixed with seeds, then planted. Pits rich in organic matter at Eleusis have been taken as evidence that the Thesmophoria was held there as well as in other demes of Attica. This agrarian magic was also used in the cult of the earth-goddesses potniai ( mistresses) in the Cabeirian, and in Knidos.

The festival was celebrated in three days. The first was the "way up" to the sacred space, the second the day of festing when they ate pomegranate seeds and the third was a meat fest in celebration of Kalligeneia a goddess of beautiful birth. Zeus penetrated the mysteries as Zeus- Eubuleus which is an euphemistical name of Hades (Chthonios Zeus). In the original myth which is an etiology for the ancient rites, Eubuleus was a swineherd who was feeding his pigs at the opening to the underworld when Persephone was abducted by Plouton. His swine were swallowed by the earth along with her.

Eleusinian mysteries

Main article: Eleusinian mysteries

The Eleusinian trio: Persephone, Triptolemus and Demeter on a marble bas-relief from Eleusis, 440-430 BC. National Archaeological Museum of Athens

The Eleusinian mysteries was a festival celebrated at the autumn sowing in the city Eleusis. Inscriptions are referring to "the Goddesses" accompanied by the agricultural god Triptolemos probably son of Ge and Oceanus . and "the God and the Goddess" (Persephone and Plouton) accompanied by Eubuleus who probably led the way back from the underworld. The myth was represented in a cycle with three phases: the "descent", the "search", and the "ascent", with contrasted emotions from sorrow to joy which roused the mystae to exultation. The main theme was the ascent of Persephone and the reunion with her mother Demeter. The festival activities included dancing, probably across the Rharian field, where according to the myth the first corn grew.

At the beginning of the fest the priests filled two special vessels and poured out, the one towards the west, the other towards the east. The people looking both to the sky and the earth shouted in a magical rhyme "rain and conceive". In a ritual a child initiated from the herth ( the divine fire). It was the ritual of the "divine child" who originally was Ploutos. In the Homeric hymn the ritual is connected with the myth of the agricultural god Triptolemos The high point of the celebration was "an ear of corn cut in silence", which represented the force of the new life. The idea of immortality didn't exist in the mysteries at the beginning, but the initiated believed that they would have a better fate in the underworld. Death remained a reality, but at the same time a new beginning like the plant which grows from the buried seed. In the earliest depictions Persephone is an armless and legless deity, who grows out of the ground.

Local cults

Demeter drives her horse-drawn chariot containing her daughter Persephone at Selinunte, Sicily 6th century BC

Local cults of Demeter an Kore existed in Greece, Asia Minor, Sicily, Magna Graecia, and Libya.

• Attica:
  • Athens, in the mysteries of Agrae. This was a local cult near the river Ilissos. They were celebrated during spring in the month Anthesterion. Later they became an obligation for the participants of the “great” Eleusinian mysteries. There was a temple of Demeter and Kore, and an image of Triptolemos.
  • Piraeus: The Skirophoria, a festival related with the Thesmophoria.
  • Megara: Cult of Demeter thesmophoros and Kore. The city was named after its megara .
  • Aegina: Cult of Demeter thesmophoros and Kore.
  • Phlya, near Koropi, in the mysteries of Phlya: These have very old roots, and were probably originally dedicated to Demeter Anesidora, Kore, and Zeus- Ktesios, who was the god of the underground stored corn. Pausanias mentions a temple of Demeter-Anesidora, Kore Protogone, and Zeus Ktesios. The surname Protogonos, indicates a later Orphic influence. It seems that the mysteries were related with the mysteries of Andania in Messene.
• Boeotia:
  • Thebes, which Zeus is said to have been given to her as an acknowledgement for a favour she had bestown to him. Pausanias records a grove of Cabeirian Demeter and the Maid, three miles outside the gates of Thebes, where a ritual was performed, so called on the grounds that Demeter gave it to the Cabeiri, who established it at Thebes. The Thebans told Pausanias that some inhabitants of Naupactus had performed the same rituals there, and had met with divine vengeance. The Cabeirian mysteries were introduced from Asia Minor at the end of the archaic period. There is not any information of the older cult, and it seems that the Cabeiri were originally wine- daemons. Inscriptions from the temple in Thebes mention the old one Cabir, and the new one son (pais), who are different. According to Pausanias, Pelarge the daughter of Potnieus, was connected with the cult of Demeter in the Cabeirian (potniai).
  • A fest in Boeotia, in the month Demetrios ( Pyanepsion), probably similar with the Thesmophoria.
  • Thebes: Cult of Demeter and Kore in a fest named Thesmophoria but probably different. It was celebrated in the summer month Bukatios.
• Peloponnese (except Arcadia)
  • Hermione  : An old cult of Demeter Chthonia, Kore, and Klymenos (Hades). Cows were pushed into the temple, and then they were killed by four women. It is possible that Hermione was a mythical name, the place of the souls.
  • Asine: Cult of Demeter Chthonia. The cult seems to be related with the original cult of Demeter in Hermione.
  • Lakonia: Temple of Demeter Eleusinia near Taygetos. The fest was named Eleuhinia, and the name was given before the relation of Demeter with the cult of Eleusis.
  • Lakonia at Aigila: Dedicated to Demeter. Men were excluded.
  • near Sparta: Cult of Demeter and Kore, the Demeters ( Δαμάτερες, ‘’Damaters’’). According to Hesychius, the fest lasted three days ( Thesmophoria).
  • Corinth: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Pluton.
  • Triphylia in Elis: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Hades.
  • Pellene: Dedicated to the Mysian Demeter. Men were excluded. The next day, men and women became naked.
  • Andania in Messenia (near the borders of Arcadia): Cult of the Great goddesses, Demeter and Hagne. Hagne , a goddess of the spring, was the original deity before Demeter. The temple was built near a spring.
• Arcadia
  • Pheneos : Mysteries of Demeter Thesmia and Demeter Eleusinia. The Eleusinian cult was introduced later. The priest took the “holy book’’ from a natural cleft. He used the mask of Demeter Kidaria, and he hit his stick on the earth, in a kind of agrarian magic. An Arcadian dance was named kidaris.
  • Pallantion near Tripoli: Cult of Demeter and Kore.
  • Karyai: Cult of Kore and Pluton.
  • Tegea: Cult of Demeter and Kore, the Karpophoroi, "Fruit givers".
  • Megalopolis: Cult of the Great goddesses, Demeter and Kore Sotira, "the savior ".
  • Mantineia: Cult of Demeter and Kore in the fest Koragia.
  • Trapezus: Mysteries of the Great goddesses, Demeter and Kore. The temple was built near a spring, and a fire was burning out of the earth.
  • near Thelpusa in Onkeion: Temple of Demeter Erinys (vengeful) and Demeter Lusia (bathing). In the myth Demeter was united with Poseidon Hippios (horse) and bore the horse Arion and the unnamed. The name Despoina was given in West Arcadia.
  • Phigalia: Cult of the mare-headed Demeter ( black), and Despoina. Demeter was depicted in her archaic form, a Medusa type with a horse's head with snaky hair, holding a dove and a dolphin. The temple was built near a spring
  • Lycosura,
    Main article: Despoina
    Cult of Demeter and Despoina. In the portico of the temple of Despoina there was a tablet with the inscriptions of the mysteries. In front of the temple there was an altar to Demeter and another to Despoine, after which was one of the Great Mother. By the sides stood Artemis and Anytos, the Titan who brought up Despoine. Besides the temple there was the hall where the Arcadians celebrated the mysteries A fire was always burning in front of the temple of Pan ( the goat-god), the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks. In a relief appear dancing animal-headed women ( or with animal-masks) in a procession. Near the temple have been found terracotta figures with human bodies, and heads of animals.
• Islands
  • Paros: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Zeus-Eubuleus.
  • Amorgos: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Zeus-Eubuleus.
  • Delos: Cult of Demeter, Kore, and Zeus-Eubuleus. Probably a different fest with the name Thesmophoria, celebrated in a summer month ( the same month in Thebes) . Two big loafs of bread were oferred to the two goddesses. Another fest was named ‘’Megalartia’’.
  • Mykonos: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Zeus-Buleus.
  • Crete : Cult of Demeter and Kore, in the month Thesmophorios.
  • Rhodes: Cult of Demeter and Kore, in the month Thesmophorios. The two goddesses are the Damaters in an inscription from Lindos
• Asia Minor
  • Knidos: Cult of Demeter, Kore and Pluton. Agrarian magic similar with the one used in Thesmophoria and in the cult of the potniai ( Cabeirian).
  • Ephesos : Cult of Demeter and Kore, celebrated at night-time.
  • Priene: Cult of Demeter and Kore, similar with the Thesmophoria.
• Sicily
  • Syracuse: There was a harvest festival of Demeter and Persephone at Syracuse when the grain was ripe (about May).
  • A fest Koris katagogi, the descent of Persephone into the underworld.
• Magna Graecia
  • Epizephyrian Locri: A temple associated with childbirth; its treasure was looted by Pyrrhus.
  • Archaeological finds suggest that worship of Demeter and Persephone was widespread in Sicily and Greek Italy.
• Libya
  • Cyrene: Temple of Demeter and Kore

Ancient literary references

• Homer:
  • Iliad:
    • "the gods fulfilled his curse, even Zeus of the nether world and dread Persephone." (9, line 457; A. T. Murray, trans)
    • "Althea prayed instantly to the gods, being grieved for her brother's slaying; and furthermore instantly beat with her hands upon the all-nurturing earth, calling upon Hades and dread Persephone" (9, 569)
  • Odyssey:
    • "And come to the house of Hades and dread Persephoneia to seek sooth saying of the spirit of Theban Teiresias. To him even in death Persephoneia has granted reason that ..." (book 10, card 473)
• Hymns to Demeter
  • Hymn 2:
    • "Mistress Demeter goddess of heaven, which God or mortal man has rapt away Persephone and pierced with sorrow your dear heart?(hymn 2, card 40)
  • Hymn 13:
    • "I start to sing for Demeter the lovely-faced goddess, for her and her daughter the most beautiful Persephoneia. Hail goddess keep this city safe!" (hymn 13, card 1)
• Pindar
  • Olympian:
    • "Now go Echo, to the dark-walled home of Phersephona."(book O, poem 14)
  • Isthmean:
    • "Aecus showed them the way to the house of Phersephona and nymphs, one of them carrying a ball."(book 1, poem 8)
  • Nemean:
    • "Island which Zeus, the lord of Olympus gave to Phersephona;he nodded descent with his flowers hair."(book N, poem 1)
  • Pythian:
    • "You spendlor-loving city, most beautiful on earth, home of Phersephona. You who inhabit the hill of well-built dwellings."(book P, poem 12)
• Aeschylus
  • Libation bearers:
    • Electra:"O Phersephassa, grant us indeed a glorious victory!"(card 479)
• Aristophanes
  • Thesmophoriazusae:
    • Mnesilochos:"Thou Mistress Demeter, the most valuable friend and thou Pherephatta, grant that I may be able to offer you!" (card 266)
• Euripides
  • Alcestis:
    • "O' you brave and best hail, sitting as attendand Beside's Hades bride Phersephone!"(card 741)
  • Hecuba:
    • "It is said that any of the dead that stand beside Phersephone, that the Danaids have left the plains to Troy."(card 130)
• Bacchylides
  • Epinicians:
    • "Flashing thunderbolt went down to the halls of slender-ankled Phersephona to bring up into the light of Hades." (book Ep. poem 5)
• Vergil
  • The Aeneid:
    • "For since she had not died through fate, or by a well-earned death, but wretchedly, before her time, inflamed with sudden madness, Proserpine had not yet taken a lock of golden hair from her head, or condemned her soul to Stygian Orcus." (IV.696-99)

Modern reception

In 1934, Igor Stravinsky based his melodrama Perséphone on Persephone's story. In 1961, Frederick Ashton of the Royal Ballet appropriated Stravinsky's score, to choreograph a ballet starring Svetlana Beriosova as Persephone.

Persephone also appears many times in popular culture.

Main article: Persephone in popular culture

See also

• Anthesphoria, festival honoring Proserpina, and Persephone
• Potnia

References

• Apollodorus, Apollodorus, The Library, with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.
• Bowra Maurice (1957), The Greek experience. The World Publishing Company, Cleveland and New York.
• Burkert Walter (1985). Greek Religion. Harvard University Press . ISBN 0-674-36281-0
• Farnell, Lewis Richard (1906), The Cults of the Greek States, Volume 3 (Chapters on: Demeter and Kore-Persephone; Cult-Monuments of Demeter-Kore; Ideal Types of Demeter-Kore).
• Janda, Michael (2010), Die Musik nach dem Chaos. Innsbruck
• Homer, The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes, Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1924.
• Homer, The Odyssey with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, PH.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1919.
• Kerenyi Karl (1967), Eleusis: Archetypal image of mother and daughter . Princeton University Press.
• Kerenyi, Karl (1976), Dionysos: Archetypal Image of Indestructible Life, Princeton: Bollingen, Google Books preview
• Nilsson Martin (1967), Die Geschichte der Griechischen Religion, Vol I , C.F Beck Verlag, Muenchen. Revised ed.
• Nilsson Martin (1950), Minoan-Mycenaean Religion, and its Survival in Greek Religion, Lund:Gleerup. Revised 2nd ed.
• Pausanias, Pausanias Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918.
• Rohde Erwin (1961), Psyche. Seelenkult und Unsterblichkeitsglaube der Griechen. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellshaft. Darmstad. (First edition 1893) : full text in German downloadable as pdf.
• Rohde Erwin (2000), Psyche: The Cult of Souls and the Belief in Immortality among the Greeks , trans. from the 8th edn. by W. B. Hillis (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1925; reprinted by Routledge, 2000), online
• Schachermeyr Fritz (1964), Die Minoische Kultur des alten Kreta, W.Kohlhammer Verlag Stuttgart.
• Smith, William; Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London (1873). "Perse'phone"
• Zuntz Günther (1973), Persephone: Three Essays on Religion and Thought in Magna Graecia

External links

• Martin Nilsson. The Greek popular religion
• Adams John Paul. Mycenean divinities
• Theoi project:Persephone Goddess
• Theoi project:The Rape of Persephone
• The Princeton Encyclopedia of classical sites:Despoina
• Theoi project:Despoine
• Kore Photographs
• Flickr users' photos tagged with Persephone