But her anger and sadness were still great, so he created a great drought to convince the gods to release her daughter from Hades.Īs the drought cost the lives of many, Zeus finally sent Hermes to persuade Hades to release his ill-gotten bride. Once the temple in Eleusis was completed, Demeter withdrew from the world and lived inside it. A temple was also built in honor of the goddess, thus commencing the celebrated sanctuary of Eleusis and the Eleusinian Mysteries, which lasted for over a millennium. There the goddess cared for Demophon, the son of Keleos, king of Eleusis, who would later offer the gift of grain to humanity and teach farming. Meanwhile, Demeter starts searching every corner of the Earth for the precious daughter and although Helios (or Hermes) told her of her daughter’s fate, she, nevertheless, continued her wanderings, disguised as an old lady with a torch in her hands, for nine long days and nine long nights, until she finally arrived at Eleusis. Thus, Hades was able to trap her in his underground kingdom where he made her his wife.Īlthough at first Persephone was very unhappy in the Underworld, in time she came to love Hades and live happily with him. The gods had caused the ground to split underneath Persephone, and then she slipped beneath the Earth. However, to her utter fright, she saw the tiny hole from which she had drawn out the flower shaft, grow rapidly in size until it started to resemble a mighty enormous chasm. You might like: The 12 Gods of Mount Olympus. She pulled with all her power and the narcissus only came out after a lot of effort. Therefore, she decided to go alone and pluck the flower from the bosom of Gaia. She called upon her playmates, the sea Nymphs, to accompany her but they couldn’t possibly go with her as leaving the side of their water bodies would result in their death. He then asked his brother Zeus, an expert in abductions, to assist him, and so the two of them devised a plan to trap her.Īs Kore was playing with her companions, she noticed a beautiful yellow flower narcissus. The location of the crime is being traditionally placed in either Sicily (famed for its fertility) or Asia.

The Myth of Hades and PersephoneĪccording to myth, Hades fell instantly in love with divinely beautiful Persephone when he saw her picking flowers one day in nature. Persephone is also associated with the Eleusinian Mysteries, the greatest religious initiations of antiquity. In this guise, she is considered the queen of the Underworld and a protector of the souls of the dead. She was also the wife of Hades, the god of the Underworld, and brother of Zeus and Poseidon. Persephone, also known as Kore, was the daughter of the Olympian goddess Demeter, and she was thus associated with vegetation and grain. The myth of Hades and Persephone is one of the most well-known stories of love and abduction in Greek mythology.

Hades and persephone