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Demeter

Demeter. By Tia Dickhut. Background. Roman- Ceres Goddess of corn and the Harvest Also presided over cycle of life and death, the sanctity of marriage and sacred law. Background Con’t. Sometimes identified with Rhea and Gaia as the fertility goddess

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Demeter

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  1. Demeter By Tia Dickhut

  2. Background • Roman- Ceres • Goddess of corn and the Harvest • Also presided over cycle of life and death, the sanctity of marriage and sacred law

  3. Background Con’t • Sometimes identified with Rhea and Gaia as the fertility goddess • Most beneficial to humans in agriculture, but also gave Mysteries, which initiate higher hope in this life and the afterlife

  4. Background Con’t • Symbol is poppy and torch • Often portrayed as a solemn woman wearing a wreath of braided ears of corn • Sacred animals were the snake and the pig

  5. Family • Daughter of Cronus and Rhea • Sister of Zeus, by whom she is the mother of Persephone • Son Ploutos by Iasion

  6. Abduction of Persephone • Hades, the god of the Underworld, desired a queen • One day Persephone was collecting flowers in a field when the earth opened up and Hades snatched her away to become his wife • Demeter wandered the earth, desolate at the loss of her only daughter

  7. Abduction of Persephone • The harvest was poor, and the earth barren • She came to Eleusis in human form and was taken in by the king and queen to be a nurse • She placed their son in the fire every night after the parents had gone to sleep to burn away the mortality of the son • One night, the queen caught her and was , surprisingly, horrified

  8. Abduction of Persephone • To appease Demeter’swrath, a temple was built in which she locked herself away • After Helios, the sun god, revealed to Demeter who had taken her daughter, she appealed to Zeus to force Hades to give her daughter back • His refusal to release their daughter led to her refusal to let crops return and the harvest continued to perish

  9. Abduction of Persephone • Zeus realized that he had no choice and told Hades to let Persephone go • Hades wittily slipped Persephone a pomegranate seed, so she was bound to spend one-third of the year in the Underworld as the wife of Hades • While Persephone is in the Underworld, her mother mourns and refuses to allow crops to grow until her daughter is returned

  10. Legacy • The abduction of Persephone is the basis for the cycle of the seasons • Persephone is the fructified flower that returns in the Spring, bringing life and joy with her to the earth, left barren by Winter

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