Demeter, Persephone and Triptolemos (the boy). An 1899 drawing from a stone carving found at Eleusis. |
Demeter
Roman name: Ceres
Goddess of the harvest
Demeter was a grain goddess and symbol of fertility.
She was typically depicted with ears of grain or a basket full of fruit and flowers. Sometimes she bears a torch to seek Persephone in the underworld.
Sacred animals include the pig (domesticated animal and fertility symbol) and snake (as underworld deity).
Grain Goddess
Demeter was a goddess of fertility and agriculture. Her name may mean either ‘grain mother’ or ‘earth mother’. She taught mankind how to grow and harvest crops, so was responsible for ordered society and, as such was also a goddess of health, birth and marriage.
However, Demeter had a darker side to her character: she was also worshipped as a goddess of the underworld. She was also known as Erinys (‘Avenger’) and Melaina (‘The Black One’).
Demeter and Persephone
Demeter was one of the major Olympian gods: a daughter of Cronus and Rhea and the sister and consort of Zeus.
Demeter and Zeus had a daughter, Persephone, who was abducted by Hades and taken to the underworld. The distraught Demeter searched endlessly for her daughter, forgetting her other duties. Without her overseeing the harvest, famine overtook the world.
To restore order Zeus forced Hades to allow Persephone to return to her mother for eight months of the year. But Demeter would only allow growth when her daughter was with her, so winter reigned in the four months of the year when Persephone was in the underworld. The story is thus another myth explaining the cycle of growth and decay with the changing seasons.
Eleusinian Mysteries
Demeter and Persephone were especially venerated in the Eleusinian mysteries - an annual festival at Eleusis in which participants observed secret sacred rituals.