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Tuesday, March 15, 2005
persephone
persephone, queen of the underworld, daughter of demeter, from greek mythology, is often seen as evil. however, shes not - nor is hades, but thats another story.
she was just picking flowers or whatever one day when hades decided he wanted her to be his queen. so, he rode up in his chariot, snatched her, and disappeared into the underworld. demeter, goddess of the harvest, went looking for her daughter, but couldnt find her. desolate, she wandered about cursing everything alive and causing a huge famine. zues, who'd had no problem with his brother marrying his daughter, realized he should not have chosen demeter's daughter to be hades' wife. so, he demanded persephone's return.
this whole time, persephone had wandered about the underworld miserably, but did not eat any food nor did she drink anything. as a parting wish, however, hades requested that she at least eat something. being a stupid softy, persephone ate three pomegranet seeds, not knowing that having eaten of the underworld she could never leave it. so the fates worked out a compromise: for the summer months, persephone would live aboveground with her mother demeter, and come fall she would return to hades. while she was in the underworld, demeter would be inconsolable, and nothing could grow. with her return, new buds would sprout and plants would live and grow again.
later, when they had forgotten this story, many greeks would hate persephone because of her domain and what awaited them there; and they would curse her name and dread ever seeing her, which was really not her fault at all.
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