Tag Archives: Persephone

By Sean Kelly, Managing Editor, Classical Wisdom The myth of Persephone and Hades, that tale of shifting seasons, strangely remains evergreen. Through the centuries, the story of the god of the underworld abducting the goddess Demeter’s daughter, resulting in Demeter’s winter-inducing depression, has endured as one of the most popular and continuously retold stories from

Written by Mary Naples, Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom Part 1 of this series can be found here. From the deep recesses of the Archaic era to enlightened Imperial Rome, the list of initiates into the Eleusinian Mysteries, a popular cult honoring the goddesses Demeter and Persephone, reads like a who’s who of the Classical era.

Written By Walter Borden, M.D., Contributing Writer, Classical Wisdom Aeschylus speaks to me. Born in Eleusis, a village just north of Athens and the haunting grounds of the goddess Demeter, said to be the goddess of fertility and the harvest. To Aeschylus that was just a myth that masked her true identity—the goddess of grief.

By Mary E. Naples, M.A. In the indigo light of the early morning, wearing white robes and carrying torches, the pious women ascended the hill to the Thesmophorion (sanctuary to Demeter) in observance of their three day long annual festival honoring Demeter, goddess of the harvest, and her daughter Persephone. Were they chanting? Were they

by Mary E. Naples, M.A. Who were Demeter and Persephone and why did their myth resonate so strongly with women of ancient Greece? The story of Demeter, goddess of the harvest, and her daughter Persephone, queen of the underworld, has inspired many. And while there are twenty-two variations of the myth, it is the Homeric