Demeter

Greek mythology · deity · grain, agriculture, the seasons

Goddess of the harvest, whose grief-strike over her abducted daughter Persephone left the earth barren until a compromise was struck, the myth the Greeks told to explain winter, and the heart of the Eleusinian Mysteries.

Stories

The Abduction of Persephone

Gathering flowers, Persephone is swallowed by the opening earth and carried to the underworld by Hades. Demeter's grief starves the world until Zeus relents; but Persephone has eaten pomegranate seeds below, and Hecate's torches light her yearly passage between the dead and the spring.