The Return of Persephone by Frederic Leighton
I love how the Greeks used storytelling to explain the mysteries of the world. Like the story of Demeter (goddess of fertility) and her daughter, Persephone, which explains the changing of the seasons…
Persephone had been picking flowers, when a great chasm opened up behind her and Hades (god of the Underworld) rode out in a chariot and took her, bringing her with him back down into the Underworld (making her the goddess of the Underworld).
Life came to a standstill as the depressed Demeter searched for her lost daughter, wandering the Earth night and day.
Finally, Zeus (the chief god and also Persephone’s father) could not put up with the dying earth and forced Hades to return Persephone by sending Hermes (the winged messenger of the gods) to retrieve her.
Hades agreed, but before Persephone was released she had been persuaded to eat four pomegranate seeds (in ancient mythology, to eat the fruit of one’s captor meant that one would have to return to the captor), which forced her to return to the underworld for four months each year (which corresponds with winter).
There was great rejoicing on earth at Persephone’s return and Demeter allowed the earth to bear crops once again. Her return marks the beginning of spring, which leads to the fruit of summer and the seeds of autumn, which in turn lead inevitably to the new growth of the next spring.
Check back tomorrow for more from my trip to Greece!
Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demeter; Greek and Roman Mythology A to Z by Kathleen N. Daly
