Episode 21 - Hades and Persephone

You counted yourself blessed. Your fields were filled with crops that grew quickly, and the hills nearby were filled with thick grass for grazing, and beautiful flowers. The year had been kind. The rain was plentiful, and the storms had lacked destructive force.

You spent your days walking the fields and grazing your flock along the hills. You would often sleep along the edge of the hills when the weather was mild. Staring up at the starry night and the distant slopes of the mountain. You felt secure, with the mountain so close, you knew that those that lived there were watching over the valley, and kept your land peaceful.

Normally, you would go for days without seeing another person, your grazing journey marked by lonely contemplation. Then one day, you see someone. A young woman standing at the top of one of the hills. Even from this distance, she is impossibly beautiful, and you realize immediately, she is not human.

She is one of those who dwell upon the slopes of Mount Olympus. She is one of the gods.

Among the most influential and well-known of all the Ancient Greek myths is the story of Hades and Persephone. Persephone was the daughter of Zeus and Demeter. Zeus was leader of the gods, and god of the sky and all that it held. Demeter was the goddess of agriculture, who brought bountiful harvests to the people of Greece.

The myth of Persephone’s abduction by Hades, and their eventual marriage, was seen as the story of the seasons. Persephone’s absence from the world, when she lives for part of the year with Hades in the underworld, drives her mother to a deep grief that causes the world to fall infertile, and barren of crops. And when she returns, back to the world above-ground, the world rejoices in rains and harvest.

There are many variations on the myth of Persephone and Hades. That’s to be expected of any story after thousands of years of translations.

In nearly every version, Persephone is abducted by Hades, and in some she remains forever a reluctant queen. In others, she embraces her role as Queen of the Underworld.

Join me today, in exploring some of the variations of the myth of Persephone and Hades, king and queen of the Greek Underworld. Almost as soon as you’d noticed the girl, she vanished behind the crest of the hill. You wished that she had stayed longer. It was amazing to witness divinity. You trekked up further into the hills than you would normally go, trying to catch another glimpse of her, but she had gone too fast. You were forced to return to your flock and give up your pursuit.

You continued on your way, and returned to your home. You told your story in the town, but you’re sure that most people didn’t believe you when you claimed what you had seen.

Weeks went by. You found yourself once more grazing in the hills, where the grass was dotted with colorful flowers. You crested a hill, ahead of your grazing flock and you saw her again. She was walking slowly through the field, picking flowers calmly, collecting them into small bouquets.

Then, as you watched, she leaned down and reached for a beautiful flower. The ground ruptured, a massive chasm opening in moments. Out of the earth came a tall man riding in a black carriage.

He forcibly lifted the goddess from the ground, drawing her into the carriage, and then as quickly as it came, it spun and the strange vessel vanished back beneath the earth as the chasm sealed.

You were left in stunned silence for a long while, staring at the small, crooked line in the grass where the world opened to swallow the goddess.

Most versions of the myth say that while Persephone danced through a garden, she spotted a beautiful narcissus flower. She decided to pluck the flower, but to her dismay, the tiny hole left in the earth where she plucked it began to widen and grow. Quickly, a chariot pulled by galloping horses burst from the chasm bearing Hades, who kidnapped her away to the underworld.

She was accompanied by nymphs at the time, but although they tried to stop Hades, they were no match for the god of the Underworld.

Demeter quickly learned of her daughter’s disappearance, although most versions contest she did not know who had taken her daughter, only that she was gone.

Only Helios, god of the sun, could identify Hades as the kidnapper. But Helios kept to himself, and Demeter fell into a deep despair. In her despair, she caused nothing to grow, and the world began to starve.

You stood in the field stunned. Trying to understand what had happened, what you’d seen. Eventually you had to force yourself to turn and return to your flock. You leave.

Had you remained, you might have seen what happened next. You might have seen the woman appear in the field. The way the flowers bloomed and flourished simply by her presence. The way the world bent around her.

You might have heard her voice as she called out for her daughter. First, languidly, then with growing concern. As her despair seemed to grow, the flowers and plants wilted in moments. The field around her blighted, and the grazing lands of the hills began to dry out and die.

She cried out for her daughter, and as she did the sky grew dark with clouds.

But you only knew that there was going to be a storm, for you left before the gods arrived, a crime that they would believe was without witness.

In some versions of the myth, Demeter fell into despair, and wandered the earth looking for her daughter. She searched far and wide, but with no luck as she never searched the land of the dead. She grew more and more bitter, and the world suffered for it. Eventually, her friend Hecate, goddess of the wilderness recommended she speak to Helios - for the sun-god sees everything.

Demeter took Hecate’s advice and visited Helios, pleading for information about her daughter’s whereabouts.

Helios felt sorry for her, of course, her pain was evident. And so he revealed to Demeter that Persephone was taken by Hades. Demeter realized Zeus must have known of his brother’s actions, and grew deeply angry. She abandoned her duties as a harvest goddess, and the world began to dry up. People began to starve as crops blighted and failed, plants withered, and animals starved.

Eventually, these cries reached Zeus upon the slopes of Mount Olympus, and he knew he had to do something. So he promised Demeter to bring Persephone back, if she truly stayed with Hades against her will. If she wanted to remain in the Underworld with Hades, he would let her remain however.

The months following your sighting of the girl were difficult. Crops that had once flourished began to fail. Your animals starved for lack of grain. You and your family were barely getting by. And elsewhere was no better, if the news was to be believed. It was like everywhere, all at once, had become barren.

The grazing lands fell dry and dead, and your flock was diminished. Although you wouldn’t say so, you were terribly worried that if something didn’t change, you would starve.

You didn’t really know why, but you felt drawn back to that meadow, the one where the girl had been taken from. And so, you packed up a meager meal and you left. You led no flock this time, you wanted to travel quickly, even if you didn’t really know why.

Eventually, you found it. No longer the verdant and colorful field, but a dry yellow plain like everywhere else. But there were people there. Or… not people. They couldn’t be people. They had to be gods.

You saw the young woman, and the man who had taken her. You saw a woman, similar in appearance to the girl, but older, and a broad-shouldered man with a white beard.

You could not hear from the distance, but they appeared to be arguing. They did not notice your mortal eyes. All for the best, really. You didn’t want to get wrapped up in the business of the gods.

Their argument continued for some time, and in the end the girl went with the older woman, her mother perhaps. And not a single person at the meeting looked happy about it.

Still the field around the woman began to revitalize immediately. Green returned to the grass, and flowers bloomed. Had you slipped closer you might have heard their deal. The young woman, happily now the queen of the underworld would spend half the year in her new domain, and for the other half, she would return to the surface and her mother.

Some versions of the story say that Hades tricked Persephone, that he fed her seeds of the pomegranate in the underworld. Because she had eaten food in the underworld, she would miss the underworld. Thus, when Zeus asked where Persephone wanted to live, she already felt the draw of the underworld and replied that she wanted to remain in the underworld.

When Demeter threatened that she would never again make the world fertile if her daughter was not returned, Zeus forced them into a compromise.

Persephone would live for the surface for six-months, and she would spend the other half of the year in the underworld. Some versions say she would spend a third of the year in the underworld and the remainder on the surface.

In either case, during the months where Persephone walked the surface with her mother, the land was fertile and green. And when she returned to Hades and the underworld, it would fall cold and barren. In this way, the myth introduced the reason why we experience seasons.

The Abduction of Persephone is a famous myth with many variations. Some paint Hades as more of a villain, others less so. In some, Zeus tells his brother to kidnap Persephone, and in others, Hades operates on his own.

But they all result in the same moment. A moment where it is decided, either by the other gods or Persephone herself, that Persephone will spend some of her time on the surface, and some in the underworld. And thus, the seasons were created.

Like many myths, it explains why something occurs. It offers an explanation for a phenomenon that is larger than us, a force in our lives that becomes understandable as we define it.

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Through the Veil. I hope you enjoyed. I encourage you to subscribe to receive new episodes weekly wherever you listen as we continue our exploration of folklore, myth, and magic.

If you are enjoying the show, and have subjects you would like to hear covered, please email me at throughtheveilpodcast@gmail.com or follow the show on Twitter, you can find it @ThroughVeil.

As always, thank you, for listening.