Ceres’ Grief or Selfishness over Proserpina

Together, the two patriarchal figures conspire to kidnap and force Persephone to marry Hades. This is done behind Demeter’s back, intentionally removing her from her role as mother. Their actions directly diminish or outright remove the will of Demeter, a symbol of women in Greek culture (The Homeric Hymn to Demeter 29-30). This theme of a removal of female autonomy is mirrored later in the text when Hades tricks Persephone into eating pomegranate seeds. This action is a deliberate attempt to remove Persephone’s ability to choose for herself, condemning her to spend the winter months in the underworld with him. Not only does this subjugate Persephone to Hades’ will, but it also lends justification to the subjugation of women by men (372-400). By removing the sovereignty of the female mind, the myth promotes male authority.

Ceres yells at Pluto with rage what are you doing to my daughter. Pluto puts on a face of pleasure and says he just wanted to feed her and that he found her wandering in the woods, so he brought her back to his palace. As Ceres signals Proserpina to come to her, Pluto grabs her before she can go and with a grin he says that he owns her because she ate the berry. Ceres desperately cries for the gods for help in this matter. Until, Pluto notices her sadness and knows this could lead to bad consequences. Pluto works out a deal. He can keep Proserpina for one half of the year. The other half she will belong to Ceres. Ceres with no other option, agrees. With this deal, the seasons came about. One

     Hades is one of the brothers of Zeus. He is the unlucky one who got to rule the underworld. He is cruel and unforgiving. Only two have ever gone to Hades domain and returned, Hercules and Odysseus. Hades fell in love with Zeus’s daughter and devised a plan to abduct her. With Zeus’s help they succeeded in the capture of Persephone. Her mother Demeter was so enraged she cursed the Earth. She continued the curse even after she was released. It was only after her mother Rhea was allowed to see her that she let the Earth prosper (message).

“Go in peace” she replied, “and be happy in your daughter; I have lost mine.” (Bulfinch’s Mythology, pg 54, para 1). The farmer and his daughter sat with Demeter and cried with her. They invited her to stay for the night and introduced her to the sick son of the farmer. Demeter healed the boy and tried to make him immortal, but was stopped by the farmer’s wife. Demeter left the farm still searching for Persephone. Demeter came across a river nymph that knew what happened to Persephone. She dared not to tell, because she fears Hades. The nymph did give Demeter the girdle that Persephone dropped. Demeter sure her daughter was dead blamed the earth. Blaming the earth Demeter stopped fertilizing the land. The cattle died, the crops weren’t growing, there was too much sun and rain. Seeing this the nymph told the goddess what she saw. The goddess Demeter heard this and rode her chariot to meet Zeus. Zeus agreed to help,

The Rape of Persephone began as a simple story of peace and unchanging atmosphere. Demeter, goddess of the earth, agriculture and fertility in general, withheld her gifts from the earth in an act of isolation and depression once she lost Persephone. Before tragedy struck, she was loved by all for providing a climate for crops to flourish year round.Persephone held the sweetest disposition and was admired by all who knew her- including the God of the dead, Hades. However, unbenounced to her and her mother, her father Zeus had agreed to the turmoil that would soon ensue. As Persephone quested for the most enchanting flower, Hades, “the lord of the dark underworld, the king of the multitudinous dead, carried her off underneath the earth, driving a

The three themes present in these tales of creation are chaos, sin, and transformation. From the beginning we see how God brings order to chaos, not creation out of nothing. Chaos is the primordial state of existence in Greek myth, and hence, these stories have an immense effect on the way people think of the universe. Chaos has a pervasive presence not only in the physical world but also in the lives and actions of human beings as Lycaon’s case represents. Ovid described Chaos as “a huge agglomeration of upset”. By separating and transforming material object and living being, the creator god imposes rational order on unruly matter. Thus, transformation is another important theme in these tales of creation. This shows that the Greco-Roman community

Back before Proserpina was born, Ceres had a daughter named Petunia who loved the outside and helping her mother in the fields. Petunia would help her mother harvest the wheat and corn, however she had a taste for exploring different places, especially a forest Petunia came across after visiting the sea nymphs. While she never set foot in the forest, she yearned to go out and see what it had to offer. One day,

As Hades enjoyed her presence and was happy he ruined Persphane’s life and her mother’s as well.

In Ovid Metamorphoses, the Roman literature described the ruthless act of Pluto of rape, to seize and carry away Proserpine without the consent of Ceres and in parallel in the Homeric Hymns of Demeter; Persephone was seized and carried away by Hades without the consent of Demeter. The invariant theme that was identified in both the Greek and Roman literature was the loss of innocence of Persephone/Proserpine. Despite the various differences the story was presented, it reinforced the innocence that was stolen from the god of the underworld, Hades or also known as Pluto. Throughout this paper, it will discuss the similar characteristics of the two myths such as the motive that led and encouraged the god of the underworld to kidnap

The Homeric Hymn to Demeter addresses the fate of Persephone is in the hands of others and is removed from freedom of choice as she is portrayed as a minor. In effect, it is symbolic of the power family holds as the actions of her mother, her father Zeus and her husband Hades determine her path. The text accustoms nickname Persephone throughout the passage as the ‘Core’, the ‘Girl’, or ‘Virgin’. These nicknames assume her role as an underage girl not responsible for her life decisions. The Hymn begins with highlighting the role of the patriarch in a family Zeus as both the head of the family and the other gods who must defer to him as he arranges Hades to take Persephone against her will. As Demeter struggles with the mourn and loss of her child she begins to abandon her reproduction responsibilities and Persephone is ordered to go to the side of your dark robed mother. However, Hades persuades Persephone to eat pomegranate seeds, representing the loss of her innocence as it spiritually bounds her to Hades. Zeus accustomed to be acknowledges as the father of justice and good government rectifies the issue with the arrangement that Persephone remains with Hades however returns to her mother and the Gods for 2 thirds of the year. The Fate of Persephone portrays the common marriage cycle that pertained in Ancient Greece whereby it held the connotation of death for the maiden and submission and adaptation into their Fathers orders.

Ceres so angered by the events that took human from and began to walk. Finally Ceres was compelled to return to Olympus, but here sadness and anger was causing a worldwide famine. Mankind was facing its end, possible extinction from starvation. However the mortals were not the only ones starving. Proserpina trapped in the underworld had not eaten either. By this time Jupiter had sent Mercury to carry his command to free his daughter. Pluto conspired to insure she could not leave for long feed Proserpina some pomegranate seeds.

Hades was a bitter middle-aged man whose heart softened once he saw Persephone, the daughter of Zeus and Demeter. So he kidnapped her and brought her down into the Underworld. Demeter had become infuriated with Hades and released her anger on the earth in the form of a time where no crops should grow. Meanwhile, Persephone ate six pomegranate seeds which made her want

In one word, the author Ovid describes the overall content and theme of his poem with the word “Metamorphoses” in the title. Some relative synonyms of this word among others are; altar, change, mutate, develop, and reshape (metamorphose). But Ovid goes further to describe the theme within the first two lines of the poem.

Ovid’s Metamorphoses is a collection of myths remastered to fit a theme of transformation. In these stories, the characters are confronted with a problem or a situation and how they react determines their fate. These fates take the form of physical alterattions. Often people transform into flora, fauna, or different human forms. In Metamorphoses the metaphors utilized by Ovid involve the natural world. These mataphors are natural for us to understand because nature is a common reference point for us all. While Ovid’s meaning behind the forms he chooses in his transformations seem simple, recognizing why characters are transformed can be confounding. The key to interpreting Ovid’s transformations is in realizing to whom the transformation is directed and this may not always be the one being transformed. The transformations that take place in Metamorphoses symbolize traits in the transformed and the transformer in both positive and negative aspects.

Transformations from one shape or form into another are the central theme in Ovid's Metamorphoses. The popularity and timelessness of this work stems from the manner of story telling. Ovid takes stories relevant to his culture and time period, and weaves them together into one work with a connecting theme of transformation throughout. The thread of humor that runs through Metamorphoses is consistent with the satire and commentary of the work. The theme is presented in the opening lines of Metamorphoses, where the poet invokes the gods, who are responsible for the changes, to look favorably on his efforts to compose. The changes are of many kinds: from human to animal, animal to human, thing to