Persephone
Persephone EuropePersephone of Greece, Proserpina of Italy—the queen of the underworld—was abducted by Hades, son of Kronos and Rhea. She was playing with the daughters of Oceanos, the circular ocean, picking flowers on a lush meadow, when she beheld the hundred-blossomed narcissus planted by the earth mother Gaia to please the god of death, Hades. As Persephone bent to pluck it with both hands, a chasm appeared in the ground, and from it rose Hades, who seized her and carried her down to his realm. Immediately the springs of fertility ran dry: vegetation languished, animals ceased to multiply, and the hand of death touched mankind. The mother of Persephone—Demeter to the Greeks, Ceres to the Romans—wandered upon the earth, with two burning torches in her hands. She would neither eat nor wash. Zeus finally intervened and ruled that his subterranean brother must give up the captured bride unless she had, by some word or deed, consented to her abduction....
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