Demeter and Persephone

Demeter (Greek: Δημήτηρ, “Earth Mother” or “Grain Mother”) and her daughter Persephone (Περσεφόνη; also Kore, “the Maiden”) formed the most sacred divine pair in Greek religion. Their myth — the abduction of Persephone by Hades, Demeter’s grief-stricken search, and the eventual compromise in which Persephone spends part of the year below and part above — explained the origin of the seasons and provided the theological foundation of the Eleusinian Mysteries, the most prestigious mystery cult of the ancient world.[1]

The canonical account is the Homeric Hymn to Demeter (7th century BCE):[1]

1. Persephone, gathering flowers in a meadow, is seized by Hades, who opens the earth beneath her and drags her to the underworld
2. Demeter hears her daughter’s cry and searches the earth in grief, disguised as an old woman
3. She comes to Eleusis, where she is received into the household of King Keleus. She attempts to make his son Demophon immortal by placing him in fire nightly, but is discovered and reveals her true form
4. In her wrath and grief, Demeter withdraws fertility from the earth — crops fail, famine threatens humanity
5. Zeus intervenes, ordering Hades to return Persephone. But Hades has given Persephone a pomegranate seed to eat — whoever eats in the underworld must remain
6. A compromise is reached: Persephone will spend one-third of the year (later versions say half) with Hades, and the remainder with Demeter
7. Demeter restores fertility and, before departing, teaches the Eleusinian princes her Mysteries[1]

The Mysteries of Eleusis — initiated from the myth of Demeter and Persephone — were the supreme religious experience of the ancient Greek and Roman world. They lasted from at least the 8th century BCE to 393 CE (when Theodosius I prohibited pagan worship), a span of over a millennium.[1]

The Greater Mysteries lasted nine days and included:

1. A procession from Athens to Eleusis along the Sacred Way (14 km)
2. Fasting — mirroring Demeter’s refusal to eat
3. Drinking the kykeon — a barley drink (some scholars have proposed it contained psychoactive ergot alkaloids, but this is unproven)
4. Entry into the Telesterion — the great hall of initiation at Eleusis (capable of holding 3,000 people)
5. Ta Dromena (“things done”), ta legomena (“things said”), and ta deiknymena (“things shown”) — the three components of revelation. The precise content was the most successfully kept secret of antiquity[1]