Dio degli Inferi, delle ombre e dei morti, ha come corrispettivo nella Mitologia egizia il Dio Osiride. È conosciuto anche come Axiokersos poiché coniuge di Persefone, soprannominata infatti "axiokersa", e Katakthonios ossia "Signore degli Inferi".
Nella mitologia romana la sua figura corrisponde a quella di Plutone.
Busto di Ade / Plutone. Marmo, copia romana di un originale greco del V sec. a.C.; la mantella nera è moderna.
Sposo di Persefone ebbe da lei le Erinni.
Altri autori gli attibuiscono anche la paternità di Zagreo e di Melinoe e secondo la Suda (un testo tardo-bizantino del X-XI secolo), avrebbe avuto una figlia di nome Macaria, dea della buona morte.
Altri autori gli attibuiscono anche la paternità di Zagreo e di Melinoe e secondo la Suda (un testo tardo-bizantino del X-XI secolo), avrebbe avuto una figlia di nome Macaria, dea della buona morte.
Genealogia (Esiodo)
| Urano | Gea | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Genitali di Urano | CRONO | Rea | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Zeus | Era | Poseidone | Ade | Demetra | Estia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| a | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| b | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ares | Efesto | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Meti | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Atena | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Latona | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Apollo | Artemide | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Maia | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ermes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Semele | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Dioniso | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Dione | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| a | b | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Afrodite | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Mitologia
Appena nato, fu brutalmente ingoiato dal padre insieme ai fratelli ma grazie a uno stratagemma della madre Rea e di Zeus, il padre rigurgitò i figli.Ade partecipò alla Titanomachia, nell'occasione in cui i Ciclopi gli fabbricarono la kunée, o elmo dell'oscurità, un magnifico elmo magico in pelle d'animale che gli permette di diventare invisibile: si poté introdurre così segretamente nella dimora di Crono rubandogli le armi e, mentre Poseidone minacciava il padre col tridente, Zeus lo colpì con la folgore.
In seguito, ricevette la sovranità del mondo sotterraneo e degli Inferi, quando l'universo fu diviso con i suoi due fratelli Zeus e Poseidone, che ottennero rispettivamente il regno del cielo e del mare.
Viene annoverato saltuariamente fra le Divinità olimpiche, nonostante questo sia contrario alla tradizione canonica; Ade è d'altra parte poco presente nella mitologia, nonostante sia uno degli dei più potenti, essendo essenzialmente legato ai racconti legati agli eroi: Orfeo, Teseo, Piritoo ed Eracle sono fra i pochi mortali ad averlo incontrato. Inoltre la tradizione lo vuole riluttante ad abbandonare il mondo dell'Aldilà: le uniche due eccezioni si ricordano per il rapimento di Persefone e per ricevere alcune cure dopo essere stato ferito da una freccia di Eracle.
La leggenda lo vuole padrone delle greggi solari, al pascolo nell'isola Erizia, la cosiddetta isola rossa, dove il Sole muore quotidianamente. Il pastore era chiamato Menete.
Tuttavia in queste storie è chiamato Crono, o Gerione.
Persefone regina degli inferi
Ade, innamorato di Persefone, la rapì con il consenso di Zeus; mentre stava raccogliendo dei fiori in compagnia delle ninfe le apparve un Asfodelo(il fiore da cui anche gli Dèi sono attratti) e quando lei lo colse, Ade la rapì. Il rapimento, secondo alcuni, avvenne ai piedi del monte Etna. Sua madre, Demetra, dea del grano e dell'agricoltura (nonché del ciclo delle stagioni), disperata per la scomparsa della figlia, la cercò per nove giorni arrivando fino alle regioni più remote: il decimo giorno, con l'aiuto di Ecate ed Helios, seppe che il rapitore era il Dio degli Inferi. Adirata, Demetra abbandonò l'Olimpo e scatenò una tremenda carestia in tutta la Terra, affinché questa non offrisse più i suoi frutti ai mortali e agli Dèi. Zeus tentò allora di riconciliare Ade e Demetra, per evitare la fine del genere umano: inviò il messaggero Ermes al fratello, ordinandogli di restituire Persefone, a patto che ella non si fosse cibata del cibo dei Morti.Ade non si oppose all'ordine ma, poiché Persefone era effettivamente digiuna dal ratto, la invitò a mangiare prima di tornare dalla madre: le offrì così un melograno, frutto proveniente dagli Inferi, in dono. In procinto di mettersi sulla via di Eleusi, uno dei giardinieri di Ade, Ascalafo, la vide mangiare pochi grani del melograno: in questo modo si compì dunque il tranello ordito da Ade, affinché Persefone restasse con lui negli Inferi. Allora si scatenò nuovamente l'ira di Demetra, Zeus propose un nuovo accordo, per cui, dato che Persefone non aveva mangiato un frutto intero sarebbe rimasta nell'oltretomba solamente per un numero di mesi equivalente al numero di semi da lei mangiati, potendo così trascorrere con la madre il resto dell'anno; avrebbe trascorso così sei mesi con il marito negli Inferi, e sei mesi con la madre sulla Terra. La proposta fu accettata da entrambi, e da quel momento si associano la primavera e l'estate ai mesi che Persefone trascorre in terra dando gioia alla madre, e l'autunno e l'inverno ai mesi che passava negli Inferi, durante i quali la madre si strugge per la figlia.
Menta e Leuce
Secondo Ovidio e Strabone, Ade tentò di approfittarsi della ninfa Menta. Persefone, gelosa del marito, si dispiacque dell'unione e si infuriò quando Menta proferì contro di lei minacce spaventose e sottilmente allusive alle proprie arti erotiche molto sviluppate. Persefone, sdegnata, la fece a pezzi: Ade le consentì di trasformarsi in erba profumata, la menta, ma Demetra la condannò alla sterilità, impedendole di produrre frutti.Ade aveva un tempio ai piedi del monte Mente in Elide.
Leuce, un'altra ninfa figlia di Oceano, fu rapita da Ade e trasformata da Persefone in pioppo bianco presso la fontana della Memoria.
Ade ed il suo regno
Il regno dell'Ade corrisponde più genericamente al mondo degli Inferi ed in principio nella lingua greca antica solo il caso genitivo del nome della divinità era impiegato come abbreviazione per intendere la casa del dio dell'oltretomba. In seguito e per estensione, si cominciò a utilizzare il termine in tale significato anche nel nominativo.Nella mitologia latina inizialmente Plutone (l'alter ego latino di Ade) è dapprima definito come il Signore degli Inferi e solo successivamente Signore dell'Ade.
Culto per Ade
Per Ade si sacrificavano, principalmente nelle ore notturne, pecore o tori neri, e coloro che offrivano il sacrificio voltavano il viso, poiché guardare negli occhi Ade senza l'ordine o il permesso del dio avrebbe portato immediatamente alla morte. Il suo culto non era molto sviluppato ed esistono poche statue con sue raffigurazioni. Euripide indica che Ade non riceveva libagioni rituali.Il principale tempio di Ade, in comune con Persefone, si trova nell'Epiro, la casa di Ade, dove aveva sede il Nekromanteion, l'oracolo dei morti. Dei pochi altri luoghi di culto a lui dedicati, uno dei più noti è in Samotracia (sebbene più propriamente dedicato a Pluto), mentre si suppone ne esistesse uno situato nell'Elide, a nord ovest del Peloponneso e un'ulteriore ad Eleusi, strettamente connesso con i misteri locali.
Un altro tempio, sempre in comune con Persefone, si trova Turchia, a Ierapoli, dove i sacrifici veninano effettuati in corrispondenza della "porta dell'inferno".
Iconografia
Veniva solitamente rappresentato come un uomo tenebroso, barbuto, freddo e serio (ma mai cattivo), spesso seduto su un trono e dotato di una patera e di uno scettro, con il cane a tre teste protettore degli Inferi, Cerbero. A volte si trovava anche un serpente ai suoi piedi. Indossa molto spesso un elmo, oppure un velo che gli copre il volto e gli occhi. Suo attributo era la cappa che rende invisibili. Si hanno sue rappresentazioni in moltissimi contesti ceramici, soprattutto nelle pìnakes di Locri Epizefiri. Altri esempi si conoscono in alcuni affreschi della Tomba dell'Orco (altro nome del dio) a Tarquinia, mentre ad Orvieto se ne ha una raffigurazione all'interno della Tomba Golini I. Per la Grecia si ricordano un trono del Partenone attribuito a Fidia ed una base colonnare da Efeso, più esattamente dal Tempio di Artemide. Nel mondo romano i sarcofagi, soprattutto in età tardo antica, usavano rappresentare il ratto di Proserpina e dunque una raffigurazione del dio infernale. Molto famosa in epoca barocca la versione scultorea di Gian Lorenzo Bernini del Ratto di Proserpina, di estremo virtuosismo. Fra le versioni pittoriche dell'episodio si ricorda il Ratto di Proserpina di RembrandtNella cultura di massa
- Ade è l'antagonista principale del film d'animazione della Walt Disney Hercules del 1997 e anche della serie animata spin-off del 1998 Hercules.
- Ade è uno dei personaggi principali del manga ed anime I Cavalieri dello zodiaco, in cui i protagonisti sono coinvolti in un combattimento finale contro di lui, quale dio degli Inferi.
- Ade è presente nella saga letteraria Percy Jackson e gli dei dell'Olimpo, padre di Nico e Bianca di Angelo.
- Ade è uno degli antagonisti principali del videogioco Horizon Zero Dawn, in cui vuole distruggere la terra con delle macchine, simili ad animali.
- Appare anche nella serie animata Zig & Sharko e nella serie televisiva "C'era una volta".
Ade e Cerbero, il cane con tre teste
Statue of Hades with Cerberus
Pinax con Persefone e Ade su trono, V secolo a.C., da Locri Epizefiri, Italia (Reggio Calabria, Museo nazionale della Magna Grecia).
Il termine Ploutōn (Πλούτων) deriva da Ploutos (Πλούτος) che significa ricco, mentre nella mitologia greca si identifica sia con Ade che, con minore frequenza, con Pluto. Quale Dio dei morti è riconducile ad Ade, il cui nome (GRC) Άιδης, Hádës, significa colui che si nasconde, sebbene differisca nel carattere. Quale Dio della prosperità è riconducibile a Pluto causa i tesori celati nelle viscere della terra (inoltre durante l'età aurea, custodiva il sottosuolo, dalla quale i semi traggono il necessario per un buon raccolto). Il nome Ploutōn conobbe un ampio uso con i Misteri eleusini, nei quali è venerato come un sovrano severo ma amorevole marito di Persefone. La coppia riceve le anime nell'oltretomba e sono invocati assieme nelle iscrizioni religiose. Viceversa, Ade aveva templi e pratiche religiose connesse solo a lui ed è rappresentato come oscuro e violento rapitore di Persefone.
Teogonia di Esiodo
Il nome Ploutōn non appare nella letteratura greca nel periodo arcaico. Nella Teogonia di Esiodo, Ade era uno dei sei figli di Crono e Rea, assieme a Poseidone, Zeus, Demetra, Era ed Estia. Sconfitto Crono, i tre fratelli maschi si divisero il mondo in tre reami e Ade ebbe per sorte l'oltretomba. Pluto, Dio dell'abbondanza, appare nella teogonia, come figlio di Demetra e Iasione, riprendendo il mito dell'isola di Samotracia. L'unione di Demetra e Iasione è descritta anche nell'Odissea.Ploutōn e Ploutos
Ploutōn, identificato come Ade, è descritto nell'Iliade come il Dio più odiato dai mortali. Platone afferma che la gente preferisce il termine Ploutōn, "dispensatore di ricchezze," in quanto il termine Ade suscita timore. Il termine Ploutōn è connesso alla ricchezza della terra, sia nei raccolti sulla superficie (era inizialmente Dio della terra), che nelle miniere nel sottosuolo Quello che adesso appare una confusione tra i due Dei, tra Ploutōn-Ade e Ploutōn-Pluto ("ricco") acquistava un significato nella teologia greca. Come signore dell'abbondanza e della ricchezza, Plutone esprimeva l'aspetto quale divinità sotterranea positiva, simbolizzata dalla cornucopia, mentre come Ade, Dio degli Inferi, ne esprime l'aspetto tetro, simbolizzato dal serpente e dal cane tricefalo Cerbero.Durante l'era imperiale il geografo greco Strabone distingue Plutone da Ade nel descrivere le risorse minerarie dell'antica Iberia (Spagna romana), affermando che presso i turdetani (antica popolazione autoctona nell'odierna Andalusia), "è Plutone, non Ade, colui che dimora nel regno sotterraneo", probabilmente nell'intento di sottolineare l'abbondanza delle ricchezze minerarie della regione.
Anche presso la mitologia romana si può riscontrare un'analoga contrapposizione tra Dis Pater (Ricco padre), generoso signore della terra e Orco, signore degli Inferi, antica divinità di origine etrusca. A complicare però il mito di Orco vi è la sovrapposizione con la figura greca di Horkos, indicato da Esiodo nella sua teogonia quale demone punitore dei giuramenti mancati. Tali figure poi sono tutte confluite in Plutone.
| « La totalità della sostanza terrestre considerata nella pienezza delle sue funzioni fu invece affidata a Dis Pater che è lo stesso che dire Dives (il ricco), il Ploutos dei Greci; denominazione giustificata dal fatto che ogni cosa ritorna alla terra e da essa trae origine. A Dis Pater si ricollega Proserpina (il nome è di origine greca, trattandosi di quella dea che i Greci chiamano Persefone) che simboleggerebbe il seme del frumento e che la madre avrebbe cercata dopo la sua scomparsa.… » |
| (Marco Tullio Cicerone, De natura deorum Libro II, 66) |
Mitologia
Il più conosciuto mito inerente a Plutone (Ade) è il ratto di Proserpina (Persefone). Rapita da Plutone mentre coglieva i fiori sulle rive del lago Pergusa ad Enna e trascinata sulla sua quadriga trainata da quattro cavalli neri, ne divenne la sposa e fu regina degli Inferi. Secondo Proclo (Epitome Oraculorum, riportata da Marafiotus) e Strabone (lib. 6), invece l'episodio del mito si verificò ad Hipponion (oggi Vibo Valentia). La madre Cerere si disperò per la sua mancanza e fece calare l'inverno sulla terra, finché Giove ordinò a Plutone di liberarla. Proserpina poté ritornare in superficie ma solo per sei mesi all'anno, in quanto Plutone riuscì a farle mangiare un chicco di melograno, legandola così per sempre con gli Inferi. Quando Proserpina tornava da Plutone, Cerere in segno di protesta faceva calare il freddo ed il gelo durante i mesi in cui la figlia era assente come segno di dolore, per poi far risvegliare la natura per il ritorno di Proserpina sulla terra.La prima versione letteraria del mito include una breve menzione nella teogonia di Esiodo ed una estesa narrativa negli Inni a Demetra di Omero; in entrambe le opere, il Signore dell'Oltretomba è detto Ade, di cui viene enfatizzata la figura tetra e insensibile, assieme alla riluttanza di Persefone.
L'uso sempre più frequente del termine Ploutōn riflette l'influenza dei Misteri eleusini, i quali trattano Plutone e Persefone quale divina coppia che ricevono gli iniziati nella vita ultraterrena ed in quanto tale Plutone non è associato alla figura del "violento rapitore" di Persefone Due testi classici che attribuiscono al Dio rapitore il nome Plutone sono due mitografie, il primo è la greca "Biblioteca" di pseudo-Apollodoro) (I secolo a.C.) il secondo è le latine Fabulae di Igino (circa 64 a.C.–17 d.C.).
Un altro mito molto noto che interessa Plutone è il suo incontro con Orfeo, disceso negli Inferi per recuperare sua moglie Euridice morta per il morso di un serpente in un prato mentre camminava o, secondo Virgilio e Ovidio, mentre correva tentando di sottrarsi alle attenzioni di Aristeo. Orfeo, al cospetto di Ade e Persefone, intonò canzoni così cariche di disperazione che li convinsero a lasciare andare Euridice, a condizione che Orfeo camminasse davanti a lei e non si voltasse a guardarla finché non fossero usciti alla luce del sole; quando però Orfeo non udì più i passi della moglie si voltò per guardare se lo stesse ancora seguendo e vide l'anima di Euridice sprofondare nell'Ade, questa volta per sempre.
Nei Dialoghi dei morti, del II secolo di Luciano di Samosata, nei quali uomini e Dei discutono fra loro con un cinico e comico realismo, l'autore reinterpreta e aggiunge nuovi miti aventi come protagonista Plutone.
Iconografia
Plutone, veniva spesso raffigurato come un uomo maturo, dallo sguardo severo, barbuto, con folta capigliatura e con in mano uno scettro, o delle chiavi, o della terra. Sovente è assiso su di un trono d'ebano e con ai piedi Cerbero, il cane tricefalo, o dei serpenti. Viene talvolta rappresentato anche con una cornucopia o sopra un carro trainato da quattro cavalli neri. I suoi copricapi sono il diadema d'ebano, l'elmo (che dona l'invisibilità) forgiato per lui dai Ciclopi e il cappuccio (per celarsi). Le piante a lui sacre sono il cipresso ed il narciso.Usi scientifici del termine
- Plutone – pianeta nano del sistema solare.
- Plutone – roccia magmatica intrusiva.
- Plutonismo - teoria proposta del geologo scozzese James Hutton nella seconda metà del XVIII secolo, secondo la quale, nei processi generatori di rocce, dovevano essere presi in considerazione soprattutto i fattori magmatici, attribuibili cioè al "calore sotterraneo" della Terra.
Plutone in un dipinto di Agostino Carracci
Hades (/ˈheɪdiːz/; Greek: ᾍδης Háidēs) was the ancient Greek chthonic god of the underworld, which eventually took his name.
In Greek mythology, Hades was regarded as the oldest son of Cronus and Rhea, although the last son regurgitated by his father. He and his brothers Zeus and Poseidon defeated their father's generation of gods, the Titans, and claimed rulership over the cosmos. Hades received the underworld, Zeus the sky, and Poseidon the sea, with the solid earth—long the province of Gaia—available to all three concurrently. Hades was often portrayed with his three-headed guard dog Cerberus.
The Etruscan god Aita and Roman gods Dis Pater and Orcus were eventually taken as equivalent to the Greek Hades and merged as Pluto, a Latinization of his euphemistic Greek name Plouton.
Name
The origin of Hades' name is uncertain, but has generally been seen as meaning "The Unseen One" since antiquity. An extensive section of Plato's dialogue Cratylus is devoted to the etymology of the god's name, in which Socrates is arguing for a folk etymology not from "unseen" but from "his knowledge (eidenai) of all noble things". Modern linguists have proposed the Proto-Greek form *Awides ("unseen")1. The earliest attested form is Aḯdēs (Ἀΐδης), which lacks the proposed digamma. West argues instead for an original meaning of "the one who presides over meeting up" from the universality of death.
In Homeric and Ionic Greek, he was known as Áïdēs. Other poetic variations of the name include Aïdōneús (Ἀϊδωνεύς) and the inflected forms Áïdos (Ἄϊδος, gen.), Áïdi (Ἄϊδι, dat.), and Áïda (Ἄϊδα, acc.), whose reconstructed nominative case *Áïs (*Ἄϊς) is, however, not attested. The name as it came to be known in classical times was Háidēs (Ἅιδης). Later the iota became silent, then a subscript marking (Άͅδης), and finally omitted entirely (Άδης).
Perhaps from fear of pronouncing his name, around the 5th century BC, the Greeks started referring to Hades as Pluto (Πλούτων, Ploútōn),
with a root meaning "wealthy", considering that from the abode below
(i.e., the soil) come riches (e.g., fertile crops, metals and so on).
Plouton became the Roman god who both rules the underworld and
distributed riches from below. This deity was a mixture of the Greek god
Hades and the Eleusinian icon Ploutos, and from this he also received a
priestess, which was not previously practiced in Greece. More elaborate names of the same genre were Ploutodótēs (Πλουτοδότης) or Ploutodotḗr (Πλουτοδοτήρ) meaning "giver of wealth".
Epithets of Hades include Agesander (Ἀγήσανδρος) and Agesilaos (Ἀγεσίλαος), both from ágō (ἄγω, "lead", "carry" or "fetch") and anḗr (ἀνήρ, "man") or laos (λαός, "men" or "people"), describing Hades as the god who carries away all. Nicander uses the form Hegesilaus (Ἡγεσίλαος). He was also referred to as Zeus Katachthonios (Ζευς καταχθονιος), meaning "the Zeus of the Underworld", by those avoiding his actual name, as he had complete control over the Underworld.
Hades obtained his wife and queen, Persephone, through abduction at the behest of Zeus. This myth is the most important one Hades takes part in; it also connected the Eleusinian Mysteries with the Olympian pantheon, particularly as represented in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, which is the oldest story of the abduction, most likely dating back to the beginning of the 6th Century BC. Helios told the grieving Demeter that Hades was not unworthy as a consort for Persephone:
Epithets of Hades include Agesander (Ἀγήσανδρος) and Agesilaos (Ἀγεσίλαος), both from ágō (ἄγω, "lead", "carry" or "fetch") and anḗr (ἀνήρ, "man") or laos (λαός, "men" or "people"), describing Hades as the god who carries away all. Nicander uses the form Hegesilaus (Ἡγεσίλαος). He was also referred to as Zeus Katachthonios (Ζευς καταχθονιος), meaning "the Zeus of the Underworld", by those avoiding his actual name, as he had complete control over the Underworld.
Greek god of the underworld
In Greek mythology, Hades, the god of the underworld, was a son of the Titans Cronus and Rhea. He had three sisters, Demeter, Hestia, and Hera, as well as two brothers, Zeus, the youngest of the three, and Poseidon. Upon reaching adulthood, Zeus managed to force his father to disgorge his siblings. After their release, the six younger gods, along with allies they managed to gather, challenged the elder gods for power in the Titanomachy, a divine war. The war lasted for ten years and ended with the victory of the younger gods. Following their victory, according to a single famous passage in the Iliad (xv.187–93), Hades and his two brothers, Poseidon and Zeus, drew lots for realms to rule. Zeus received the sky, Poseidon received the seas, and Hades received the underworld, the unseen realm to which the souls of the dead go upon leaving the world as well as any and all things beneath the earth. Some myths suggest that Hades was dissatisfied with his turnout, but had no choice and moved to his new realm.Hades obtained his wife and queen, Persephone, through abduction at the behest of Zeus. This myth is the most important one Hades takes part in; it also connected the Eleusinian Mysteries with the Olympian pantheon, particularly as represented in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, which is the oldest story of the abduction, most likely dating back to the beginning of the 6th Century BC. Helios told the grieving Demeter that Hades was not unworthy as a consort for Persephone:
Aidoneus, the Ruler of Many, is no unfitting husband among the deathless gods for your child, being your own brother and born of the same stock: also, for honor, he has that third share which he received when division was made at the first, and is appointed lord of those among whom he dwells.Despite modern connotations of death as evil, Hades was actually more altruistically inclined in mythology. Hades was often portrayed as passive rather than evil; his role was often maintaining relative balance. That said, he was also depicted as cold and stern, and he held all of his subjects equally accountable to his laws. Any other individual aspects of his personality are not given, as Greeks refrained from giving him much thought to avoid attracting his attention.
— Homeric Hymn to Demeter
Hades ruled the dead, assisted by others over whom he had complete
authority. The House of Hades was described as full of "guests," though
he rarely left the Underworld. He cared little about what happened in the Upperworld, as his primary attention was ensuring none of his subjects ever left.
He strictly forbade his subjects to leave his domain and would become
quite enraged when anyone tried to leave, or if someone tried to steal
the souls from his realm. His wrath was equally terrible for anyone who
tried to cheat death or otherwise crossed him, as Sisyphus and Pirithous
found out to their sorrow. While usually indifferent to his subjects,
Hades was very focused on the punishment of these two people;
particularly Pirithous,
as he entered the underworld in an attempt to steal Persephone for
himself, and consequently was forced onto the "Chair of Forgetfulness". Another myth is about the Roman god Asclepius who was originally a demigod, fathered by Apollo and birthed by Coronis,
a Thessalian princess. During his lifetime, he became a famous and
talented physician, who eventually was able to bring the dead back to
life. Feeling cheated, Plouton persuaded Zeus to kill him with a
thunderbolt. After his death, he was brought to Olympus where he became a
god.
Hades was only depicted outside of the Underworld once in myth, and
even that is believed to have been an instance where he had just left
the gates of the Underworld, which was when Heracles shot him with an arrow as Hades was attempting to defend the city of Plyus. After he was shot, however, he traveled to Olympus to heal. Besides Heracles, the only other living people who ventured to the Underworld were also heroes: Odysseus, Aeneas (accompanied by the Sibyl), Orpheus, who Hades showed uncharacteristic mercy towards at Persephone's persuasion, who was moved by Orpheus' music, Theseus with Pirithous, and, in a late romance, Psyche. None of them were pleased with what they witnessed in the realm of the dead. In particular, the Greek war hero Achilles, whom Odysseus conjured with a blood libation, said:
He spent most of the time in his dark realm. Formidable in battle, he proved his ferocity in the famous Titanomachy, the battle of the Olympians versus the Titans, which established the rule of Zeus.
Feared and loathed, Hades embodied the inexorable finality of death: "Why do we loathe Hades more than any god, if not because he is so adamantine and unyielding?" The rhetorical question is Agamemnon's. He was not, however, an evil god, for although he was stern, cruel, and unpitying, he was still just. Hades ruled the Underworld and was therefore most often associated with death and feared by men, but he was not Death itself — the actual embodiment of Death was Thanatos, although Euripides' play "Alkestis" states fairly clearly that Thanatos and Hades were one and the same deity, and gives an interesting description of him as dark-cloaked and winged; moreover, Hades was also referred to as "Hesperos Theos" ("God of Death and Darkness").
When the Greeks propitiated Hades, they banged their hands on the ground to be sure he would hear them. Black animals, such as sheep, were sacrificed to him, and the very vehemence of the rejection of human sacrifice expressed in myth suggests an unspoken memory of some distant past.[citation needed] The blood from all chthonic sacrifices including those to propitiate Hades dripped into a pit or cleft in the ground. The person who offered the sacrifice had to avert his face.
One ancient source says that he possessed the Cap of invisibility. His chariot, drawn by four black horses, made for a fearsome and impressive sight. His other ordinary attributes were the narcissus and cypress plants, the Key of Hades and Cerberus, the three-headed dog. In certain portraits, snakes also appeared to be attributed to Hades as he was occasionally portrayed to be either holding them or accompanied by them. This is believed to hold significance as in certain classical sources Hades ravished Kore in the guise of a snake, who went on to give birth to Zagreus-Dionysus. While bearing the name 'Zeus', Zeus Olympios, the great king of the gods, noticeably differs from the Zeus Meilichios, a decidedly Chthonian character, often portrayed as a snake, and as seen beforehand, they cannot be different manifestations of the same god, in fact whenever 'another Zeus' is mentioned, this always refers to Hades. Zeus Meilichios and Zeus Eubouleus are often referred to being alternate names for Hades.
The philosopher Heraclitus, unifying opposites, declared that Hades and Dionysus, the very essence of indestructible life (zoë), are the same god. Among other evidence Kerényi notes that the grieving goddess Demeter refused to drink wine, which is the gift of Dionysus, after Persephone's abduction, because of this association, and suggests that Hades may in fact have been a "cover name" for the underworld Dionysus. He suggests that this dual identity may have been familiar to those who came into contact with the Mysteries. One of the epithets of Dionysus was "Chthonios", meaning "the subterranean". The role of unifying Hades, Zeus and Dionysus as a single tripartite god was used to represent the birth, death and resurrection of a deity and to unify the 'shining' realm of Zeus and the dark underworld realm of Hades.
As Plouton, he was regarded in a more positive light. He holds a cornucopia, representing the gifts he bestows upon people as well as fertility, which he becomes connected to.
O shining Odysseus, never try to console me for dying.
I would rather follow the plow as thrall to another
man, one with no land allotted to him and not much to live on,
than be a king over all the perished dead.— Achilles' soul to Odysseus. Homer, Odyssey 11.488-491 (Lattimore translation)
Cult
Hades, as the god of the dead, was a fearsome figure to those still living; in no hurry to meet him, they were reluctant to swear oaths in his name, and averted their faces when sacrificing to him. Since to many, simply to say the word "Hades" was frightening, euphemisms were pressed into use. Since precious minerals come from under the earth (i.e., the "underworld" ruled by Hades), he was considered to have control of these as well, and was referred to as Πλούτων (Plouton, related to the word for "wealth"), Latinized as Pluto. Sophocles explained the notion of referring to Hades as "the rich one" with these words: "the gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears." In addition, he was called Clymenus ("notorious"), Polydegmon ("who receives many"), and perhaps Eubuleus ("good counsel" or "well-intentioned"), all of them euphemisms for a name that was unsafe to pronounce, which evolved into epithets.He spent most of the time in his dark realm. Formidable in battle, he proved his ferocity in the famous Titanomachy, the battle of the Olympians versus the Titans, which established the rule of Zeus.
Feared and loathed, Hades embodied the inexorable finality of death: "Why do we loathe Hades more than any god, if not because he is so adamantine and unyielding?" The rhetorical question is Agamemnon's. He was not, however, an evil god, for although he was stern, cruel, and unpitying, he was still just. Hades ruled the Underworld and was therefore most often associated with death and feared by men, but he was not Death itself — the actual embodiment of Death was Thanatos, although Euripides' play "Alkestis" states fairly clearly that Thanatos and Hades were one and the same deity, and gives an interesting description of him as dark-cloaked and winged; moreover, Hades was also referred to as "Hesperos Theos" ("God of Death and Darkness").
When the Greeks propitiated Hades, they banged their hands on the ground to be sure he would hear them. Black animals, such as sheep, were sacrificed to him, and the very vehemence of the rejection of human sacrifice expressed in myth suggests an unspoken memory of some distant past.[citation needed] The blood from all chthonic sacrifices including those to propitiate Hades dripped into a pit or cleft in the ground. The person who offered the sacrifice had to avert his face.
One ancient source says that he possessed the Cap of invisibility. His chariot, drawn by four black horses, made for a fearsome and impressive sight. His other ordinary attributes were the narcissus and cypress plants, the Key of Hades and Cerberus, the three-headed dog. In certain portraits, snakes also appeared to be attributed to Hades as he was occasionally portrayed to be either holding them or accompanied by them. This is believed to hold significance as in certain classical sources Hades ravished Kore in the guise of a snake, who went on to give birth to Zagreus-Dionysus. While bearing the name 'Zeus', Zeus Olympios, the great king of the gods, noticeably differs from the Zeus Meilichios, a decidedly Chthonian character, often portrayed as a snake, and as seen beforehand, they cannot be different manifestations of the same god, in fact whenever 'another Zeus' is mentioned, this always refers to Hades. Zeus Meilichios and Zeus Eubouleus are often referred to being alternate names for Hades.
The philosopher Heraclitus, unifying opposites, declared that Hades and Dionysus, the very essence of indestructible life (zoë), are the same god. Among other evidence Kerényi notes that the grieving goddess Demeter refused to drink wine, which is the gift of Dionysus, after Persephone's abduction, because of this association, and suggests that Hades may in fact have been a "cover name" for the underworld Dionysus. He suggests that this dual identity may have been familiar to those who came into contact with the Mysteries. One of the epithets of Dionysus was "Chthonios", meaning "the subterranean". The role of unifying Hades, Zeus and Dionysus as a single tripartite god was used to represent the birth, death and resurrection of a deity and to unify the 'shining' realm of Zeus and the dark underworld realm of Hades.
Artistic representations
Hades was depicted so infrequently in artwork, as well as mythology, because the Greeks were so afraid of him. His artistic representations, which are generally found in Archaic pottery, are not even concretely thought of as the deity; however at this point in time it is heavily believed that the figures illustrated are indeed Hades. He was later presented in the classical arts in the depictions of the Rape of Persephone. Within these illustrations, Hades was often young, yet he was also shown as varying ages in other works. Due to this lack of depictions, there weren't very strict guidelines when representing the deity. On pottery, he has a dark beard and is presented as a stately figure on an "ebony throne." His attributes in art include a scepter, cornucopia, rooster, and a key, which both represented his control over the underworld and acted as a reminder that the gates of the Underworld were always locked so that souls could not leave. Even if the doors were open, Cerberus, the three-headed guard dog of the Underworld, ensured that while all souls were allowed to enter into The Underworld freely, none could ever escape. The dog is often portrayed next to the god as a means of easy identification, since no other deity relates to it so directly. Sometimes, artists painted Hades as looking away from the other gods, as he was disliked by them as well as humans.As Plouton, he was regarded in a more positive light. He holds a cornucopia, representing the gifts he bestows upon people as well as fertility, which he becomes connected to.
Persephone
The consort of Hades was Persephone, represented by the Greeks as the beautiful daughter of Demeter.
Persephone did not submit to Hades willingly, but was abducted by him while picking flowers in the fields of Nysa. In protest of his act, Demeter cast a curse on the land and there was a great famine; though, one by one, the gods came to request she lift it, lest mankind perish, she asserted that the earth would remain barren until she saw her daughter again. Finally, Zeus intervened; via Hermes, he requested that Hades return Persephone. Hades complied,
It is during this time that winter casts on the earth "an aspect of sadness and mourning."
Heracles' final labour was to capture Cerberus. First, Heracles went to Eleusis to be initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries. He did this to absolve himself of guilt for killing the centaurs and to learn how to enter and exit the underworld alive. He found the entrance to the underworld at Taenarum. Athena and Hermes helped him through and back from Hades. Heracles asked Hades for permission to take Cerberus. Hades agreed as long as Heracles didn't harm Cerberus. When Heracles dragged the dog out of Hades, he passed through the cavern Acherusia.
There were several sections of the realm of Hades, including Elysium, the Asphodel Meadows, and Tartarus. Greek mythographers were not perfectly consistent about the geography of the afterlife. A contrasting myth of the afterlife concerns the Garden of the Hesperides, often identified with the Isles of the Blessed, where the blessed heroes may dwell.
In Roman mythology, the entrance to the Underworld located at Avernus, a crater near Cumae, was the route Aeneas used to descend to the realm of the dead. By synecdoche, "Avernus" could be substituted for the underworld as a whole. The di inferi were a collective of underworld divinities.
For Hellenes, the deceased entered the underworld by crossing the Styx, ferried across by Charon kair'-on), who charged an obolus, a small coin for passage placed in the mouth of the deceased by pious relatives. Paupers and the friendless gathered for a hundred years on the near shore according to Book VI of Vergil's Aeneid. Greeks offered propitiatory libations to prevent the deceased from returning to the upper world to "haunt" those who had not given them a proper burial. The far side of the river was guarded by Cerberus, the three-headed dog defeated by Heracles (Roman Hercules). Passing beyond Cerberus, the shades of the departed entered the land of the dead to be judged.
The five rivers of the realm of Hades, and their symbolic meanings, are Acheron (the river of sorrow, or woe), Cocytus (lamentation), Phlegethon (fire), Lethe (oblivion), and Styx (hate), the river upon which even the gods swore and in which Achilles was dipped to render him invincible. The Styx forms the boundary between the upper and lower worlds. See also Eridanos.
The first region of Hades comprises the Fields of Asphodel, described in Odyssey xi, where the shades of heroes wander despondently among lesser spirits, who twitter around them like bats. Only libations of blood offered to them in the world of the living can reawaken in them for a time the sensations of humanity.
Beyond lay Erebus, which could be taken for a euphonym of Hades, whose own name was dread. There were two pools, that of Lethe, where the common souls flocked to erase all memory, and the pool of Mnemosyne ("memory"), where the initiates of the Mysteries drank instead. In the forecourt of the palace of Hades and Persephone sit the three judges of the Underworld: Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Aeacus. There at the trivium sacred to Hecate, where three roads meet, souls are judged, returned to the Fields of Asphodel if they are neither virtuous nor evil, sent by the road to Tartarus if they are impious or evil, or sent to Elysium (Islands of the Blessed) with the "blameless" heroes.
In the Sibylline oracles, a curious hodgepodge of Greco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian elements, Hades again appears as the abode of the dead, and by way of folk etymology, it even derives Hades from the name Adam (the first man), saying it is because he was the first to enter there. Owing to its appearance in the New Testament of the Bible, Hades also has a distinct meaning in Christianity.
Amphora Hades Louvre G209 n2 © Marie-Lan Nguyen
Oionokles Painter - User:Jastrow, own work, 2008-03-15
Hades (right-hand side) and Persephone (left-hand side). Detail from an Attic red-figure amphora, ca. 470 BC. From Italy.
Pluto (Greek: Πλούτων, Ploutōn) was the ruler of the underworld in classical mythology. The earlier name for the god was Hades, which became more common as the name of the underworld itself. In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pluto represents a more positive concept of the god who presides over the afterlife. Ploutōn was frequently conflated with Ploutos (Πλοῦτος, Plutus), a god of wealth, because mineral wealth was found underground, and because as a chthonic god Pluto ruled the deep earth that contained the seeds necessary for a bountiful harvest. The name Ploutōn came into widespread usage with the Eleusinian Mysteries, in which Pluto was venerated as a stern ruler but the loving husband of Persephone. The couple received souls in the afterlife, and are invoked together in religious inscriptions. Hades, by contrast, had few temples and religious practices associated with him, and he is portrayed as the dark and violent abductor of Persephone.
Pluto and Hades differ in character, but they are not distinct figures and share two dominant myths. In Greek cosmogony, the god received the rule of the underworld in a three-way division of sovereignty over the world, with his brother Zeus ruling the Sky and his other brother Poseidon sovereign over the Sea. His central narrative is the abduction of Persephone to be his wife and the queen of his realm. Plouton as the name of the ruler of the underworld first appears in Greek literature of the Classical period, in the works of the Athenian playwrights and of the philosopher Plato, who is the major Greek source on its significance. Under the name Pluto, the god appears in other myths in a secondary role, mostly as the possessor of a quest-object, and especially in the descent of Orpheus or other heroes to the underworld.
Plūtō ([ˈpluːtoː]; genitive Plūtōnis) is the Latinized form of the Greek Plouton. Pluto's Roman equivalent is Dis Pater, whose name is most often taken to mean "Rich Father" and is perhaps a direct translation of Plouton. Pluto was also identified with the obscure Roman Orcus, like Hades the name of both a god of the underworld and the underworld as a place. The borrowed Greek name Pluto is sometimes used for the ruler of the dead in Latin literature, leading some mythology handbooks to assert misleadingly that Pluto was the Roman counterpart of Hades. Pluto (Pluton in French and German, Plutone in Italian) becomes the most common name for the classical ruler of the underworld in subsequent Western literature and other art forms.
The name Plouton does not appear in Greek literature of the Archaic period. In Hesiod's Theogony, the six children of Cronus and Rhea are Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Hades, Demeter, and Hestia. The male children divide the world into three realms. Hades takes Persephone by force from her mother Demeter, with the consent of Zeus. Ploutos, "Wealth," appears in the Theogony as the child of Demeter and Iasion: "fine Plutus, who goes upon the whole earth and the broad back of the sea, and whoever meets him and comes into his hands, that man he makes rich, and he bestows much wealth upon him." The union of Demeter and Iasion, described also in the Odyssey, took place in a fallow field that had been ploughed three times, in what seems to be a reference to a ritual copulation or sympathetic magic to ensure the earth's fertility. "The resemblance of the name Ploutos to Plouton ...," it has been noted, "cannot be accidental. Plouton is lord of the dead, but as Persephone's husband he has serious claims to the powers of fertility." Demeter's son Plutus merges in the narrative tradition with her son-in-law Pluto, redefining the implacable chariot-driver Hades whose horses trample the flowering earth.
That the underworld god was associated early on with success in agricultural activity is already evident in Hesiod's Works and Days, line 465-469: "Pray to Zeus of the Earth and to pure Demeter to make Demeter's holy grain sound and heavy, when first you begin ploughing, when you hold in your hand the end of the plough-tail and bring down your stick on the backs of the oxen as they draw on the pole-bar by the yoke-straps."
The Roman poet Ennius (ca. 239–169 BC), the leading figure in the Hellenization of Latin literature, considered Pluto a Greek god to be explained in terms of the Roman equivalents Dis Pater and Orcus. It is unclear whether Pluto had a literary presence in Rome before Ennius. Some scholars think that rituals and beliefs pertaining to Pluto entered Roman culture with the establishment of the Saecular Games in 249 BC, and that Dis pater was only a translation of Plouton. In the mid-1st century BC, Cicero identifies Pluto with Dis, explaining that "The earth in all its power and plenty is sacred to Father Dis, a name which is the same as Dives, 'The Wealthy One,' as is the Greek Plouton. This is because everything is born of the earth and returns to it again."
During the Roman Imperial era, the Greek geographer Strabo (1st century AD) makes a distinction between Pluto and Hades. In writing of the mineral wealth of ancient Iberia (Roman Spain), he says that among the Turdetani, it is "Pluto, and not Hades, who inhabits the region down below." In the discourse On Mourning by the Greek author Lucian (2nd century AD), Pluto's "wealth" is the dead he rules over in the abyss (chasma); the name Hades is reserved for the underworld itself.
The most influential version of the abduction myth is that of Ovid (d. 17 or 18 AD), who tells the story in both the Metamorphoses (Book 5) and the Fasti (Book 4). Another major retelling, also in Latin, is the long unfinished poem De raptu Proserpinae ("On the Abduction of Proserpina") by Claudian (d. 404 AD). Ovid uses the name Dis, not Pluto in these two passages, and Claudian uses Pluto only once; translators and editors, however, sometimes supply the more familiar "Pluto" when other epithets appear in the source text. The abduction myth was a popular subject for Greek and Roman art, and recurs throughout Western art and literature, where the name "Pluto" becomes common (see Pluto in Western art and literature below). Narrative details from Ovid and Claudian influence these later versions in which the abductor is named as Pluto, especially the role of Venus and Cupid in manipulating Pluto with love and desire. Throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and certainly by the time of Natale Conti's influential Mythologiae (1567), the traditions pertaining to the various rulers of the classical underworld coalesced into a single mythology that made few if any distinctions among Hades, Pluto, Dis, and Orcus.
Justin Martyr (2nd century AD) alludes to children of Pluto, but neither names nor enumerates them. Hesychius (5th century AD) mentions a "son of Pluto." In his 14th-century mythography, Boccaccio records a tradition in which Pluto was the father of the divine personification Veneratio ("Reverence"), noting that she had no mother because Proserpina (the Latin name of Persephone) was sterile.
In The Faerie Queene (1590s), Edmund Spenser invents a daughter for Pluto whom he calls Lucifera. The character's name was taken from the 16th-century mythography of Natale Conti, who used it as the Latin translation of Greek phosphor, "light-bearer," a regular epithet of Hecate. Spenser incorporated aspects of the mysteries into The Faerie Queene.
In his central myth, Orpheus visits the underworld in the hope of retrieving his bride, Eurydice, relying on the power of his music to charm the king and queen of Hades. Greek narratives of Orpheus's descent and performance typically name the ruler of the underworld as Plouton, as for instance in the Bibliotheca. The myth demonstrates the importance of Pluto "the Rich" as the possessor of a quest-object. Orpheus performing before Pluto and Persephone was a common subject of ancient and later Western literature and art, and one of the most significant mythological themes of the classical tradition.
The demonstration of Orpheus's power depends on the normal obduracy of Pluto; the Augustan poet Horace describes him as incapable of tears. Claudian, however, portrays the steely god as succumbing to Orpheus's song so that "with iron cloak he wipes his tears" (ferrugineo lacrimas deterget amictu), an image renewed by Milton in Il Penseroso (106–107): "Such notes ... / Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek."
The Greek writer Lucian (ca. 125–after 180 AD) suggests that Pluto's love for his wife gave the ruler of the underworld a special sympathy or insight into lovers parted by death. In one of Lucian's Dialogues of the Dead, Pluto questions Protesilaus, the first Greek hero killed in the Trojan War, who wishes to return to the world of the living. "You are then in love with life?" Pluto asks. "Such lovers we have here in plenty; but they love an object, which none of them can obtain." Protesilaus explains, like an Orpheus in reverse, that he has left behind a young bride whose memory even the Lethe's waters of forgetting have not erased from him. Pluto assures him that death will reunite them someday, but Protesilaus argues that Pluto himself should understand love and its impatience, and reminds the king of his grant to Orpheus and to Alcestis, who took her husband's place in death and then was permitted at the insistence of Heracles to return to him. When Persephone intercedes for the dead warrior, Pluto grants the request at once, though allowing only one day for the reunion.
In the ritual texts of the mystery religions preserved by the so-called Orphic or Bacchic gold tablets, from the late 5th century BC onward the name Hades appears more frequently than Plouton, but in reference to the underground place: Plouton is the ruler who presides over it in a harmonious partnership with Persephone. By the end of the 4th century BC, the name Plouton appears in Greek metrical inscriptions. Two fragmentary tablets greet Pluto and Persephone jointly, and the divine couple appear as welcoming figures in a metrical epitaph:
A set of curse tablets written in Doric Greek and found in a tomb addresses a Pasianax, "Lord to All," sometimes taken as a title of Pluto, but more recently thought to be a magical name for the corpse. Pasianax is found elsewhere as an epithet of Zeus, or in the tablets may invoke a daimon like Abrasax.
Attributes of Pluto mentioned in the Orphic Hymn to Pluto are his scepter,
keys, throne, and horses. In the hymn, the keys are connected to his
capacity for giving wealth to humanity, specifically the agricultural
wealth of "the year's fruits."
Pausanias explains the significance of Pluto's key in describing a wondrously carved cedar chest at the Temple of Hera in Elis. Numerous deities are depicted, with one panel grouping Dionysus, Persephone, the nymphs and Pluto. Pluto holds a key because "they say that what is called Hades has been locked up by Pluto, and that nobody will return back again therefrom." Natale Conti cites Pausanias in noting that keys are an attribute of Pluto as the scepter is of Jove (Greek Zeus) and the trident of Neptune (Poseidon).
A golden key (chrusea klês) was laid on the tongue of initiates by priests at Eleusis and was a symbol of the revelation they were obligated to keep secret. A key is among the attributes of other infernal deities such as Hecate, Anubis, and Persephone, and those who act as guardians or timekeepers, such as Janus and Aion. Aeacus (Aiakos), one of the three mortal kings who became judges in the afterlife, is also a kleidouchos (κλειδοῦχος), "holder of the keys," and a priestly doorkeeper in the court of Pluto and Persephone.
Ambiguity of color is characteristic of Pluto. Although both he and his realm are regularly described as dark, black, or gloomy, the god himself is sometimes seen as pale or having a pallor. Martianus Capella (5th century) describes him as both "growing pale in shadow, a fugitive from light" and actively "shedding darkness in the gloom of Tartarean night," crowned with a wreath made of ebony as suitable for the kingdom he governs. The horses of Pluto are usually black, but Ovid describes them as "sky-colored" (caeruleus, from caelum, "sky"), which might be blue, greenish-blue, or dark blue.
The Renaissance mythographer Natale Conti says wreaths of narcissus, maidenhair fern (adianthus), and cypress were given to Pluto. In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Gaia (Earth) produced the narcissus at Zeus's request as a snare for Persephone; when she grasps it, a chasm opens up and the "Host to Many" (Hades) seizes her. Narcissus wreaths were used in early times to crown Demeter and Persephone, as well as the Furies (Eumenides). The flower was associated with narcotic drugginess (narkê, "torpor"), erotic fascination, and imminent death; to dream of crowning oneself with narcissus was a bad sign. In the myth of Narcissus, the flower is created when a beautiful, self-absorbed youth rejects sexuality and is condemned to perpetual self-love along the Styx.
Conti's inclusion of adianthus (Adiantum in modern nomenclature) is less straightforward. The name, meaning "unmoistened" (Greek adianton), was taken in antiquity to refer to the fern's ability to repel water. The plant, which grew in wet places, was also called capillus veneris, "hair of Venus," divinely dry when she emerged from the sea. Historian of medicine John M. Riddle has suggested that the adianthus was one of the ferns Dioscorides called asplenon and prescribed as a contraceptive (atokios). The associations of Proserpine (Persephone) and the maidenhair are alluded to by Samuel Beckett in a 1946 poem, in which the self is a Platonic cave with capillaires, in French both "maidenhair fern" and "blood vessels".
The cypress (Greek cyparissus, Latin cupressus) has traditional associations with mourning. In ancient Attica, households in mourning were garlanded with cypress, and it was used to fumigate the air during cremations. In the myth of Cyparissus, a youth was transformed into a cypress, consumed by grief over the accidental death of a pet stag. A "white cypress" is part of the topography of the underworld that recurs in the Orphic gold tablets as a kind of beacon near the entrance, perhaps to be compared with the Tree of Life in various world mythologies. The description of the cypress as "white" (Greek leukē), since the botanical tree is dark, is symbolic, evoking the white garments worn by initiates or the clothing of a corpse, or the pallor of the dead. In Orphic funeral rites, it was forbidden to make coffins of cypress.
The tradition of the mystery religions favors Pluto as a loving and faithful partner to Persephone, in contrast to the violence of Hades in early myths, but one ancient myth that preserves a lover for him parallels the abduction and also has a vegetative aspect. A Roman source says that Pluto fell in love with Leuca (Greek Leukē, "White"), the most beautiful of the nymphs, and abducted her to live with him in his realm. After the long span of her life came to its end, he memorialized their love by creating a white tree in the Elysian Fields. The tree was the white poplar (Greek leukē), the leaves of which are white on one side and dark on the other, representing the duality of upper and underworld. A wreath of white poplar leaves was fashioned by Heracles to mark his ascent from the underworld, an aition for why it was worn by initiates and by champion athletes participating in funeral games. Like other plants associated with Pluto, white poplar was regarded as a contraceptive in antiquity. The relation of this tree to the white cypress of the mysteries is debated.
The helmet Pluto receives is presumably the magical Cap of Invisibility (aidos kyneê), but the Bibliotheca is the only ancient source that explicitly says it belonged to Pluto. The verbal play of aidos, "invisible," and Hades is thought to account for this attribution of the helmet to the ruler of the underworld, since no ancient narratives record his use or possession of it. Later authors such as Rabelais (16th century) do attribute the helmet to Pluto. Erasmus calls it the "helmet of Orcus" and gives it as a figure of speech referring to those who conceal their true nature by a cunning device. Francis Bacon notes the proverbial usage: "the helmet of Pluto, which maketh the politic man go invisible, is secrecy in the counsel, and celerity in the execution."
No ancient image of the ruler of the underworld can be said with certainty to show him with a bident, though the ornamented tip of his scepter may have been misunderstood at times as a bident. In the Roman world, the bident (from bi-, "two" + dent-, "teeth") was an agricultural implement. It may also represent one of the three types of lightning wielded by Jupiter, the Roman counterpart of Zeus, and the Etruscan Tinia. The later notion that the ruler of the underworld wielded a trident or bident can perhaps be traced to a line in Seneca's Hercules Furens ("Hercules Enraged"), in which Father Dis, the Roman counterpart of Pluto, uses a three-pronged spear to drive off Hercules as he attempts to invade the underworld. Seneca calls Dis the "Infernal Jove" or the "dire Jove" (the Jove who gives dire or ill omens, dirae), just as in the Greek tradition, Plouton
is sometimes identified as a "chthonic Zeus." That the trident and
bident might be somewhat interchangeable is suggested by a Byzantine scholiast, who mentions Poseidon being armed with a bident.
In the Middle Ages, classical underworld figures began to be depicted with a pitchfork. Early Christian writers had identified the classical underworld with Hell, and its denizens as demons or devils. In the Renaissance, the bident became a conventional attribute of Pluto. In an influential ceiling mural depicting the wedding of Cupid and Psyche, painted by Raphael's workshop for the Villa Farnesina in 1517, Pluto is shown holding the bident, with Cerberus at his side, while Neptune holds the trident. Perhaps influenced by this work, Agostino Carracci originally depicted Pluto with a bident in a preparatory drawing for his painting Pluto (1592), in which the god ended up holding his characteristic key. In Caravaggio's Giove, Nettuno e Plutone (ca. 1597), a ceiling mural based on alchemical allegory, it is Neptune who holds the bident.
Persephone did not submit to Hades willingly, but was abducted by him while picking flowers in the fields of Nysa. In protest of his act, Demeter cast a curse on the land and there was a great famine; though, one by one, the gods came to request she lift it, lest mankind perish, she asserted that the earth would remain barren until she saw her daughter again. Finally, Zeus intervened; via Hermes, he requested that Hades return Persephone. Hades complied,
But he on his part secretly gave her sweet pomegranate seed to eat, taking care for himself that she might not remain continually with grave, dark-robed Demeter.Demeter questioned Persephone on her return to light and air:
— Homeric Hymn to Demeter
...but if you have tasted food, you must go back again beneath the secret places of the earth, there to dwell a third part of the seasons every year: yet for the two parts you shall be with me and the other deathless gods.This bound her to Hades and the Underworld, much to the dismay of Demeter. It is not clear whether Persephone was accomplice to the ploy. Zeus proposed a compromise, to which all parties agreed: of the year, Persephone would spend one third with her husband.
— Homeric Hymn to Demeter
It is during this time that winter casts on the earth "an aspect of sadness and mourning."
Theseus and Pirithous
Theseus and Pirithous pledged to kidnap and marry daughters of Zeus. Theseus chose Helen and together they kidnapped her and decided to hold onto her until she was old enough to marry. Pirithous chose Persephone. They left Helen with Theseus' mother, Aethra, and traveled to the Underworld. Hades knew of their plan to capture his wife, so he pretended to offer them hospitality and set a feast; as soon as the pair sat down, snakes coiled around their feet and held them there. Theseus was eventually rescued by Heracles but Pirithous remained trapped as punishment for daring to seek the wife of a god for his own.Heracles
Heracles' final labour was to capture Cerberus. First, Heracles went to Eleusis to be initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries. He did this to absolve himself of guilt for killing the centaurs and to learn how to enter and exit the underworld alive. He found the entrance to the underworld at Taenarum. Athena and Hermes helped him through and back from Hades. Heracles asked Hades for permission to take Cerberus. Hades agreed as long as Heracles didn't harm Cerberus. When Heracles dragged the dog out of Hades, he passed through the cavern Acherusia.
Minthe
The nymph Minthe, associated with the river Cocytus, loved by Hades, was turned into the mint plant, by a jealous Persephone.Realm of Hades
In older Greek myths, the realm of Hades is the misty and gloomy abode of the dead (also called Erebus) where all mortals go when they die. Very few mortals could leave Hades once they entered. The exceptions, Heracles and Theseus, are heroic.[citation needed] Even Odysseus in his Nekyia (Odyssey, xi) calls up the spirits of the departed, rather than descend to them. Later Greek philosophy introduced the idea that all mortals are judged after death and are either rewarded or cursed.[citation needed]There were several sections of the realm of Hades, including Elysium, the Asphodel Meadows, and Tartarus. Greek mythographers were not perfectly consistent about the geography of the afterlife. A contrasting myth of the afterlife concerns the Garden of the Hesperides, often identified with the Isles of the Blessed, where the blessed heroes may dwell.
In Roman mythology, the entrance to the Underworld located at Avernus, a crater near Cumae, was the route Aeneas used to descend to the realm of the dead. By synecdoche, "Avernus" could be substituted for the underworld as a whole. The di inferi were a collective of underworld divinities.
For Hellenes, the deceased entered the underworld by crossing the Styx, ferried across by Charon kair'-on), who charged an obolus, a small coin for passage placed in the mouth of the deceased by pious relatives. Paupers and the friendless gathered for a hundred years on the near shore according to Book VI of Vergil's Aeneid. Greeks offered propitiatory libations to prevent the deceased from returning to the upper world to "haunt" those who had not given them a proper burial. The far side of the river was guarded by Cerberus, the three-headed dog defeated by Heracles (Roman Hercules). Passing beyond Cerberus, the shades of the departed entered the land of the dead to be judged.
The five rivers of the realm of Hades, and their symbolic meanings, are Acheron (the river of sorrow, or woe), Cocytus (lamentation), Phlegethon (fire), Lethe (oblivion), and Styx (hate), the river upon which even the gods swore and in which Achilles was dipped to render him invincible. The Styx forms the boundary between the upper and lower worlds. See also Eridanos.
The first region of Hades comprises the Fields of Asphodel, described in Odyssey xi, where the shades of heroes wander despondently among lesser spirits, who twitter around them like bats. Only libations of blood offered to them in the world of the living can reawaken in them for a time the sensations of humanity.
Beyond lay Erebus, which could be taken for a euphonym of Hades, whose own name was dread. There were two pools, that of Lethe, where the common souls flocked to erase all memory, and the pool of Mnemosyne ("memory"), where the initiates of the Mysteries drank instead. In the forecourt of the palace of Hades and Persephone sit the three judges of the Underworld: Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Aeacus. There at the trivium sacred to Hecate, where three roads meet, souls are judged, returned to the Fields of Asphodel if they are neither virtuous nor evil, sent by the road to Tartarus if they are impious or evil, or sent to Elysium (Islands of the Blessed) with the "blameless" heroes.
In the Sibylline oracles, a curious hodgepodge of Greco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian elements, Hades again appears as the abode of the dead, and by way of folk etymology, it even derives Hades from the name Adam (the first man), saying it is because he was the first to enter there. Owing to its appearance in the New Testament of the Bible, Hades also has a distinct meaning in Christianity.
Oionokles Painter - User:Jastrow, own work, 2008-03-15
Hades (right-hand side) and Persephone (left-hand side). Detail from an Attic red-figure amphora, ca. 470 BC. From Italy.
Pluto (Greek: Πλούτων, Ploutōn) was the ruler of the underworld in classical mythology. The earlier name for the god was Hades, which became more common as the name of the underworld itself. In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pluto represents a more positive concept of the god who presides over the afterlife. Ploutōn was frequently conflated with Ploutos (Πλοῦτος, Plutus), a god of wealth, because mineral wealth was found underground, and because as a chthonic god Pluto ruled the deep earth that contained the seeds necessary for a bountiful harvest. The name Ploutōn came into widespread usage with the Eleusinian Mysteries, in which Pluto was venerated as a stern ruler but the loving husband of Persephone. The couple received souls in the afterlife, and are invoked together in religious inscriptions. Hades, by contrast, had few temples and religious practices associated with him, and he is portrayed as the dark and violent abductor of Persephone.
Pluto and Hades differ in character, but they are not distinct figures and share two dominant myths. In Greek cosmogony, the god received the rule of the underworld in a three-way division of sovereignty over the world, with his brother Zeus ruling the Sky and his other brother Poseidon sovereign over the Sea. His central narrative is the abduction of Persephone to be his wife and the queen of his realm. Plouton as the name of the ruler of the underworld first appears in Greek literature of the Classical period, in the works of the Athenian playwrights and of the philosopher Plato, who is the major Greek source on its significance. Under the name Pluto, the god appears in other myths in a secondary role, mostly as the possessor of a quest-object, and especially in the descent of Orpheus or other heroes to the underworld.
Plūtō ([ˈpluːtoː]; genitive Plūtōnis) is the Latinized form of the Greek Plouton. Pluto's Roman equivalent is Dis Pater, whose name is most often taken to mean "Rich Father" and is perhaps a direct translation of Plouton. Pluto was also identified with the obscure Roman Orcus, like Hades the name of both a god of the underworld and the underworld as a place. The borrowed Greek name Pluto is sometimes used for the ruler of the dead in Latin literature, leading some mythology handbooks to assert misleadingly that Pluto was the Roman counterpart of Hades. Pluto (Pluton in French and German, Plutone in Italian) becomes the most common name for the classical ruler of the underworld in subsequent Western literature and other art forms.
Hesiod
The name Plouton does not appear in Greek literature of the Archaic period. In Hesiod's Theogony, the six children of Cronus and Rhea are Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Hades, Demeter, and Hestia. The male children divide the world into three realms. Hades takes Persephone by force from her mother Demeter, with the consent of Zeus. Ploutos, "Wealth," appears in the Theogony as the child of Demeter and Iasion: "fine Plutus, who goes upon the whole earth and the broad back of the sea, and whoever meets him and comes into his hands, that man he makes rich, and he bestows much wealth upon him." The union of Demeter and Iasion, described also in the Odyssey, took place in a fallow field that had been ploughed three times, in what seems to be a reference to a ritual copulation or sympathetic magic to ensure the earth's fertility. "The resemblance of the name Ploutos to Plouton ...," it has been noted, "cannot be accidental. Plouton is lord of the dead, but as Persephone's husband he has serious claims to the powers of fertility." Demeter's son Plutus merges in the narrative tradition with her son-in-law Pluto, redefining the implacable chariot-driver Hades whose horses trample the flowering earth.
That the underworld god was associated early on with success in agricultural activity is already evident in Hesiod's Works and Days, line 465-469: "Pray to Zeus of the Earth and to pure Demeter to make Demeter's holy grain sound and heavy, when first you begin ploughing, when you hold in your hand the end of the plough-tail and bring down your stick on the backs of the oxen as they draw on the pole-bar by the yoke-straps."
Plouton and Ploutos
Plouton was one of several euphemistic names for Hades, described in the Iliad as the god most hateful to mortals. Plato says that people prefer the name Plouton, "giver of wealth," because the name of Hades is fear-provoking. The name was understood as referring to "the boundless riches of the earth, both the crops on its surface—he was originally a god of the land—and the mines hidden within it." What is sometimes taken as "confusion" of the two gods Plouton and Ploutos ("Wealth") held or acquired a theological significance in antiquity. As a lord of abundance or riches, Pluto expresses the aspect of the underworld god that was positive, symbolized in art by the "horn of plenty" (cornucopia), by means of which Plouton is distinguished from the gloomier Hades.The Roman poet Ennius (ca. 239–169 BC), the leading figure in the Hellenization of Latin literature, considered Pluto a Greek god to be explained in terms of the Roman equivalents Dis Pater and Orcus. It is unclear whether Pluto had a literary presence in Rome before Ennius. Some scholars think that rituals and beliefs pertaining to Pluto entered Roman culture with the establishment of the Saecular Games in 249 BC, and that Dis pater was only a translation of Plouton. In the mid-1st century BC, Cicero identifies Pluto with Dis, explaining that "The earth in all its power and plenty is sacred to Father Dis, a name which is the same as Dives, 'The Wealthy One,' as is the Greek Plouton. This is because everything is born of the earth and returns to it again."
During the Roman Imperial era, the Greek geographer Strabo (1st century AD) makes a distinction between Pluto and Hades. In writing of the mineral wealth of ancient Iberia (Roman Spain), he says that among the Turdetani, it is "Pluto, and not Hades, who inhabits the region down below." In the discourse On Mourning by the Greek author Lucian (2nd century AD), Pluto's "wealth" is the dead he rules over in the abyss (chasma); the name Hades is reserved for the underworld itself.
Other identifications
In Greek religious practice, Pluto is sometimes seen as the "chthonic Zeus" (Zeus Chthonios or Zeus Catachthonios), or at least as having functions or significance equivalent to those of Zeus but pertaining to the earth or underworld. In ancient Roman and Hellenistic religion, Pluto was identified with a number of other deities, including Summanus, the Roman god of nocturnal thunder; Februus, the Roman god from whose purification rites the month of February takes its name; the syncretic god Serapis, regarded as Pluto's Egyptian equivalent; and the Semitic god Muth (Μούθ). Muth was described by Philo of Byblos as the equivalent of both Thanatos (Death personified) and Pluto. The ancient Greeks did not regard Pluto as "death" per se.Mythology
The best-known myth involving Pluto or Hades is the abduction of Persephone, also known as Kore ("the Maiden"). The earliest literary versions of the myth are a brief mention in Hesiod's Theogony and the extended narrative of the Homeric Hymn to Demeter; in both these works, the ruler of the underworld is named as Hades ("the Hidden One"). Hades is an unsympathetic figure, and Persephone's unwillingness is emphasized. Increased usage of the name Plouton in religious inscriptions and literary texts reflects the influence of the Eleusinian Mysteries, which treated Pluto and Persephone as a divine couple who received initiates in the afterlife; as such, Pluto was disassociated from the "violent abductor" of Kore. Two early works that give the abductor god's name as Pluto are the Greek mythography traditionally known as the Library of "Apollodorus" (1st century BC) and the Latin Fables of Hyginus (ca. 64 BC–AD 17).The most influential version of the abduction myth is that of Ovid (d. 17 or 18 AD), who tells the story in both the Metamorphoses (Book 5) and the Fasti (Book 4). Another major retelling, also in Latin, is the long unfinished poem De raptu Proserpinae ("On the Abduction of Proserpina") by Claudian (d. 404 AD). Ovid uses the name Dis, not Pluto in these two passages, and Claudian uses Pluto only once; translators and editors, however, sometimes supply the more familiar "Pluto" when other epithets appear in the source text. The abduction myth was a popular subject for Greek and Roman art, and recurs throughout Western art and literature, where the name "Pluto" becomes common (see Pluto in Western art and literature below). Narrative details from Ovid and Claudian influence these later versions in which the abductor is named as Pluto, especially the role of Venus and Cupid in manipulating Pluto with love and desire. Throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and certainly by the time of Natale Conti's influential Mythologiae (1567), the traditions pertaining to the various rulers of the classical underworld coalesced into a single mythology that made few if any distinctions among Hades, Pluto, Dis, and Orcus.
Offspring
Unlike his freely procreating brothers Zeus and Poseidon, Pluto is monogamous, and is rarely said to have children. In Orphic texts, the chthonic nymph Melinoe is the daughter of Persephone by Zeus disguised as Pluto, and the Eumenides ("The Kindly Ones") are the offspring of Persephone and Zeus Chthonios, often identified as Pluto. The Augustan poet Vergil says that Pluto is the father of Allecto the Fury, whom he hates. The lack of a clear distinction between Pluto and "chthonic Zeus" confuses the question of whether in some traditions, now obscure, Persephone bore children to her husband. In the late 4th century AD, Claudian's epic on the abduction motivates Pluto with a desire for children. The poem is unfinished, however, and anything Claudian may have known of these traditions is lost.Justin Martyr (2nd century AD) alludes to children of Pluto, but neither names nor enumerates them. Hesychius (5th century AD) mentions a "son of Pluto." In his 14th-century mythography, Boccaccio records a tradition in which Pluto was the father of the divine personification Veneratio ("Reverence"), noting that she had no mother because Proserpina (the Latin name of Persephone) was sterile.
In The Faerie Queene (1590s), Edmund Spenser invents a daughter for Pluto whom he calls Lucifera. The character's name was taken from the 16th-century mythography of Natale Conti, who used it as the Latin translation of Greek phosphor, "light-bearer," a regular epithet of Hecate. Spenser incorporated aspects of the mysteries into The Faerie Queene.
Pluto and Orpheus
Orpheus was regarded as a founder and prophet of the mysteries called "Orphic," "Dionysiac," or "Bacchic." Mythologized for his ability to entrance even animals and trees with his music, he was also credited in antiquity with the authorship of the lyrics that have survived as the Orphic Hymns, among them a hymn to Pluto. Orpheus's voice and lyre-playing represented a medium of revelation or higher knowledge for the mystery cults.In his central myth, Orpheus visits the underworld in the hope of retrieving his bride, Eurydice, relying on the power of his music to charm the king and queen of Hades. Greek narratives of Orpheus's descent and performance typically name the ruler of the underworld as Plouton, as for instance in the Bibliotheca. The myth demonstrates the importance of Pluto "the Rich" as the possessor of a quest-object. Orpheus performing before Pluto and Persephone was a common subject of ancient and later Western literature and art, and one of the most significant mythological themes of the classical tradition.
The demonstration of Orpheus's power depends on the normal obduracy of Pluto; the Augustan poet Horace describes him as incapable of tears. Claudian, however, portrays the steely god as succumbing to Orpheus's song so that "with iron cloak he wipes his tears" (ferrugineo lacrimas deterget amictu), an image renewed by Milton in Il Penseroso (106–107): "Such notes ... / Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek."
The Greek writer Lucian (ca. 125–after 180 AD) suggests that Pluto's love for his wife gave the ruler of the underworld a special sympathy or insight into lovers parted by death. In one of Lucian's Dialogues of the Dead, Pluto questions Protesilaus, the first Greek hero killed in the Trojan War, who wishes to return to the world of the living. "You are then in love with life?" Pluto asks. "Such lovers we have here in plenty; but they love an object, which none of them can obtain." Protesilaus explains, like an Orpheus in reverse, that he has left behind a young bride whose memory even the Lethe's waters of forgetting have not erased from him. Pluto assures him that death will reunite them someday, but Protesilaus argues that Pluto himself should understand love and its impatience, and reminds the king of his grant to Orpheus and to Alcestis, who took her husband's place in death and then was permitted at the insistence of Heracles to return to him. When Persephone intercedes for the dead warrior, Pluto grants the request at once, though allowing only one day for the reunion.
Mysteries and cult
As Pluto gained importance as an embodiment of agricultural wealth within the Eleusinian Mysteries, from the 5th century BC onward the name Hades was increasingly reserved for the underworld as a place. Neither Hades nor Pluto was one of the traditional Twelve Olympians, and Hades seems to have received limited cult, perhaps only at Elis, where the temple was opened once a year. During the time of Plato, the Athenians periodically honored the god called Plouton with the "strewing of a couch" (tên klinên strôsai). At Eleusis, Plouton had his own priestess. Pluto was worshipped with Persephone as a divine couple at Knidos, Ephesos, Mytilene, and Sparta as well as at Eleusis, where they were known simply as God (Theos) and Goddess (Thea).In the ritual texts of the mystery religions preserved by the so-called Orphic or Bacchic gold tablets, from the late 5th century BC onward the name Hades appears more frequently than Plouton, but in reference to the underground place: Plouton is the ruler who presides over it in a harmonious partnership with Persephone. By the end of the 4th century BC, the name Plouton appears in Greek metrical inscriptions. Two fragmentary tablets greet Pluto and Persephone jointly, and the divine couple appear as welcoming figures in a metrical epitaph:
I know that even below the earth, if there is indeed a reward for the worthy ones,Hesychius identifies Pluto with Eubouleus, but other ancient sources distinguish between these two underworld deities. In the Mysteries Eubouleus plays the role of a torchbearer, possibly a guide for the initiate's return. In the view of Lewis Richard Farnell, Eubouleus was originally a title referring to the "good counsel" the ruler of the underworld was able to give and which was sought at Pluto's dream oracles; by the 2nd century BC, however, he had acquired a separate identity.
the first and foremost honors, nurse, shall be yours, next to Persephone and Pluto.
Orphic Hymn to Pluto
The Orphic Hymn to Pluto addresses the god as "strong-spirited" and the "All-Receiver" who commands death and is the master of mortals. His titles are given as Zeus Chthonios and Euboulos ("Good Counsel"). In the hymn's topography, Pluto's dwelling is in Tartarus, simultaneously a "meadow" and "thick-shaded and dark," where the Acheron encircles "the roots of the earth." Hades is again the name of the place, here described as "windless," and its gates, through which Pluto carried "pure Demeter's daughter" as his bride, are located in an Attic cave within the district of Eleusis. The route from Persephone's meadow to Hades crosses the sea. The hymn concludes:You alone were born to judge deeds obscure and conspicuous.The hymn is one of several examples of Greco-Roman prayer that express a desire for the presence of a deity, and has been compared to a similar epiclesis in the Acts of Thomas.
Holiest and illustrious ruler of all, frenzied god,
You delight in the worshiper's respect and reverence.
Come with favor and joy to the initiates. I summon you.
Magic invocations
The names of both Hades and Pluto appear also in the Greek Magical Papyri and curse tablets, with Hades typically referring to the underworld as a place, and Pluto regularly invoked as the partner of Persephone. Five Latin curse tablets from Rome, dating to the mid-1st century BC, promise Persephone and Pluto an offering of "dates, figs, and a black pig" if the curse is fulfilled by the desired deadline. The pig was a characteristic animal sacrifice to chthonic deities, whose victims were almost always black or dark in color.A set of curse tablets written in Doric Greek and found in a tomb addresses a Pasianax, "Lord to All," sometimes taken as a title of Pluto, but more recently thought to be a magical name for the corpse. Pasianax is found elsewhere as an epithet of Zeus, or in the tablets may invoke a daimon like Abrasax.
Sanctuaries of Pluto
A sanctuary dedicated to Pluto was called a ploutonion (Latin plutonium). The complex at Eleusis for the mysteries had a ploutonion regarded as the birthplace of the divine child Ploutos, in another instance of conflation or close association of the two gods. Greek inscriptions record an altar of Pluto, which was to be "plastered", that is, resurfaced for a new round of sacrifices at Eleusis. One of the known ploutonia was in the sacred grove between Tralleis and Nysa, where a temple of Pluto and Persephone was located. Visitors sought healing and dream oracles. The ploutonion at Hierapolis, Phrygia, was connected to the rites of Cybele, but during the Roman Imperial era was subsumed by the cult of Apollo, as confirmed by archaeological investigations during the 1960s. It too was a dream oracle.The sites often seem to have been chosen because the presence of naturally occurring mephitic vapors was thought to indicate an opening to the underworld. In Italy, Avernus was considered an entrance to the underworld that produced toxic vapors, but Strabo seems not to think that it was a ploutonion.Iconography and attributes
In Eleusinian scenes
Kevin Clinton attempted to distinguish the iconography of Hades, Plouton, Ploutos, and the Eleusinian Theos in 5th-century vase painting that depicts scenes from or relating to the mysteries. In Clinton's schema, Plouton is a mature man, sometimes even white-haired; Hades is also usually bearded and mature, but his darkness is emphasized in literary descriptions, represented in art by dark hair. Plouton's most common attribute is a sceptre, but he also often holds a full or overflowing cornucopia; Hades sometimes holds a horn, but it is depicted with no contents and should be understood as a drinking horn. Unlike Plouton, Hades never holds agrarian attributes such as stalks of grain. His chest is usually bare or only partly covered, whereas Plouton is fully robed (exceptions, however, are admitted by the author). Plouton stands, often in the company of both Demeter and Kore, or sometimes one of the goddesses, but Hades almost always sits or reclines, usually with Persephone facing him. "Confusion and disagreement" about the interpretation of these images remain.The keys of Pluto
Pausanias explains the significance of Pluto's key in describing a wondrously carved cedar chest at the Temple of Hera in Elis. Numerous deities are depicted, with one panel grouping Dionysus, Persephone, the nymphs and Pluto. Pluto holds a key because "they say that what is called Hades has been locked up by Pluto, and that nobody will return back again therefrom." Natale Conti cites Pausanias in noting that keys are an attribute of Pluto as the scepter is of Jove (Greek Zeus) and the trident of Neptune (Poseidon).
A golden key (chrusea klês) was laid on the tongue of initiates by priests at Eleusis and was a symbol of the revelation they were obligated to keep secret. A key is among the attributes of other infernal deities such as Hecate, Anubis, and Persephone, and those who act as guardians or timekeepers, such as Janus and Aion. Aeacus (Aiakos), one of the three mortal kings who became judges in the afterlife, is also a kleidouchos (κλειδοῦχος), "holder of the keys," and a priestly doorkeeper in the court of Pluto and Persephone.
Vegetation and color
According to the Stoic philosopher Cornutus (1st century AD), Pluto wore a wreath of phasganion, more often called xiphion, traditionally identified as a type of gladiolus. Dioscorides recorded medical uses for the plant. For extracting stings and thorns, xiphion was mixed with wine and frankincense to make a cataplasm. The plant was also used as an aphrodisiac and contraceptive. It grew in humid places. In an obscure passage, Cornutus seems to connect Pluto's wearing of phasganion to an etymology for Avernus, which he derives from the word for "air," perhaps through some association with the color glaukos, "bluish grey," "greenish" or "sea-colored," which might describe the plant's leaves. Because the color could describe the sky, Cornutus regularly gives it divine connotations. Pluto's twin sister was named Glauca.Ambiguity of color is characteristic of Pluto. Although both he and his realm are regularly described as dark, black, or gloomy, the god himself is sometimes seen as pale or having a pallor. Martianus Capella (5th century) describes him as both "growing pale in shadow, a fugitive from light" and actively "shedding darkness in the gloom of Tartarean night," crowned with a wreath made of ebony as suitable for the kingdom he governs. The horses of Pluto are usually black, but Ovid describes them as "sky-colored" (caeruleus, from caelum, "sky"), which might be blue, greenish-blue, or dark blue.
The Renaissance mythographer Natale Conti says wreaths of narcissus, maidenhair fern (adianthus), and cypress were given to Pluto. In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Gaia (Earth) produced the narcissus at Zeus's request as a snare for Persephone; when she grasps it, a chasm opens up and the "Host to Many" (Hades) seizes her. Narcissus wreaths were used in early times to crown Demeter and Persephone, as well as the Furies (Eumenides). The flower was associated with narcotic drugginess (narkê, "torpor"), erotic fascination, and imminent death; to dream of crowning oneself with narcissus was a bad sign. In the myth of Narcissus, the flower is created when a beautiful, self-absorbed youth rejects sexuality and is condemned to perpetual self-love along the Styx.
Conti's inclusion of adianthus (Adiantum in modern nomenclature) is less straightforward. The name, meaning "unmoistened" (Greek adianton), was taken in antiquity to refer to the fern's ability to repel water. The plant, which grew in wet places, was also called capillus veneris, "hair of Venus," divinely dry when she emerged from the sea. Historian of medicine John M. Riddle has suggested that the adianthus was one of the ferns Dioscorides called asplenon and prescribed as a contraceptive (atokios). The associations of Proserpine (Persephone) and the maidenhair are alluded to by Samuel Beckett in a 1946 poem, in which the self is a Platonic cave with capillaires, in French both "maidenhair fern" and "blood vessels".
The cypress (Greek cyparissus, Latin cupressus) has traditional associations with mourning. In ancient Attica, households in mourning were garlanded with cypress, and it was used to fumigate the air during cremations. In the myth of Cyparissus, a youth was transformed into a cypress, consumed by grief over the accidental death of a pet stag. A "white cypress" is part of the topography of the underworld that recurs in the Orphic gold tablets as a kind of beacon near the entrance, perhaps to be compared with the Tree of Life in various world mythologies. The description of the cypress as "white" (Greek leukē), since the botanical tree is dark, is symbolic, evoking the white garments worn by initiates or the clothing of a corpse, or the pallor of the dead. In Orphic funeral rites, it was forbidden to make coffins of cypress.
The tradition of the mystery religions favors Pluto as a loving and faithful partner to Persephone, in contrast to the violence of Hades in early myths, but one ancient myth that preserves a lover for him parallels the abduction and also has a vegetative aspect. A Roman source says that Pluto fell in love with Leuca (Greek Leukē, "White"), the most beautiful of the nymphs, and abducted her to live with him in his realm. After the long span of her life came to its end, he memorialized their love by creating a white tree in the Elysian Fields. The tree was the white poplar (Greek leukē), the leaves of which are white on one side and dark on the other, representing the duality of upper and underworld. A wreath of white poplar leaves was fashioned by Heracles to mark his ascent from the underworld, an aition for why it was worn by initiates and by champion athletes participating in funeral games. Like other plants associated with Pluto, white poplar was regarded as a contraceptive in antiquity. The relation of this tree to the white cypress of the mysteries is debated.
The helmet of invisibility
The Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus uses the name Plouton instead of Hades in relating the tripartite division of sovereignty, the abduction of Persephone, and the visit of Orpheus to the underworld. This version of the theogony for the most part follows Hesiod (see above), but adds that the three brothers were each given a gift by the Cyclopes to use in their battle against the Titans: Zeus thunder and lightning; Poseidon a trident; and Pluto a helmet (kyneê).The helmet Pluto receives is presumably the magical Cap of Invisibility (aidos kyneê), but the Bibliotheca is the only ancient source that explicitly says it belonged to Pluto. The verbal play of aidos, "invisible," and Hades is thought to account for this attribution of the helmet to the ruler of the underworld, since no ancient narratives record his use or possession of it. Later authors such as Rabelais (16th century) do attribute the helmet to Pluto. Erasmus calls it the "helmet of Orcus" and gives it as a figure of speech referring to those who conceal their true nature by a cunning device. Francis Bacon notes the proverbial usage: "the helmet of Pluto, which maketh the politic man go invisible, is secrecy in the counsel, and celerity in the execution."
Bident
In the Middle Ages, classical underworld figures began to be depicted with a pitchfork. Early Christian writers had identified the classical underworld with Hell, and its denizens as demons or devils. In the Renaissance, the bident became a conventional attribute of Pluto. In an influential ceiling mural depicting the wedding of Cupid and Psyche, painted by Raphael's workshop for the Villa Farnesina in 1517, Pluto is shown holding the bident, with Cerberus at his side, while Neptune holds the trident. Perhaps influenced by this work, Agostino Carracci originally depicted Pluto with a bident in a preparatory drawing for his painting Pluto (1592), in which the god ended up holding his characteristic key. In Caravaggio's Giove, Nettuno e Plutone (ca. 1597), a ceiling mural based on alchemical allegory, it is Neptune who holds the bident.
In Greek literature and philosophy
To Plato, the god of the underworld was “an agent in [the] beneficent cycle of death and rebirth” meriting worship under the name of Plouton, a giver of spiritual wealth. In the dialogue Cratylus, Plato has Socrates explain the etymology of Plouton, saying that Pluto gives wealth (ploutos), and his name means “giver of wealth, which comes out of the earth beneath”. Because the name Hades is taken to mean “the invisible”, people fear what they cannot see; although they are in error about the nature of this deity's power, Socrates says, “the office and name of the God really correspond”:And where do you think Pluto gets his name [i.e. “rich”],
if not because he took the best portion?
...
How much better are things below than what Zeus possesses!
He is the perfect and accomplished Sophist, and the great benefactor of the inhabitants of the other world; and even to us who are upon earth he sends from below exceeding blessings. For he has much more than he wants down there; wherefore he is called Pluto (or the rich). Note also, that he will have nothing to do with men while they are in the body, but only when the soul is liberated from the desires and evils of the body. Now there is a great deal of philosophy and reflection in that; for in their liberated state he can bind them with the desire of virtue, but while they are flustered and maddened by the body, not even father Cronos himself would suffice to keep them with him in his own far-famed chains.Since "the union of body and soul is not better than the loosing," death is not an evil. Walter Burkert thus sees Pluto as a "god of dissolution." Among the titles of Pluto was Isodaitēs, "divider into equal portions," a title that connects him to the fate goddesses the Moirai. Isodaitēs was also a cult title for Dionysus and Helios.
In ordering his ideal city, Plato proposed a calendar in which Pluto was honored as a benefactor in the twelfth month, implicitly ranking him as one of the twelve principal deities. In the Attic calendar, the twelfth month, more or less equivalent to June, was Skirophorion; the name may be connected to the rape of Persephone.
Theogonies and cosmology
Euhemerism and Latinization
In the theogony of Euhemerus (4th century BC), the gods were treated as mortal rulers whose deeds were immortalized by tradition. Ennius translated Euhemerus into Latin about a hundred years later, and a passage from his version was in turn preserved by the early Christian writer Lactantius. Here the union of Saturn (the Roman equivalent of Cronus) and Ops, an Italic goddess of abundance, produces Jupiter (Greek Zeus), Juno (Hera), Neptune, Pluto, and Glauca:Then Saturn took Ops to wife. Titan, the elder brother, demanded the kingship for himself. Vesta their mother, with their sisters Ceres [Demeter] and Ops, persuaded Saturn not to give way to his brother in the matter. Titan was less good-looking than Saturn; for that reason, and also because he could see his mother and sisters working to have it so, he conceded the kingship to Saturn, and came to terms with him: if Saturn had a male child born to him, it would not be reared. This was done to secure reversion of the kingship to Titan's children. They then killed the first son that was born to Saturn. Next came twin children, Jupiter and Juno. Juno was given to Saturn to see while Jupiter was secretly removed and given to Vesta to be brought up without Saturn's knowledge. In the same way without Saturn knowing, Ops bore Neptune and hid him away. In her third labor Ops bore another set of twins, Pluto and Glauce. (Pluto in Latin is Diespiter; some call him Orcus.) Saturn was shown his daughter Glauce but his son Pluto was hidden and removed. Glauce then died young. That is the pedigree, as written, of Jupiter and his brothers; that is how it has been passed down to us in holy scripture.In this theogony, which Ennius introduced into Latin literature, Saturn, "Titan," Vesta, Ceres, and Ops are siblings; Glauca is the twin of Pluto and dies mysteriously young. There are several mythological figures named Glauca; the sister of Pluto may be the Glauca who in Cicero's account of the three aspects of Diana conceived the third with the equally mysterious Upis. This is the genealogy for Pluto that Boccaccio used in his Genealogia Deorum Gentilium and in his lectures explicating the Divine Comedy of Dante.
In Book 3 of the Sibylline Oracles, dating mostly to the 2nd century AD, Rhea gives birth to Pluto as she passes by Dodona, "where the watery paths of the River Europus flowed, and the water ran into the sea, merged with the Peneius. This is also called the Stygian river."
Orphic and philosophical systems
The Orphic theogonies are notoriously varied, and Orphic cosmology influenced the varying Gnostic theogonies of late antiquity. Clementine literature (4th century AD) preserves a theogony with explicit Orphic influence that also draws on Hesiod, yielding a distinctive role for Pluto. When the primordial elements came together by orderly cyclonic force, they produced a generative sphere, the "egg" from which the primeval Orphic entity Phanes is born and the world is formed. The release of Phanes and his ascent to the heavenly top of the world-egg causes the matter left in the sphere to settle in relation to weight, creating the tripartite world of the traditional theogonies:Its lower part, the heaviest element, sinks downwards, and is called Pluto because of its gravity, weight, and great quantity (plêthos) of matter. After the separation of this heavy element in the middle part of the egg the waters flow together, which they call Poseidon. The purest and noblest element, the fire, is called Zeus, because its nature is glowing (ζέουσα, zeousa). It flies right up into the air, and draws up the spirit, now called Metis, that was left in the underlying moisture. And when this spirit has reached the summit of the ether, it is devoured by Zeus, who in his turn begets the intelligence (σύνεσις, sunesis), also called Pallas. And by this artistic intelligence the etherial artificer creates the whole world. This world is surrounded by the air, which extends from Zeus, the very hot ether, to the earth; this air is called Hera.This cosmogony interprets Hesiod allegorically, and so the heaviest element is identified not as the Earth, but as the netherworld of Pluto. (In modern geochemistry, plutonium is the heaviest primordial element.) Supposed etymologies are used to make sense of the relation of physical process to divine name; Plouton is here connected to plêthos (abundance).
In the Stoic system, Pluto represented the lower region of the air, where according to Seneca (1st century AD) the soul underwent a kind of purgatory before ascending to the ether. Seneca's contemporary Cornutus made use of the traditional etymology of Pluto's name for Stoic theology. The Stoics believed that the form of a word contained the original truth of its meaning, which over time could become corrupted or obscured. Plouton derived from ploutein, "to be wealthy," Cornutus said, because "all things are corruptible and therefore are 'ultimately consigned to him as his property.'"
Within the Pythagorean and Neoplatonic traditions, Pluto was allegorized as the region where souls are purified, located between the moon (as represented by Persephone) and the sun. Neoplatonists sometimes interpreted the Eleusinian Mysteries as a fabula of celestial phenomena:
Authors tell the fable that Ceres was Proserpina's mother, and that Proserpina while playing one day was raped by Pluto. Her mother searched for her with lighted torches; and it was decreed by Jupiter that the mother should have her daughter for fifteen days in the month, but Pluto for the rest, the other fifteen. This is nothing but that the name Ceres is used to mean the earth, called Ceres on analogy with crees ('you may create'), for all things are created from her. By Proserpina is meant the moon, and her name is on analogy with prope serpens ('creeping near'), for she is moved nearer to the earth than the other planets. She is called earth's daughter, because her substance has more of earth in it than of the other elements. By Pluto is meant the shadow that sometimes obstructs the moon.
Plouton Helios
A dedicatory inscription from Smyrna describes a 1st–2nd century sanctuary to "God Himself" as the most exalted of a group of six deities, including clothed statues of Plouton Helios and Koure Selene, "Pluto the Sun" and "Kore the Moon." The status of Pluto and Kore as a divine couple is marked by what the text describes as a "linen embroidered bridal curtain." The two are placed as bride and groom within an enclosed temple, separately from the other deities cultivated at the sanctuary.Plouton Helios is mentioned in other literary sources in connection with Koure Selene and Helios Apollon; the sun on its nighttime course was sometimes envisioned as traveling through the underworld on its return to the east. Apuleius describes a rite in which the sun appears at midnight to the initiate at the gates of Proserpina; it has been suggested that this midnight sun could be Plouton Helios.
The Smyrna inscription also records the presence of Helios Apollon at the sanctuary. As two forms of Helios, Apollo and Pluto pose a dichotomy:
| Helios Apollon | Plouton Helios |
|---|---|
| One | Many |
| clarity | invisibility |
| bright | dark |
| memory | oblivion |
Plutonius
In the Hellenistic era, the title or epithet Plutonius is sometimes affixed to the names of other deities. In the Hermetic Corpus, Jupiter Plutonius "rules over earth and sea, and it is he who nourishes mortal things that have soul and bear fruit."In Ptolemaic Alexandria, at the site of a dream oracle, Serapis was identified with Aion Plutonius. Gilles Quispel conjectured that this figure results from the integration of the Orphic Phanes into Mithraic religion at Alexandria, and that he "assures the eternity of the city," where the birth of Aion was celebrated at the sanctuary of Kore on January 6. In Latin, Plutonius can be an adjective that simply means "of or pertaining to Pluto."
Neoplatonic demiurge
The Neoplatonist Proclus (5th century AD) considered Pluto the third demiurge, a sublunar demiurge who was also identified variously with Poseidon or Hephaestus. This idea is present in Renaissance Neoplatonism, as for instance in the cosmology of Marsilio Ficino (1433–99), who translated Orphic texts into Latin for his own use. Ficino saw the sublunar demiurge as "a daemonic 'many-headed' sophist, a magus, an enchanter, a fashioner of images and reflections, a shape-changer of himself and of others, a poet in a way of being and of not-being, a royal Pluto." This demiurgic figure identified with Pluto is also "'a purifier of souls' who presides over the magic of love and generation and who uses a fantastic counter-art to mock, but also ... to supplement, the divine icastic or truly imitative art of the sublime translunar Demiurge."In Western art and literature
Christianization
Christian writers of late antiquity sought to discredit the competing gods of Roman and Hellenistic religions, often adopting the euhemerizing approach in regarding them not as divinities, but as people glorified through stories and cultic practices and thus not true deities worthy of worship. The infernal gods, however, retained their potency, becoming identified with the Devil and treated as demonic forces by Christian apologists.One source of Christian revulsion toward the chthonic gods was the arena. Attendants in divine costume, among them a "Pluto" who escorted corpses out, were part of the ceremonies of the gladiatorial games. Tertullian calls the mallet-wielding figure usually identified as the Etruscan Charun the "brother of Jove," that is, Hades/Pluto/Dis, an indication that the distinctions among these denizens of the underworld were becoming blurred in a Christian context. Prudentius, in his poetic polemic against the religious traditionalist Symmachus, describes the arena as a place where savage vows were fulfilled on an altar to Pluto (solvit ad aram / Plutonis fera vota), where fallen gladiators were human sacrifices to Dis and Charon received their souls as his payment, to the delight of the underworld Jove (Iovis infernalis).
Medieval mythography
Medieval mythographies, written in Latin, continue the conflation of Greek and Roman deities begun by the ancient Roman themselves. Perhaps because the name Pluto was used in both traditions, it appears widely in these Latin sources for the classical ruler of the underworld, who is also seen as the double, ally, or adjunct to the figure in Christian mythology known variously as the Devil, Satan, or Lucifer. The classical underworld deities became casually interchangeable with Satan as an embodiment of Hell. For instance, in the 9th century, Abbo Cernuus, the only witness whose account of the Siege of Paris survives, called the invading Vikings the "spawn of Pluto."In the Little Book on Images of the Gods, Pluto is described as
an intimidating personage sitting on a throne of sulphur, holding the scepter of his realm in his right hand, and with his left strangling a soul. Under his feet three-headed Cerberus held a position, and beside him he had three Harpies. From his golden throne of sulphur flowed four rivers, which were called, as is known, Lethe, Cocytus, Phlegethon and Acheron, tributaries of the Stygian swamp.This work derives from that of the Third Vatican Mythographer, possibly one Albricus or Alberic, who presents often extensive allegories and devotes his longest chapter, including an excursus on the nature of the soul, to Pluto.
Medieval and Renaissance literature
In Dante's Divine Comedy (written 1308–1321), Pluto presides over the fourth circle of Hell, to which the greedy are condemned. The Italian form of the name is Pluto, taken by some commentators to refer specifically to Plutus as the god of wealth who would preside over the torment of those who hoarded or squandered it in life. Dante's Pluto is greeted as "the great enemy" and utters the famously impenetrable line Papé Satàn, papé Satàn aleppe. Much of this Canto is devoted to the power of Fortuna to give and take away. Entrance into the fourth circle has marked a downward turn in the poet's journey, and the next landmark after he and his guide cross from the circle is the Stygian swamp, through which they pass on their way to the city of Dis (Italian Dite). Dante's clear distinction between Pluto and Dis suggests that he had Plutus in mind in naming the former. The city of Dis is the "citadel of Lower Hell" where the walls are garrisoned by fallen angels and Furies. Pluto is treated likewise as a purely Satanic figure by the 16th-century Italian poet Tasso throughout his epic Jerusalem Delivered, in which "great Dis, great Pluto" is invoked in the company of "all ye devils that lie in deepest hell."Influenced by Ovid and Claudian, Geoffrey Chaucer (1343–1400) developed the myth of Pluto and Proserpina (the Latin name of Persephone) in English literature. Like earlier medieval writers, Chaucer identifies Pluto's realm with Hell as a place of condemnation and torment, and describes it as "derk and lowe" ("dark and low"). But Pluto's major appearance in the works of Chaucer comes as a character in "The Merchant's Tale," where Pluto is identified as the "Kyng of Fayerye" (Fairy King).As in the anonymous romance Sir Orfeo (ca. 1300), Pluto and Proserpina rule over a fantastical world that melds classical myth and fairyland. Chaucer has the couple engage in a comic battle of the sexes that undermines the Christian imagery in the tale, which is Chaucer's most sexually explicit. The Scottish poet William Dunbar ca. 1503 also described Pluto as a folkloric supernatural being, "the elrich incubus / in cloke of grene" ("the eldritch incubus in cloak of green"), who appears among the courtiers of Cupid.
The name Pluto for the classical ruler of the underworld was further established in English literature by Arthur Golding, whose translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses (1565) was of great influence on William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, and Edmund Spenser. Golding translates Ovid's Dis as Pluto, a practice that prevails among English translators, despite John Milton's use of the Latin Dis in Paradise Lost. The Christian perception of the classical underworld as Hell influenced Golding's translation practices; for instance, Ovid's tenebrosa sede tyrannus / exierat ("the tyrant [Dis] had gone out of his shadowy realm") becomes "the prince of fiends forsook his darksome hole".
Pluto's court as a literary setting could bring together a motley assortment of characters. In Huon de Méry's 13th-century poem "The Tournament of the Antichrist", Pluto rules over a congregation of "classical gods and demigods, biblical devils, and evil Christians." In the 15th-century dream allegory The Assembly of Gods, the deities and personifications are "apparelled as medieval nobility" basking in the "magnyfycence" of their "lord Pluto," who is clad in a "smoky net" and reeking of sulphur.
Throughout the Renaissance, images and ideas from classical antiquity entered popular culture through the new medium of print and through pageants and other public performances at festivals. The Fête-Dieu at Aix-en-Provence in 1462 featured characters costumed as a number of classical deities, including Pluto, and Pluto was the subject of one of seven pageants presented as part of the 1521 Midsummer Eve festival in London. During the 15th century, no mythological theme was brought to the stage more often than Orpheus's descent, with the court of Pluto inspiring fantastical stagecraft. Leonardo da Vinci designed a set with a rotating mountain that opened up to reveal Pluto emerging from the underworld; the drawing survives and was the basis for a modern recreation.
Opera and ballet
The tragic descent of the hero-musician Orpheus to the underworld to retrieve his bride, and his performance at the court of Pluto and Proserpina, offered compelling material for librettists and composers of opera (see List of Orphean operas) and ballet. Pluto also appears in works based on other classical myths of the underworld. As a singing role, Pluto is almost always written for a bass voice, with the low vocal range representing the depths and weight of the underworld, as in Monteverdi and Rinuccini's L'Orfeo (1607) and Il ballo delle ingrate (1608). In their ballo, a form of ballet with vocal numbers, Cupid invokes Pluto from the underworld to lay claim to "ungrateful" women who were immune to love. Pluto's part is considered particularly virtuosic, and a reviewer at the première described the character, who appeared as if from a blazing Inferno, as "formidable and awesome in sight, with garments as given him by poets, but burdened with gold and jewels."The role of Pluto is written for a bass in Peri's Euridice (1600); Caccini's Euridice (1602); Rossi's Orfeo (1647); Cesti's Il pomo d'oro (1668); Sartoris's Orfeo (1672); Lully's Alceste, a tragédie en musique (1674); Charpentier's chamber opera La descente d'Orphée aux enfers (1686); Telemann's Orpheus (1726); and Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie (1733). Pluto was a baritone in Lully's Proserpine (1680), which includes a duo dramatizing the conflict between the royal underworld couple that is notable for its early use of musical characterization. Perhaps the most famous of the Orpheus operas is Offenbach's satiric Orpheus in the Underworld (1858), in which a tenor sings the role of Pluton, disguised in the giddily convoluted plotting as Aristée (Aristaeus), a farmer.
Scenes set in Pluto's realm were orchestrated with instrumentation that became conventionally "hellish", established in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo as two cornets, three trombones, a bassoon, and a régale.
Pluto has also been featured as a role in ballet. In Lully's "Ballet of Seven Planets'" interlude from Cavalli's opera Ercole amante ("Hercules in Love"), Louis XIV himself danced as Pluto and other characters; it was a spectacular flop. Pluto appeared in Noverre's lost La descente d'Orphée aux Enfers (1760s). Gaétan Vestris danced the role of the god in Florian Deller's Orefeo ed Euridice (1763). The Persephone choreographed by Robert Joffrey (1952) was based on André Gide's line "king of winters, the infernal Pluto."
Fine art
The abduction of Proserpina by Pluto was the scene from the myth most often depicted by artists, who usually follow Ovid's version. The influential emblem book Iconologia of Cesare Ripa (1593, second edition 1603) presents the allegorical figure of Rape with a shield on which the abduction is painted. Jacob Isaacsz. van Swanenburg, the first teacher of Rembrandt, echoed Ovid in showing Pluto as the target of Cupid's arrow while Venus watches her plan carried out (location of painting unknown). The treatment of the scene by Rubens is similar. Rembrandt incorporates Claudian's more passionate characterizations. The performance of Orpheus in the court of Pluto and Proserpina was also a popular subject.Major artists who produced works depicting Pluto include:
- Dürer, Abduction of Proserpine on a Unicorn (1516), etching (pictured under Medieval and Renaissance literature above). Dürer's first English biographer called this work "a wild, weird conception" that "produces a most uncomfortable, shuddering impression on the beholder." The source or significance of the unicorn as the form of transport is unclear; Dürer's preparatory drawing showed a conventional horse. Pluto seems to be presented in a manner that recalls the leader of the Wild Hunt.
- Caravaggio, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto (Italian Giove, Nettuno e Plutone, ca. 1597), a ceiling mural (pictured under Theogonies and cosmology above) intended for viewing from below, hence the unusual perspective. Caravaggio created the work for a room adjacent to the alchemical distillery of Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte, his most important patron. The three gods hover around a translucent globe that represents the world: Jupiter with his eagle, Neptune holding a bident, and Pluto accompanied by a bluish-gray horse and a Cerberus who resembles a three-headed border collie more than a hellhound. In addition to personifying the classical elements air, water, and earth, the three figures represent "an allegory of the applied science of alchemy".
- Jan Brueghel the Elder, Orpheus before Pluto and Proserpina (1604), painting.
- Bernini, Pluto and Proserpina (1621–22), also known as The Rape of Proserpina, sculpture with a Cerberus looking in three different directions.
- Rembrandt, Abduction of Proserpina (ca. 1631), painting influenced by Rubens (via the engraving of his student Pieter Soutman). Rembrandt's leonine Pluto draws on Claudian's description of the god as like a ravening lion.
Modern literature
After the Renaissance, literary interest in the abduction myth waned until the revival of classical myth among the Romantics. The work of mythographers such as J.G. Frazer and Jane Ellen Harrison helped inspire the recasting of myths in modern terms by Victorian and Modernist writers. In Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891), Thomas Hardy portrays Alec d'Urberville as "a grotesque parody of Pluto/Dis" exemplifying the late-Victorian culture of male domination, in which women were consigned to "an endless breaking ... on the wheel of biological reproduction." A similar figure is found in The Lost Girl (1920) by D.H. Lawrence, where the character Ciccio acts as Pluto to Alvina's Persephone, "the deathly-lost bride ... paradoxically obliterated and vitalised at the same time by contact with Pluto/Dis" in "a prelude to the grand design of rebirth." The darkness of Pluto is both a source of regeneration, and of "merciless annihilation." Lawrence takes up the theme elsewhere in his work; in The First Lady Chatterley (1926, an early version of Lady Chatterley's Lover), Connie Chatterley sees herself as a Persephone and declares "she'd rather be married to Pluto than Plato," casting her earthy gamekeeper lover as the former and her philosophy-spouting husband as the latter.Percy Jackson series
In Rick Riordan's young adult fantasy series The Heroes of Olympus, the character Hazel Levesque is the daughter of Pluto, god of riches. She is one of seven characters with a parent from classical mythology. In The Son of Neptune, the second volume in the series, Riordan describes Pluto as "cool. ... He just got bad luck when the gods were dividing up the world ... . Jupiter got the sky, Neptune got the sea, and Pluto got the shaft." In Riordan's explanation, Hades "was more of a death god," but acquired his identity as a god of wealth among the Romans, along with a new name.Scientific terms
Scientific terms derived from the name of Pluto include:- Pluto, the name of the dwarf planet, with related terms plutoid and plutino
- plutonium, the heaviest primordial element
- pluton, a term of petrology
- plutonism, a geologic theory
Pluto velificans, with a Cupid attending his abduction of Proserpina in a four-horse chariot (Roman cinerary altar, Antonine Era, 2nd century)
Cinerary altar with tabula representing the rape of Proserpina. White marble, Antonine Era, 2nd century CE.
Hades, Hierapolis
Hierapolis Müzesinde sergilenen ve 2. yüzyıl sonuna tarihlenen Hades heykeli.
Plutone rapisce Proserpina, scultura di Vincenzo de' Rossi.
This
copy of Vincenzo de'Rossi's "The Rape of Proserpina" is on a pedestal
in The Ring of the Parterre faces the Garden Front of Cliveden House
Source: http://www.wyrdlight.com Author: Antony McCallum
Red figure volute krater with scene of the Underworld, follower of the Baltimore Painter, Hermitage
Red
figure volute krater with scene of the Underworld with Hades,
Persephone and Hermes in the palace and the Danaides below, 325-300 BCE,
follower of the Baltimore Painter, southern Italy, The Hermitage
A mosaic of the Kasta Tomb in Amphipolis depicting the abduction of Persephone by Pluto, 4th century BC
The Abduction of Persephone by Pluto, Amphipolis, Greece.
Plutone, assieme a Proserpina, nella Tomba dell'Orco, un sito etrusco a Tarquinia (fine del IV sec. a.C. - inizio III sec. a.C)
Fresco of Hades ("Aita", right) and Persephone ("Φersipnei", middle) leading a procession. Tomb of Orcus II, Tarquinia, Italy.
Hades and Cerberus, in Meyers Konversationslexikon, 1888
Hades (mit Kerberos)
Ploutos with the horn of abundance, in the company of Dionysos (4th century BC)
Dionysos
(sitting left, at the end of the couch) and Ploutos (sitting right,
holding a cornucopia) surrounded by satyrs and maenads. A satyr is
helping and supporting a drunken Hephaistos with his hammer (right).
Eros plays with a goose at the bottom. Attic red-figured krater, ca.
370–360 BC. Said to be from S. Agata dei Goti (Campania).
Plutone in trono con le principali divinità dell'Ade
Blake afrer Flaxman: Hesiod, Theogony
John Flaxman,
Compositions From the Works Days and Theogony of Hesiod, copy 1, object
36 (Bentley 456.36) "Furies Cerberus Pluto Rroserpine Harpies Death"
Description from the source listed below.
Sector E plate Illustration:
Pluto (Hades to the Greeks), god of the underworld, and his consort
Proserpine sit facing forward on a throne at the center of the design,
surrounded by attendants. Pluto's right arm is extended down by his
side, resting against the staff, scepter, or rod that is propped against
his right shoulder. Proserpine, wearing a gown and wrapped in a cloak,
sits to his right, facing forward but turning her head to the left. The
upper bodies of three Furies (Erinyes to the Greeks) appear in the upper
left corner. Two of them hold snakes with open mouths. Three winged and
taloned Harpies appear in the upper right corner, facing right. Death
steps or crouches over three human figures huddled in the lower right
corner. His right leg is bent and drawn forward, and he leans forward
sharply, his torso tilted to the right. His wings are drawn up behind
him on either side of his head. The three humans lie or kneel in
positions of distress beneath him. Cerberus' three lion heads appear to
the left of Pluto's throne, facing left and forward. Each has an open
mouth with visible teeth, biting the head, arm, or torso of a nearby
human. These three humans huddle or lie in distressed positions near the
lower left corner.
Component (Sector E)
Keywords: male, Pluto, arm at side, arm down, arm extended, arm resting,
facing forward, facing left, feet, hand resting, holding, legs bent,
leg bent at knee, sitting, beard, long hair, curly hair, cloak, cloth,
sandal, tunic, hem, staff, rod, scepter Pluto (Hades to the Greeks), god
of the underworld, sits on his throne facing forward near the center of
the design. His legs are bent and his feet rest flat on a step beneath
his seat. His right arm is extended down by his side, resting against
the staff, scepter, or rod that is propped against his right shoulder.
His right hand holds this staff. His left hand is visible above his left
shoulder, resting against Proserpine's right shoulder. He turns his
head slightly to the left. He has a beard and long curly hair. He wears a
tunic with a decorative hem; a cloak or other cloth drapes over his lap
and his feet, visible beneath the decorative hem, are clad in sandals.
Component (Sector E)
Keywords: female, Proserpine, arm at side, arm bent, arm down, arm on
lap, arm resting, facing forward, facing left, leg bent at knee, legs
bent, sitting, right foot, hair, cloak, lap, gown, hem, sandal
Proserpine sits on the throne to the right of Pluto near the center of
the design. She faces forward but turns her head to look left. Her legs
are bent and her one visible foot (the right, clad in a sandal) rests on
a footstool or step above the one on which Pluto's feet rest. Her hair
is drawn back and covered with a scarf or cloak that covers her head and
wraps around her neck. She wears a long gown and a cloak with a
decorative hem that covers her upper body entirely, draping her torso
and falling in folds towards the floor on the right. The shape of this
cloak indicates that her right arm is bent and lying across her lap.
Component (Sector E)
Keywords: throne, couch, step, plinth, stool Proserpine and Pluto sit
side-by-side on a throne with decorative arms. The throne accommodates
both figures, and thus resembles a bench or couch. The throne is raised
on a plinth; below Proserpine's feet is another plinth, step, or
footstool.
Component (Sector A)
Keywords: female, Fury, hovering, arm bent, arm bent upward, arm raised,
arm raised horizontally, facing left, facing forward, facing right,
hand, holding, handle, hammer, ax, mouth open, long hair, short hair,
hair standing on end, band, snake, serpent, tongue, cloak, gown, shirt
The upper bodies of three Furies (Erinyes to the Greeks) appear
(possibly hovering) in the upper left corner. The leftmost Fury faces
left, wrapped entirely in a cloak. One hand is visible above the cloak,
holding a snake with an open mouth. She has long hair, and may be
wearing a head band. The middle Fury faces forward, her torso twisted
slightly to the left and her head turned slightly to the right. Her
right arm is raised horizontally, her forearm bent upward and her hand
holding the handle of what might be a hammer an ax (note the shape of
the head of this tool to the right of this Fury's head). Her short hair
flies around her head as if standing on end. She is wearing a short
garment that flutters around her torso. The rightmost Fury faces
forward, her torso twisted slightly left and her head turned slightly
right. She holds both of her hands in fists up at chest level, each
grasping the body of a snake that wraps around her wrists. Both snakes
have their mouths open and forked tongues extended. She is wearing a
gown or other garment that falls in folds over her torso; the curving
lines above and to the right of her left shoulder may be part of her
flowing gown. She has short hair standing on end. All three Furies hold
their mouths open.
Component (Sector B)
Keywords: female, Harpy, arm at side, facing forward, facing right,
facing left, flying, hovering, breasts, mouth open, short hair, wing,
feather, talon, claw Three Harpies hover or fly near the upper right
corner of the design. The body of the rightmost Harpy faces right, but
she tilts her head back and turns it to look forward and to the left.
Her short hair flies around her head and her feathered wings are raised
on each side of her body. One claw with two talons appears below her to
the left; it may belong to her or to the Harpy to the left. One of her
breasts is visible. The middle Harpy faces left, her head bent back
slightly and her short hair blown back. One feathered wing is drawn up
behind her to the left. The leftmost Harpy faces left also, with one
feathered wing drawn up behind her to the left, and the other drawn up
before her to the right. Her visible right arm is feathered and at her
side, her right taloned claw down. The other taloned claw is held up in
front of her chest. She has short hair. All three Harpies have their
mouths open.
Component (Sector BD)
Keywords: male, Death, young, muscular, fighting, arm bent, arms bent,
arm drawn back, arm down, arm extended, arm raised, arm reaching
downward, bending forward, facing forward, facing right, hand on face,
hand beside head, head bent back, holding, knee, leaning, leg bent at
knee, leg drawn up, right foot, crouching, nude, short hair, wing,
shadow Death, surprisingly young and muscular, steps or crouches over
three human figures near the lower right corner. His right leg is bent
and drawn forward, his right foot resting on the head of one of the
humans. He leans forward sharply, his torso tilted slightly to the
right. His right arm is bent and drawn back, his hand grasping the chin
and throat of another human. His slightly bent left arm is extended down
to the right, his left hand resting on the head of the third human. His
head is turned to the right and bent back, so that he looks down and to
the right. His short hair is blown back. His large wings are drawn up
behind him on either side of his head. He is nude, and he and the humans
below him cast shadows that extend to the right.
Component (Sector D)
Keywords: male, female, arm bent, arm drawn back, arm raised, arm raised
horizontally, arm resting, arm wrapped around head, arms bent, bending
forward, facing down, facing right, facing up, fist, hand beside head,
hand on ground, hand resting, hand beside head, hand on ankle, hands on
ground, hands resting, head down, head on arm, head toward viewer,
holding, huddled, hunched over, knees, leaning, left foot, leg bent at
knee, leg drawn up, legs bent, nude, genitals, shirt, gown, short hair,
bun, shadow Three humans huddle in the lower right corner beneath Death.
The rightmost human is on his knees, left leg drawn up beneath his body
and left foot on tiptoe. He bends forward and rests his head on the
floor, his face hidden. His right arm is raised horizontally with the
elbow out toward the viewer and right hand resting in a fist on the
floor. His left hand, also in a fist, is visible on the floor to the
left of his right hand. He is nude with visible genitals (minimally
depicted) and has short hair. The head and bare arms of a second human
appear to the left of the one on his knees. The head, with short hair,
is towards the viewer, face down and hidden. His bent left arm is
wrapped around his head, supporting it. His right arm is bent and raised
horizontally, with his right hand in a fist resting on the floor. The
head and arms of the third human appear to the left of Death's leg. The
head is bent back so that the face looks forward and up. Short hair that
seems to be drawn back (into a bun?) suggests that this is a female.
Lines at her throat and shoulder suggest that she is wearing a
sleeveless shirt or gown. Her bent right arm is down and drawn back, and
her right hand holds Death's ankle. Death grasps her chin and throat.
The grouping casts shadows that extend to the right.
Component (Sector C)
Keywords: lion, Cerberus, facing left, facing forward, mouth open,
teeth, mane Cerberus' three lion heads appear to the left of Plato's
throne, facing left and forward. The leftmost head is the highest,
facing left. Its mouth is open with one visible tooth and it grasps the
head of a human to the left. The middle head also faces left with mouth
open and tooth showing, biting the arm and elbow of another human. The
third head faces forward, mouth open to bite the torso of a third human.
Teeth appear in this head's mouth as well. All three heads have thick
manes.
Component (Sector C)
Keywords: male, nude, arm bent, arm bent upward, arm drawn back, arm
extended, arm raised, arm raised horizontally, facing away, facing left,
facing up, facing right, fist, hand, hand resting, head bent back,
kneeling, knee, knees, leaning, leg bent at knee, leg drawn up, leg
extended backward, legs bent, lying, lying on side, mouth open, supine,
head toward viewer, upside down, tiptoe, left foot, right foot, nude,
genitals, short hair, long hair, buttocks
The three heads of Cerberus grasp three humans huddled in the lower left
corner. The rightmost human lies face up, head to the right and out
toward the viewer. His head is tilted back so that his face is visible
upside down, mouth open and short hair falling backward onto the ground.
His nude torso turns slightly to the right, with left arm raised, drawn
across his body, and bent upward. His left hand is hidden in the mane
of Cerberus' rightmost head. His lower body is mostly hidden. The middle
human is on his knees, facing left and leaning slightly forward and
away from the viewer. His right leg is bent and drawn forward, right
foot resting on tiptoe. His left leg is bent and extended slightly
backward. His right hand appears to the left of his torso, while his
left arm is drawn back behind him, his elbow held in the mouth of
Cerberus' middle head. His left forearm and fist dangle. Mouth open, he
turns his head up to the right as if looking at Cerberus. He is nude
with visible, but minimally depicted, genitals. The third human faces
away and seems to be kneeling. The bottom of his left foot is visible
below his buttocks and to the left of the middle human's right knee. His
head, turned slightly to the left and mouth open, is grasped in the
mouth of Cerberus' leftmost head. His right hand and lower arm are
visible beneath Cerberus' leftmost head, hand resting on the hip of the
rightmost human. He is nude and has medium-length to long hair.
Getty Villa - Collection (5305218066) by Dave & Margie Hill, originally found on Flickr
Pluto (Roman, AD 1-100) - In his visage as the Greek god Plouton, god of wealth and agrarian abundance
Ratto di Proserpina su di un unicorno, di Albrecht Dürer (1516)
Persephone and Hades: tondo of an Attic red-figured kylix, ca. 440–430 BC
Persephone and Hades. Tondo of an Attic red-figured kylix, ca. 440-430 BC. Said to be from Vulci.
Pluton (1884–86) by Henri Chapu, part of a pair with a standing Persephone gathering flowers
Pluton (1884-1886) by Henri Chapu (1833-1891), on the grounds of the Château de Chantilly. The statue underwent restoration in 2009. Cropped from original photograph.
Ratto di Proserpina, di Luca Giordano (1684-1686)
Oil painting of Hades abducting Persephone. 18th Century. Oil on wood with gilt background. Property of Missing Link Antiques.
This
is a painting of Hades abduction of Persephone who became his wife, and
was only permitted to leave the Underworld once a year. The painting is
on wood with a gold gilt background, 43 cm x 52 cm. Circa 18th century.
Provided by Missing Link Antiques.
Orpheus before Pluto and Proserpina (1605), by Jan Brueghel the Elder
Plutone lascia andare Euridice con Orfeo, di Jean Raoux (1718–1720)
Hades abducting Persephone, fresco in the small Macedonian royal tomb at Vergina, Macedonia, Greece, c. 340 BC
Hydria (ca. 340 BC) depicting figures from the Eleusinian Mysteries
God assembly (shoulder). Eleusinian mysteries, Demeter and Metanira (belly). Apulian red-figure hydria, ca. 340 BC.
John Martin- Ade 1841
Plouton with cornucopia (Attic red-figure amphora, ca. 470 BC)
Hades (on the right) and Persephone (on the left). Detail from an Attic red-figure amphora, ca. 470 BC, from Italy.
19th century Burmese temple painting. Tempura-like paint on cotton. 47” x 35”
Pluto (1588–89) with bident, chiaroscuro woodcut from a series on gods and goddesses by Hendrik Goltzius
Serapis with moon and sun on oil lamp
Etruscan Charun presiding over an execution
Pluto God of Underworld & Cerberus Alabaster Statue Sculpture 9.45" - 24cm
HADES
Hades (steampunk) by dartbaston
Neo Solarise god of Pluto draconer by thefastzza
Hades by GENZOMAN
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Ratto di Proserpina
Charun
armed with a hammer. Side A from an Etruscan red-figure calyx-crater
representing Achilles killing a Trojan prisonner in front of Charun, the
Etruscan demon of death, related to the Greek Charon. End of the 4th
century BC-beginning of the 3rd century BC.
Rembrandt's Abduction of Proserpina (ca. 1631)
Baal-Hammon
Statuette en terre cuite de Baal Hammon retrouvée à Thinissut exposée au musée de Bardo
HADES
Pluto God of Underworld & Cerberus Alabaster Statue Sculpture 9.45" - 24cm HADES
Pluto God of Underworld & Cerberus Statue Sculpture Bronze Finish 7.87"
Hades, the King of the Underworld
Pluto, Roman God of the Underworld with Cerberus
Hades (steampunk) by dartbaston
PLUTONE
hades_and_cerberus_by_chazillah
Neo Solarise god of Pluto draconer by thefastzzaHades by GENZOMAN
Pluto: God of the Underworld
Ade (Disney)
Il mito di Ade e Persefone
Ratto di Proserpina
Galleria Borghese
IL REGNO DI ADE
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