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Your Inner Goddess © 2006-08
Faces of the Goddess
PERSEPHONE was the daughter of Demeter and lived a peaceful life before Hades abducted her and she became the goddess of the underworld. Demeter, an earth goddess, was so distraught over the loss of her daughter that she could no longer tend to the earth. Zeus, pressured by the cries of the hungry people, forced Hades to return Persephone. But before she was released to Hermes, who had been sent to retrieve her, Hades tricked her into eating pomegranate seeds, which forced her to return to the underworld for one month each year for every seed that she ate. (In some versions, she ate four and in others she ate six). When Demeter and her daughter were together, the earth flourished with vegetation and color, but for four (or six) months each year, when Persephone returned to the underworld, the earth once again became barren. In some instances, Persephone and her mother Demeter are often referred to as aspects of the same goddess, called "the Demeters" or simply "the goddesses."
PERSEPHONE
