Agriculture and Greek Myth Essay Example

of the most famous religious cults in the ancient world. The myth of Demeter and Persephone, preserved in time by the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, tells the story of the wheat-goddess’ controlling power over the fertility of the earth and the consequences that result from her wrath of famine. The divine myth explains how Hades, god of Death, abducts Persephone, daughter of Demeter and Zeus, and takes her to the underworld to be his bride.

A fifth century clay plaque depicting Persephone, enthroned beside Hades, holding a stalk of wheat, is demonstrative of her close relationship to the grain-goddess, Demeter (see Fig. 1). Enraged by her beloved daughters capture (at the consent of Zeus), Demeter plagued the earth and its harvest until Persephone was returned. The Homeric Hymn tells of the devastating impact of Demeter’s curse on the land, writing ‘the oxen tugged the curved plows through the furrows, in vain, and plentiful grains of white barley fell on the ground without fruit’.

The significance of Demeter’s act is heightened by the fact that both god and mortal were affected by the plaguing of agricultural land, for even the almighty Zeus was powerless against her. The hymn acknowledges this extraordinary power of Demeter and the importance of agricultural fecundity, describing the Goddess’ terrible scheme, ‘to wipe out the frail human races born and sustained by the earth, by hiding the seeds in the ground, ending the offerings that men now make to the gods in the heavens’.

At Zeus’ request, Hades returned Persephone to Demeter at her temple in Eleusis, but only for two-thirds of the circling year. It was with this

joyous occasion that spring arrived, and the source of life to humankind was restored. To the ancient world, the etiological tale of Demeter and Persephone rationalised the changing of seasons. More specifically, it existed as a metaphor for the inevitable cycle of life and death that applies to both the seasonal pattern of growth in agriculture, and also to mankind.

Descriptions in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, identify the goddess as “ripener of bountiful harvests” and “bringer of seasons, bestower of wonderful gifts” , exemplifying ancient beliefs that connect Demeter’s control over the fruitfulness of the earth with the cycle of the agricultural year. As we learn from the myth, for a third of the year, when Persephone was in the underworld with Hades, Demeter made the land hot and barren for the four months of summer.

For the remainder of the circling year, however, when Persephone was returned to her mother, the land would be made fertile and the grain would once again be able to grow. The Roman equivalent of the myth of Demeter and Persephone is that of Ceres and Prosperina. In his Metamorphoses, Ovid tells of how Jove (Jupiter) seeks to end the famine that Ceres has cast over the once fertile lands, by dividing the revolving year into two equal parts. Ovid describes the onset of spring once order is restored, asserting ‘the sun, which, long concealed behind dark and misty clouds, disperses the clouds and reveals his face’.

Unlike the division of seasons into thirds in the Greek version of the myth, Ovid’s Roman account of the etiological tale sees Ceres’ sacrifice her daughter to Hades

for half of the circling year. The most famous of Greek festivals, the Eleusinian Mysteries are quintessential to the study of agriculture within classical mythology. From the Homeric Hymn to Demeter we learn of the founding of the mystery cult at Eleusis by Demeter, as well as gaining insight into the nature of the secret rituals that initiates would conduct in commemoration of the annual rebirth of the grain.

In their book, Sources for the Study of Greek Religion, historians David Rice and John Stambaugh recognise the contextual relevance of the Mysteries to antiquity, explaining how they ‘associated the annual vegetation cycle with the myth of the rape of Persephone by Hades and the subsequent sorrow of the girl’s mother, the goddess Demeter’. The significance of the Mysteries is further emphasised by Pausanias, who said “Earlier Greeks considered the Eleusinian rite as being as much more to be honoured than all other religious rituals as gods are honoured above heroes. ”

In her interpretive essay on the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Helene Foley offers the reading that Demeter bestowed the Eleusinian Mysteries to mortals as a gift for the information they provided regarding the whereabouts of Persephone when Hades had abducted her. According to Attic/Eleusinian versions of the myth, it is not until Demeter imparts her wisdom of agriculture to Triptolemos and initiates of the Mysteries, that mortals were able to cultivate the land. Prior to this time, it is supposed that humanity lived in a primitive land, “at the mercy of nature, foraging for roots, acorns, and berries. This variant of the myth is assumed to have come after the Homeric Hymn,

and is said to have coincided with the rise of Athenian interest in the Mysteries and the first depictions of Triptolemos in art. These primary sources for Triptolemos (and by extension, the Eleusinian Mysteries) reveal a lot about the importance of agriculture to ancient Greek society and culture. In the fifth century marble relief, “Grand Relief of Eleusis” (see Fig. 2), for example, Triptolemos is represented in the form of a young boy, standing before Demeter as she hands him the gift of the seed.

It is assumed that the relief depicts the young hero before he sets out on his mission to share Demeter’s gift of agriculture with the world. The importance of agriculture to the ancient world is made evident in the etiological tale of Demeter and Persephone. As an allegory for the creation of the four seasons and the inevitable cycle of life and death in the growing of the grain, the myth provides priceless insight into the way in which these natural events were rationalised by ancient civilisations.

Demeter’s ability to wipe out humanity with famine, demonstrates her almighty power as goddess of the grain and rich harvest. Furthermore, through the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, we learn of the goddess’ founding of the Eleusinian Mysteries as a means for sharing her gift of the seed with the world. As one of the most famous religious cults in antiquity, the significance of the Mysteries lies in their ability to reveal the important cultural function of agriculture to these ancient civilisations.