Demeter and Poseidon Next, Demeter's brother Poseidon forced himself upon her (once transformed into a stallion), and the goddess, once again, became pregnant with two children: Despoena, a nymph, and Arion, a talking horse.
Demeter is notable as the mother of Persephone, described by both Hesiod and in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter as the result of a union with her younger brother Zeus.
(1) DIVINE LOVES (GODS)
She bore him two children--the horse Areion and the goddess Despoine. ZEUS The king of the gods and Demeter mated in the form of intertwining serpents. From this union the goddess Persephone was born.
In local Arcadian traditions, Demeter was also impregnated by her brother Poseidon, giving birth to a flying horse named Arion and/or a fertility goddess named Despoina (depending on the tradition). Demeter also had a mortal lover named Iasion.
Demeter is the goddess of the harvest, fertility, and the earth. She never married, but had two children by her brother, Zeus. She bore him a daughter, Persephone, and a son, Iacchus.
In the myth, Poseidon saw Demeter and desired her. To avoid him, she took her archaic form of a mare, but he took the form of a stallion and mated with her. From this union Demeter bore a daughter, Despoina, and a fabulous horse, Arion.
Helios told Demeter that Zeus had given their daughter to "The Invisible" (Hades) for his bride and that Hades, acting on that promise, had taken Persephone home to the Underworld.
Persephone was born so deformed that Rhea ran away from her frightened, and did not breastfeed Persephone. Zeus then mates with Persephone, who gives birth to Dionysus. She later stays in her mother's house, guarded by the Curetes. Rhea-Demeter prophecies that Persephone will marry Apollo.
One version of Persephone's story told by the Roman poet Ovid might suggest she had grown some feelings of affection for Hades in spite of everything. In Ovid's famous text Metamorphosis, Hades has an affair with a young Nymph named Minthe.
As an act of kindness to those who had sheltered her, she attempted to immortalize him by burning out his mortal parts but was surprised in the act by his mother, who thought that she was harming the boy. Incensed, Demeter quickly withdrew the child from the fire, thus leaving him susceptible to death.
His third wife was Eurynome, an ocean nymph, and she bore the three Graces. Zeus then was attracted by his sister Demeter, who resisted him. But he violated her in the form of a bull, and from their union came Persephone. His next wife was the Titaness Mnemosyne (Memory), who produced the Nine Muses.
Aphrodite later and of her own volition had an affair with Zeus, but his jealous wife Hera laid her hands upon the belly of the goddess and cursed their offspring with malformity. Their child was the ugly god Priapos.
Persephone's abduction
Hades consulted Zeus and asked him if he could marry Persephone. Zeus explained that the goddess, Demeter, would be unhappy with the marriage because it would mean that Persephone would be taken away to live in the Underworld, as the Underworld is where Hades lived and ruled.
Demeter, goddess of the harvest and fertility searched for her daughter when Persephone went missing. Once she realized Persephone was taken to the underworld, she protested the abduction by stopping her work with the crops.
While Demeter loved all of her children dearly, Persephone remained her favorite child of all, the one whom she took to spending whatever free time she had with. Due to her great beauty, Persephone was often desired by many gods, but Demeter would never allow it.
When the goddess Demeter was searching for her daughter Persephone, she was pursued by Poseidon. To escape Poseidon, Demeter turned herself into a mare and hid among the mares of Oncius, king of Thelpusa in Arcadia.
As time went on, Persephone fell in love with Hades and they built an empire which they ruled together as equals.
The gods had caused the ground to split underneath Persephone, and then she slipped beneath the Earth. Thus, Hades was able to trap her in his underground kingdom where he made her his wife. Although at first Persephone was very unhappy in the Underworld, in time she came to love Hades and live happily with him.
She turned him down, as Zeus had already proposed to her and by accepting his proposal she would be Queen of the Gods. Despite this, the two still held a candle for each other. Due to Zeus' constant infidelity during their marriage, Hera began a long-term, on and off affair with Hades.
Perhaps partly because of the strange circumstances of her birth, Athena is often cited as Zeus's favourite child. He also greatly admired her strength of character and fighting spirit.
Before his marriage to Hera, Zeus consorted with a number of the female Titanes (and his sister Demeter). These liaisons are ordered by Hesiod as follows: (1) Metis; (2) Themis; (3) Eurynome; (4) Demeter; (5) Mnemosyne; (6) Leto.
Persephone's Children
Though a maiden goddess, zealously defended by her mother for a long time, Persephone did eventually have two children, a daughter named Melinoe and a son called Zagreus.
Demeter could no longer see her daughter and missed her hugely. She was so sad, it affected the harvest across Greece. Crops, fruit and nature all stopped growing. She went to Zeus, the king of the gods, to ask him to help get her daughter back from Hades.
The legend centres on the story of her daughter Persephone, who is carried off by Hades, the god of the underworld. Demeter goes in search of Persephone and, during her journey, reveals her secret rites to the people of Eleusis, who had hospitably received her (see Eleusinian Mysteries).
In an archaic myth, Poseidon once pursued Demeter. She spurned his advances, turning herself into a mare so that she could hide in a herd of horses; he saw through the deception and became a stallion, captured and raped her. Their child was a horse, Arion, which was capable of human speech.