For according to them, there were seven islands in that sea in their time, sacred to Persephone, and also three others of enormous size, one of which was sacred to Hades, another to Ammon, and another one between them to Poseidon, the extent of which was a thousand stadia ; and the inhabitants of it — they add — preserved the remembrance from their ancestors of the immeasurably large island of Atlantis which had really existed there and which for many ages had reigned over all islands in the Atlantic sea and which itself had like-wise been sacred to Poseidon.

Her daughter by Zeus was Persephone, Queen of the Underworld.

As Eurystheus prepared to attack, an oracle told Demophon that he would win if and only if a noble woman was sacrificed to Persephone.

In another version, Dionysus was originally the son of Zeus by either Demeter or Persephone.

As Eurysttheus prepared to attack, an oracle told Demophon that he would win if and only if a noble woman was sacrificed to Persephone.

Persephone was abducted by Hades, the god-king of the underworld.

Persephone was commonly worshipped along with Demeter, and with the same mysteries.

At Locri, perhaps uniquely, Persephone was the protector of marriage, a role usually assumed by Hera ; in the iconography of votive plaques at Locri, her abduction and marriage to Hades served as an emblem of the marital state, children at Locri were dedicated to Proserpina, and maidens about to be wed brought their peplos to be blessed.

Of the four deities of Empedocles's elements, it is the name of Persephone alone that is taboo — Nestis is a euphemistic cult title — for she was also the terrible Queen of the Dead, whose name was not safe to speak aloud, who was euphemistically named simply as Kore or " the Maiden ", a vestige of her archaic role as the deity ruling the underworld.

As a goddess of the underworld, Persephone was given euphemistically friendly names.

Despoina and " Hagne " were probably euphimistic surnames of Persephone, therefore he theorizes that the cult of Persephone was the continuation of the worship of a Minoan Great goddess.

Persephone was conflated with Despoina, " the mistress ", a chthonic divinity in West-Arcadia.

Despoine was one of her surnames just as the surname of Persephone Kore.

Nysion ( or Mysion ), the place of the abduction of Persephone was also probably a mythical place which didn ’ t exist in the map, a magically distant chthonic land of myth which was intended in the remote past.

Zeus, it is said, advised Pluto ( Hades ) who was in love with the beautiful Persephone, to carry her off, as her mother Demeter, was not likely to allow her daughter to go down to Hades.

Persephone was released by Hermes, who had been sent to retrieve her, but she was obliged to spend four months of a year in the underworld, and the remaining two thirds with the gods above.

Before Persephone was abducted by Hades, the shepherd Eumolpus and the swineherd Eubuleus, saw a girl being carried of into the earth which had violently opened up, in a black chariot, driven by an invisible driver.

According to the hymn, Demeter's daughter Persephone ( also referred to as Kore, " maiden ") was gathering flowers with friends, when she was seized by Hades, the god of death and the underworld.

The association with the flower-picking Persephone and her companions is compelling. On the Minoan ring of Isopata, four women are performing a dance between flowers in a field, and a smaller figure, the goddess herself appears floating in the air.

* In the Mythic Tarot, created by Juliet Sharman-Burke and Liz Greene, the High Priestess is portrayed by Persephone, descending a staircase into the Underworld, with the Earth behind her, dressed in white, and holding falling, white flowers.

What she reminds him of is Persephone at the moment that she is abducted by Hades and the spring flowers fell from her lap.

In the Linear B Mycenean Greek tablets of circa 1400-1200 BC found at Pylos, the " two mistresses and the king " are identified with Demeter, Persephone and Poseidon.

The most obvious identification for the " Two Queens " is with Demeter and Persephone, or their precursors, goddesses who were not associated with Poseidon in later periods.

In a Linear B ( Mycenean Greek ) inscription on a tablet found at Pylos dated 1400 – 1200 BC, John Chadwick reconstructs the name of a goddess * Preswa who could be identified with Persa, daughter of Oceanus and finds speculative the further identification with the first element of Persephone.

The earliest depiction of a goddess who may be identified with Persephone growing out of the ground, is on a plate from the Old-Palace period in Phaistos.

Hades with his horses and Persephone ( down ).

In the Arcadian cults, it seems that Demeter and Persephone were the first from a series of daemons with the same nature.

She has a large stylized flower turned over her head, and the resemblance with the flower picking Persephone and her companions is compelling The depiction of the goddess is similar with later images of " Anodos of Pherephata ".

Sarcophagus with the abduction of Persephone.

The Cretans thought that their own island had been the scene of the rape, and the Eleusinians mentioned the Nysian plain in Boeotia, and said that Persephone had descended with Hades into the lower world at the entrance of the western Oceanus.

In the hymn, Persephone returns and she is reunited with her mother near Eleusis.

When Demeter and her daughter were reunited, the Earth flourished with vegetation and color, but for some months each year, when Persephone returned to the underworld, the earth once again became a barren realm.

During summer months, the Greek Corn-Maiden ( Kore ) is lying in the corn of the underground silos, in the realm of Hades and she is fused with Persephone, the Queen of the underworld.

Persephone was worshipped along with her mother Demeter and in the same mysteries.

The main theme was the ascent of Persephone and the reunion with her mother Demeter.

***" Althea prayed instantly to the gods, being grieved for her brother's slaying ; and furthermore instantly beat with her hands upon the all-nurturing earth, calling upon Hades and dread Persephone " ( 9, 569 )

The most famous example of this is the putative division of all the aspects of the so-called Great Goddess into a number of goddesses with more specialized functions — Gaea, Demeter, Persephone, Artemis and Hecate among them.

These resulted in many godly and heroic offspring, including Athena, Apollo and Artemis, Hermes, Persephone ( by Demeter ), Dionysus, Perseus, Heracles, Helen of Troy, Minos, and the Muses ( by Mnemosyne ); by Hera, he is usually said to have fathered Ares, Hebe and Hephaestus.

In these cults Poseidon appears usually as a horse, which represents the river spirit of the underworld as it usually happens in northern-European folklore. The precursor goddesses of Demeter and Persephone are closely related with the springs and the animals, and especially with Poseidon and Artemis who was the first nymph.

Eileithyia, along with Artemis and Persephone, is often shown carrying torches to bring children out of darkness and into light: in Roman mythology her counterpart in easing labor is Lucina (" of the light ").

Pliny gives a list of his works ; among them a Rape of Persephone, Victory in a Quadriga, Apollo and Artemis, and Cybele seated on a Lion.

Considerable fragments, including three colossal heads from a group by him representing Demeter, Persephone, Artemis and the Titan Anytus, were discovered on the site of Lycosura in Arcadia, where there was a sanctuary of the goddess Despoina, The Mistress.