Greek name Demeter

1
The Goddess Demeter

• Greek name- Demeter
• Roman name- Ceres
• She is the goddess of agriculture and fertility.

2
Demeter's Powers

• Demeter controls the agricultural aspects of the
  earth.
• She is able to create famine, or abundance of
  food for the people of the earth.
• She also has the ability to give life after death
  to anyone who is able to learn her mysteries.

3
Demeter's Powers

• Demeter has the ability to make the seasons
  change.
• Her daughter Persephone is forced to live in the
  under world four months of each year. (Myth
  explained later in presentation.)

4
Demeter's Powers

• During those four months, Demeter extracts her
  gifts from earth which creates the season of
  Winter.
• The other eight months of the year, when
  Persephone lives with Demeter, Demeter gives
  again those gifts to the earth, which creates
  spring.

5
Symbols and Objects Relating to Demeter

• Torch- because she carried this around every
  night in search of her daughter.

• Corn, wheat, and grain
• Scepter

• The Horn of Plenty

6
Demeter
7
Myth

• Demeter and Zeus had a young daughter named
  Persephone. One day while Persephone was
  gathering flowers, she was snatched away and
  taken to the underworld by Hades.

Hades taking Persephone to the underworld.
8
Myth

• Demeter searched all over the world in desperate
  pursuit of her daughter.
• When she came upon Helius, the Sun God who sees
  everything, he told her that Zeus had given
  Persephones hand in marriage to Hades.

9
Myth

• Immensely upset, Demeter began to live among the
  world of mortals.
• She cause famine in the world for over a year,
  and Zeus was forced to ask Hades to let
  Persephone out of the underworld.

10
Myth

• Hades was forced to comply
• However, before Persephone left the underworld
  Hades made her taste some food, which meant that
  she was forced to return after seeing her mother.
  
• Eventually an agreement was made that Persephone
  would live four months of each year in the
  underworld and eight months of the year with her
  mother, Demeter.

11
Bibliography

• www.Mythography.com
• www.about.com
• www.goddessherself.com
• http//www.crystalinks.com/olympians.html