The Children of Hades and Persephone
I received an ask about this so I thought I might concentrate some sources on a post here. Thanks to @coloricioso who guided me on this (and has done extensive research on the matter)!
Here is a big post from @coloricioso (Link) It is a post on Melinoe that is private for now (I think) so I will quote:
The first we must say is that Melinoe is an obsecure figure and the Orphic Hymn 71 is the sole literary testimony of her existence and the only other appearance of her name is found inscribed on a magical device (Athanassakis and Wolkow, The Orphic Hymns, 195). The magical device is a tablet where she is called along with other chthonic deities like Persephone and Hecate.
There are some sources on her which I have no access to: Études sur les Hymnes OrphiquesBy Anne-France Morand; Pauly-Wissowa Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft XV, 1978, pages 133-134.
Despite some people want to argue that Melinoe is Hades and Persephone’s daughter I don’t think we can agree on that, and even if we wanted to believe that, the Hymn 71 is not the best source to state Hades’ paternity.
I call upon Melinoe, safron-cloacked nymph of the earth,
to whom august Persephone gave birth by the mouth of the Kokytos, upon the sacred bed of Kronian Zeus.
He lied to Plouton and through treachery mated with Persepone, whose skin when she was pregnant he mangled in anger.
(Athanassakis, 1977 edition)
I call upon Melinoe, saffron-cloacked nymph of the earth, whom revered Persephone bore by the mouth of the Kokytos river upon the sacred bed of Kronian Zeus. In the guise of Plouton Zeus tricked Persephone and through wily plots bedded her; a two-bodied specter sprang forth from Persephone’s fury. –> no skin tearing mention.
(Athanassakis, 2013)
Invoco a Melínoe, doncella infernal de azafranado peplo, a la que dio a luz, en la desembocadura del Cocito, la venerable Perséfone en el sagrado lecho del crónida Zeus. Engañó éste a Plutón y se unió a ella con perfidia falaz y en su furor desgarró la piel de dos colores de Perséfone, que empuja a los mortales a la locura con sus fantasmas aéreos... –> He tricked Plouton and mated Persephone and in his rage he teared Persephone’s double colored skin.
(Miguel Periago Lorente, 1987, Editorial Gredos).
(comment from this version translator: “this verse is not clear, specially when it comes to the double skin color (disomaton, literally double body).. GESNER says it’s due her realtion with both divinities. For one part, with Plouton, her abductor, gives her black color; for other, Zeus, her own father, givves her white color. About the skin tearing we must think it’s due erotic rage of the father with the daughter (…) Some wrongly assume that Melinoe is Hades and Persephone’s daughter.”.
And I was told by my Greek friends that the Greek texts they found,say it’s Zeus who tears Persephone’s flesh.
So… we have rape by trickery and skin tearing; we really don’t want to use Orphic Hymn 71 as a source to try to claim Hades’ paternity, not at all.
If we say “well, Zeus Kronion is Hades and not Zeus”, the Hymn would make no sense by speaking of tricks and everything if Hades was Persephone’s legitimate husband anyway. Some say “why didn’t Zeus just rape the unwilling Persephone and period? why bothering into changing himself into Hades’ shape?”, remember that most of the times Zeus and other gods use seduction instead of raping by force (see LEFKKOWITZ book on this) Just as Zeus changed himself into rain, snakes, swans,*** etc., turning himself into Hades would make the union easier because he could charm and seduce Persephone in that way (and here we coud speculate that Persephone would be willing to have sex if Hades came in because she loved him, and not only slept with him to fulfill wife’s duties or whatever).
(btw, someone in Tumblr said it’s Hades who tears Persephone’s skin out of anger-jealousy of her pregnancy; but I fail to see what source they used to state such thing; from the translations I have read, I understand it’s Zeus the one who does that).
Anyway, if anyone has more information on this Melinoe topic I would be super thankful!
***edit: as a-gnosis said, to deceive Alcmena Zeus changed himself into her husband shape!
______________________________________________________________
Here is another post from @coloricioso with @a-gnosis adding on the matter (Link). I will quote it as well in case it dissapears in the future:
Two things I’m a bit tired of reading around here in Tumblr and why:
1) “Hades was an infertile god because he was the god of death” : Hades is the god who RULES on the world of dead, and here, again, if you didn’t get it already….. HADES IS NOT DEATH. HADES IS NOT THE PERSONIFICATION OF DEATH. NO, no, and NOOOoO. THANATOS = DEATH.
Okay… Hades is the son of Cronus just like Zeus, Demeter and the other gods who were fertile. And Hades was not born as “the king of the dead realm” so is not possible that he was “infertile by nature” associated to his ruler role.
The only logic that I could follow is that after living for aeons in a land that is portrayed as sterile (dark, sunless, full of shadows as Homer portrays it in the Odyssey and the Iliad) his body lost the hability to generate any offspring or something similar. But we also have the portrayal of Hades as a god of wealth, richness and fertility, so the “infertile god” imagery is not necessarily a “canon”.
2) “Hades and Persephone had cute children!!”: NO. No. and NO. Get over it, they did not. And here is something for you:
Zagreus: is the child of Persephone and ZEUS in orphic tradition.
Melinoe: is the child of Persephone and ZEUS again in orphic tradition.
And NO, none of the above is “oh but maybe they refer to Hades bcz Hades was called Zeus Chthonion” because in first myth we have Hera’s jealousy on Zagreus -and seriously, why would that happen if it was Hades’ child- and in second myth it is clearly stated that Zeus took Plouton(Hades)’s semblance to trick Persephone. So. no.
Makaria: the only source on her is the Suda Lexicon, that is an encyclopedic lexicon (a dictionary-encyclopedia thing). Makaria’s meaning is “blessedness”. What the Suda Lexicon tell us is this: [A way of referring to] death. [Makaria was] a daughter of Hades. And [there is] a proverb: “be gone into blessedness”, meaning into misery and utter destruction. Or “begone into blessedness” [is said] by euphemism. Since even the dead are called blessed ones. [Makaria was] also a daughter of Herakles, whom the Athenians buried with very expensive funeral rites when she had died on their behalf.[1]
It doesn’t say she was a daughter of “Hades and Persephone” together, it only says of Hades. And since Hades can be used to refer not only to the god, but also his realm, it is most than likely that as a personifcation of death, she is someone who belongs to the Underworld as Thanatos, Hypnos, Erinyes and other chthonian deities.
The Erinyes: the orphic hymns (69, To the Furies) say they are daughters of Zeus Khthonios and Persephone (Holy and pure, from Jove terrestrial [Zeus Khthonios] born and Proserpine [Phersephone], whom lovely locks adorn). This is orphic tradition, because the Erinyes are either Gaia’s or Nyx’ offspring according to “classic” sources (as Hesiod). We could also suppose that despite the “born”, Hades and Persephone are the parents of the Erinyes because they ruled on them and whenever someone wanted to curse and invoked, they had to ask it to Hades and Persephone.
The other source mentioned is Statius’s Thebaid that never says “Hades and Persephone”, neither says “Hades”. Also remember he is a roman poet, so is not greek ancient source. Thebaid, XII, 557: Of their race and famous sires I speak not; they were men, renowned Theseus, and of the seed of men, born to the selfsame stars to the same human lot, the same food and drink as ye are; yet Creon denies them fire, and like the father of the Furies or the ferryman of Lethe’s stream debars them from the Stygian gate and keeps them hovering doubtfully between the worlds of heaven and hell.
SO…. THE CONCLUSION: if you are making Hades-Persephone fan art/fan fiction and you want to get inspired, sure, you can imagine that Macaria and Melinoe are Hades-Persephone’s little cute babies or whatever. But do not state or assume that Hades and Persephone were portrayed and worshipped by ancient greek/roman people as a couple that had tons of little babies because it did not happen. :) thank you.
I agree. I don’t mind at all when people interpret Zagreus, Melinoe and Makaria as children of Hades and Persephone, but it gets a bit annoying when people believe it’s canon.
There is only one ancient source I know of which seems to suggest that Zagreus was Hades’ son. A fragment from Sisyphus, a lost play by Aeschylus: “Now [I came] to bid farewell to Zagreus and to his sire, the hospitaler.” (source: theoi.com)
But since it’s only a fragment it’s hard to say anything for sure.
About Zagreus’ identification with Dionysos in the Orphic tradition… I’ve been reading Ritual Texts for the Afterlife: Orpheus and the Bacchic Gold Tablets by Fritz Graf and Sarah Iles Johnston, and they believe that this myth and cult was created in the early fifth or late sixth century BCE, inspired by the mystery cult at Eleusis. Dionysos’ role in the Orphic cult was to be a mediator between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Therefor he could not be the son of BOTH Hades and Persephone, because that would have made his link to the Underworld too strong: "It would have jarred with other aspects of his mythic and cultic persona and diminished his appropiateness as a mediator between the two worlds, the very role that the new cult demanded from him. He needed a foot in each camp, and Zeus’ paternity ensured him of this".
_______________________________________________________________
coloricioso also told me that Zagreus is son of Zeus and Persephone. Makaria is only named in the Suda Lexicon and it only says "a daughter of Haides".
So the only deities who could be "daughters" to HxP are the Erinyes.
Not Makaria-Melinoe-Zagreus as is repeated on Tumblr.
Makaria = Hades (1 source only)
Melinoe = Persephone x Zeus (1 source only)
Zagreus = Persephone x Zeus (orphic cosmology, not panhellenic cult)
______________________________________________________________
I really appreciate coloricioso and a-gnosis and that’s why I wanted to keep their text on my own post. In case they leave Tumblr or delete the posts I would still like to have those sources somewhere in an archive. I hope that’s ok!
