Nemesis Now Greek Goddess Hekate Magic Goddess Bronze Figurine

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And more, I feel maybe the godness has already called me.When I was a teenager, the smell of lavender helped me accept the fear of death. And these days I dream of the holy name of godness. Yesterday at Sunset, I hear the barking of dogs in a place where dogs have almost never appeared before. It barked once or twice every few minutes, and the sound seems to come from the air. I searched carefully but couldn’t find its direction. I feel shame and guilty… I really don’t want to disappoint the godness.Because of those blasphemous thoughts,I dare not start a connection with the goddess. Cypria (Synopsis, fragments); Hesiod, Catalogue of Women frag. 23b M-W; Pausanias, Description of Greece 1.43.1. ↩ Worship of the Goddess Hecate Marble statuette of triple-bodied Hecate and the three Graces, 1st–2nd century C.E. via MoMa, New York. The ground-work of the above-mentioned confusions and identifications, especially with Demeter and Persephone, is contained in the Homeric hymn to Demeter; for, according to this hymn, she was, besides Helios, the only divinity who, from her cave, observed the abduction of Persephone. With a torch in her hand, she accompanied Demeter in the search after Persephone; and when the latter was found, Hecate remained with her as her attendant and companion. She thus becomes a deity of the lower world; but this notion does not occur till the time of the Greek tragedians, though it is generally current among the later writers. She is described in this capacity as a mighty and formidable divinity, ruling over the souls of the departed; she is the goddess of purifications and expiations, and is accompanied by Stygian dogs. 11 By Phorcys she became the mother of Scylla. 12

Another myth explains how Hecate became associated with the polecat (or weasel), which was one of her sacred animals. There are two versions of this myth. In her three-headed representations, discussed above, Hecate often has one or more animal heads, including cow, dog, boar, serpent, and horse. [46] Lions are associated with Hecate in early artwork from Asia Minor, as well as later coins and literature, including the Chaldean Oracles. [29] The frog, which was also the symbol of the similarly named Egyptian goddess Heqet, [47] has also become sacred to Hecate in modern pagan literature, possibly due in part to its ability to cross between two elements. [48] Smith, William. “Hecate.” In A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. London: Spottiswoode and Company, 1873. Perseus Digital Library. Accessed November 8, 2021. https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0104%3Aalphabetic+letter%3DH%3Aentry+group%3D4%3Aentry%3Dhecate-bio-1.

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By the 5th century BCE, Hecate had come to be strongly associated with ghosts, possibly due to conflation with the Thessalian goddess Enodia (meaning "traveller"), who travelled the earth with a retinue of ghosts and was depicted on coinage wearing a leafy crown and holding torches, iconography strongly associated with Hecate. [29] As a goddess of witchcraft [ edit ] Hecate’s scope of divine duties was extensive in Ancient Greek religion. She was most notably the goddess of magic, witchcraft, the night, light, ghosts, necromancy, and the moon. Further, she was the goddess and protector of the oikos, and entranceways. Because she is the goddess of life and death, she is also a protector and gatekeeper of the spirit realm. Her presence is felt in cemeteries, as well as in birthing centers and hospitals. If you’re brave enough AND understand how to protect yourself, spirit work in the cemetery is another way to honor Hecate. But be careful…this isn’t a practice for beginners or for fun. There are many different kinds of spirits in the cemetery. And, while this is Hecate’s domain, she won’t keep the spirits at bay for those who disrespect the dead. 10. Offerings by the Door Hecate makes another appearance in the mythology of Persephone and her mother Demeter. When Persephone was abducted by her uncle Hades and spirited away to his gloomy Underworld kingdom, Hecate was the only one who heard her cries.

Hecate was also invoked on curse tablets. These tablets were engraved texts that called upon a god—usually a “chthonian” god associated with the Underworld (such as Persephone, Hermes, or Gaia)—to punish or harm an enemy, who would generally be named in the text.

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The Romans often referred to Hecate as Trivia (“she of the triple road”), echoing the goddess’s association with crossroads. Titles and Epithets Finally, the Chaldean Oracles, mystical texts produced between the third and sixth century CE, imagined Hecate in an entirely different light. Here, we find that Hecate has been transformed into the cosmic soul, an entity that can be grasped through ritual but also through contemplation. Pop Culture There were a handful of unique depictions of Hecate in antiquity, some of which gave the goddess frightening features. One vase, for example, shows Hecate, accompanied by the Erinyes (“Fates”), with man-eating dogs for feet. [7] By late antiquity, the Orphics sometimes imagined Hecate as a terrifying figure with three heads (of a horse, a dog, and a lion). [8] Family Family Tree Apollonius Rhodius. Argonautica iii, 529, 861; iv, 829; Theocritus, l.c.; Ovid. Heroides xii, 168; Metamorphoses xiv, 405; Statius. Thebaid iv, 428; Virgil. Aeneid iv, 609; Orphic. Lithica, 45, 47; Eustathius on Homer, p. 1197, 1887; Diodorus Siculus. Historical Library iv, 45.

Aside from her triple form, Hecate was most often identified by a polos, a kind of cylindrical crown, and by torches. She was often accompanied by dogs. It was said that the howling or barking of these dogs would announce Hecate’s presence when she wandered at night, accompanied by an entourage made up of the souls of the dead—especially the souls of girls who had died unmarried or childless. [5]Hecate was said to favour offerings of garlic, which was closely associated with her cult. [53] She is also sometimes associated with cypress, a tree symbolic of death and the underworld, and hence sacred to a number of chthonic deities. [54] A number of other plants (often poisonous, medicinal and/or psychoactive) are associated with Hecate. [55] These include aconite (also called hecateis), [56] belladonna, dittany, and mandrake. It has been suggested that the use of dogs for digging up mandrake is further corroboration of the association of this plant with Hecate; indeed, since at least as early as the 1st century CE, there are a number of attestations to the apparently widespread practice of using dogs to dig up plants associated with magic. [57] Functions [ edit ] Gilt bronze Hekataion, 1st century CE. Musei Capitolini, Rome. As a goddess of boundaries [ edit ] Whether or not Hecate's worship originated in Greece, some scholars have suggested that the name derives from a Greek root, and several potential source words have been identified. For example, ἑκών "willing" (thus, "she who works her will" or similar), may be related to the name Hecate. [13] However, no sources suggested list will or willingness as a major attribute of Hecate, which makes this possibility unlikely. [14] Another Greek word suggested as the origin of the name Hecate is Ἑκατός Hekatos, an obscure epithet of Apollo [11] interpreted as "the far reaching one" or "the far-darter". [15] This has been suggested in comparison with the attributes of the goddess Artemis, strongly associated with Apollo and frequently equated with Hecate in the classical world. Supporters of this etymology suggest that Hecate was originally considered an aspect of Artemis prior to the latter's adoption into the Olympian pantheon. Artemis would have, at that point, become more strongly associated with purity and maidenhood, on the one hand, while her originally darker attributes like her association with magic, the souls of the dead, and the night would have continued to be worshipped separately under her title Hecate. [16] Though often considered the most likely Greek origin of the name, the Ἑκατός theory does not account for her worship in Asia Minor, where her association with Artemis seems to have been a late development, and the competing theories that the attribution of darker aspects and magic to Hecate were themselves not originally part of her cult. [14] Hecate was one of several deities worshipped in ancient Athens as a protector of the oikos (household), alongside Zeus, Hestia, Hermes, and Apollo. [8] In the post-Christian writings of the Chaldean Oracles (2nd–3rd century CE) she was also regarded with (some) rulership over earth, sea, and sky, as well as a more universal role as Savior ( Soteira), Mother of Angels and the Cosmic World Soul. [9] [10]

The polecat is also associated with Hecate. Antoninus Liberalis used a myth to explain this association: In Samothrace, the goddess was worshipped as a goddess of the Mysteries. Evidence of her worship has likewise been discovered in Thessaly, Thrace, Colophon, and Athens. The latter two cities bear evidence of sacrifices of dogs in the goddess’ honor. Pausanias offers that Hecate was the goddess most worshipped by the people of Aegina who believed that Orpheus established the rites of the goddess on their island. Pausanias also describes a wooden image of Hecate located in the Aeginetan temple. Hecate appears in some versions of the birth of Zeus. This myth tells of how the Titan Cronus, Zeus’ father, swallowed each of his children as soon as they were born, fearing they would someday overthrow him. But when his last child, Zeus, was born, Cronus’ wife Rhea decided to save the newborn’s life at all costs. Thus, she dressed a stone in swaddling clothes for Cronus to swallow while she hid the real Zeus away.

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See, for example, Sophocles, frag. 534, 535 Radt; Euripides, Medea 397; Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica 3.1035ff. ↩ This extensive power possessed by Hecate was probably the reason that subsequently she was confounded and identified with several other divinities, and at length became a mystic goddess, to whom mysteries were celebrated in Samothrace 6 and in Aegina. 7 For being as it were the queen of all nature, we find her identified with Demeter, Rhea ( Cybele or Brimo); being a huntress and the protector of youth, she is the same as Artemis ( Curotrophos); and as a goddess of the moon, she is regarded as the mystic Persephone. 8 She was further connected with the worship of other mystic divinities, such as the Cabeiri and Curetes, 9 and also with Apollo and the Muses. 10 Johnston, Sarah Iles. “Hecate.” In Brill’s New Pauly, edited by Hubert Cancik, Helmuth Schneider, Christine F. Salazar, Manfred Landfester, and Francis G. Gentry. Published online 2006. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1574-9347_bnp_e505900.