praise the night

Hylas and the Nymphs

Hekate Triformis

Imperial age, 50–350 AD

Rijksmuseum van Oudheden

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Jean-Baptiste Marie Pierre, 1714-1789

[Ceres] Allegory of Summer, n/d, oil on canvas, 108x135 cm

they detail the aspects of the universe, what place the gods, daimones, and important mortals have. the stories tell important lessons, such as don't succumb to hubris and impossible pride. even the basic ones detail why the gods have that place in the universe. like after the titanomachy how zeus got the sky, poseidon got the ocean, and hades got the underworld.

then there's also different cosmogonies like orphism where the idea is venerating figures who have gone down to and come back from the underworld, like orpheus himself. its myths are also different

and that's not even getting into the thing i always say about aphrodite's parentage, because she's a daughter of ouranos by hesiod but by zeus and dione by homer (and in fact goes to complain to her mother after diomedes stabs her in the iliad) (dione is a titaness)

Andrea Spencer Glassworks

— Homeric Hymn №11 to Athena