#pyriphlegethon

Реки мои реки

Никакого гейства, только крепкая хтоническая братская любовь 🖤

CONGRATS ON THE RELEASE!!

I haven’t gotten to play the whole thing yet but I’m so so excited aaaaa

I’ve been wanting to draw a bunch of characters in j fashion and I thought Pyri would be such a decora monarch :3

I was going for something decora and osare looking, I hope it looks fine 😸

v close up & sketches v

Five Rivers wind along the underworld

Each strange and accursed

Fear each branch curled

Be wary of the rivers of the dead

First is Styx in all her gravity

From below to above, her waters fall

Break her oath and face calamity

Her hatred and her wrath enthrall

Second is Lethe, though she would forget

She washes it all away, gives only thirst in exchange

Sip from her and you’d never regret

But from yourself, you’d be estranged

Third is Cocytus, wailing and whimp’ring

In him, you could be easily lost,

In sorrows and such. You’d be a pitiful thing.

Your fate would be to whine and accost

Fourth is Pyriphlegethon, who’s always burning

His fires alone flow to Tartarus 

Such a gruesome sight, a strange way of learning,

For a purgatory, isn't it somewhat barbarous?

Fifth and final, Acheron, the border and barrier

He is so woeful but steady and true

Painful is death, and he is the carrier,

In his waters, in his chest, and across so you may receive your due.

Thusly, child, know the five Rivers grand

SEE OTHER POSTS HERE

Pyriphlegethon | The Devil's Trance | 2024

Dutch Black Metal

More M de Jong madness

greek mythology | gods & goddesses | Πυριφλεγεθων

The God of the underworld river of fire of the same name. A child of Okeanos, or elsewhere of Kokytus (another river associated with tears and the father of the Nymph Menthe). Seneca speaks of the fire being used to punish sinners. Statius in the Thebaid mentions Kokytus and Phlegethon as being assistants to Plutos when it comes time to judge the dead, alongside Minos and Rhadamanthys. Plato and Homer both described the river, and the philosopher tells us that the streams of lava that burst from the earth originate with Pyriphlegethon. And it is also Plato who tells us that those who died having displeased their parents will enter the House of Haides via Pyriphlegethon.

Virgil describes the river as a fiery moat around the castle that is Tartaros, emphasizing the prison-like character of that region of the underworld. Ovid tells a story in his Metamorphoses in which Demeter battles a Daimon named Askalaphos, and when she splashes him with the water from Phlegethon, he is transformed into a screech owl.

It is Pyriphlegethon the Burning who causes volcanoes, hot springs, and lava flows, it seems, and I suspect we could envision him as the God of the mantle of the Earth, responsible for the upswells of magma and heat that we see in places like Yellowstone. Several of the surviving sources describe the river itself as being both of water and of fire, sometimes simultaneously.

It is clear that Pyriphlegethon received no cultus, no temples, and no sacrifices in the past, and living in an area with absolutely no volcanic activity, I haven’t had cause to pray to this particular god. It makes me rather curious how someone who lives near Mount Etna or Vesuvius might experience such a thing. In antiquity, it appears that Pyriphlegethon was mostly mentioned as part of the delineation of the underworld, rather than as anything philosophical or spiritual. It seems I have no cause to reach for this particular deity.

Sources:

Theoi.com

McInerney, Jeremy and Ineke Sluiter, eds. Valuing Landscape in Classical Antiquity: Natural Environment and Cultural Imagination, Brill, 2016. Plato. Great Dialogues of Plato, New American Library, 1970.

Images:

The River Phlegethon (or Pyriphlegethon) is the river of fire in the Underworld. As such, I find it probably one of the easiest powders I had to figure out how to craft. I stick with only Greek mentions of the river, so it is strictly a river of fire/flame and not of “boiling blood” as the Seventh Circle of Hell, as stated in Dante’s Inferno. I only add blood to two of my Underworld powders, and this is not one of them.  However, as I’ve stated before, feel free to edit the ingredients to better reflect what you associate with the River.

Phlegethon Powder:

graveyard dirt (all my powders have a base of graveyard dirt because of my personal craft/style and to tie it to the Underworld where the Rivers resides)

cayenne pepper

cinnamon

red pepper flakes

pomegranate liquor (another element I add to all my powders as tribute to Hades and Persephone- you can use juice or seeds instead if liquor is not possible)

I use this as a power booster to spells and crafting, or fire element powder if needed in rituals and spells. Sometimes I also use it for burning away certain types of illness (like colds or the flu) in healing work.

My Underworld Powders recipes:

Lethe

Cocytus

Phlegethon

Acheron