Tag: Ploutonion

The God as Superhero: Part IV, Hades

Posted C. LaVielle6 CommentsPosted in Gifts from the Multiverse, Greece

Continued from previous posts… Hades? You’ve got to be kidding. The dread Lord of the Underworld? The god the Greeks feared so much that they wouldn’t even speak his name?* The god who granted Medea her death and , at her request, destroyed her lover, Jason?** The master of the remorseless Furies, who releases them to torment the living?** The infernal Jove, the snatcher of things, who causes the earth to shake and open up and devour his unfortunate prey? ** The god who called a deadly plague down upon the city of Thebes?** The god who snatched his sister’s only child and took her down to the underworld to be his queen? That’s not a Superhero, that’s an Archvillian! So, imagine my surprise and terror when Hades began talking to me as I stood outside his Ploutonion in Elefsina, Greece. (see previous post: Power Points of Eleusius: The Ploutonion ) I was there a few years ago with my husband and two good friends.… Read More »

Power Points of Eleusius: The Ploutonion

Posted C. LaVielle9 CommentsPosted in Greece

We left the Demeter Well and headed up the steps, thinking that we were headed for the Site Museum, but we were waylaid once again. Just before the entrance to the Temple of Demeter, where the final part of the Eleusinian Mysteries took place, we came upon a sign that said “Ploutonion”. It also said that this was the spot where Hades abducted Persephone as she was picking flowers. A Ploutonion is a sanctuary or shrine dedicated to Hades, god of the underworld. They are built at entrances to the underworld, and are, fortunately, rare. Strabo* identifies the only other ones I could find. Both were in Anatolia (modern Turkey), one outside Caria and one near Phrygia, and both had vents that released mephitic (noxious) vapors, and both were dream oracles. There is another sort of sanctuary of Hades called a necromanteion. This is also an opening to the underworld, but it is an oracle of the dead. People go here to speak with the… Read More »