Hades was the god of the Underworld and the brother of Zeus and Poseidon. He abducted Persephone, daughter of Zeus and Demeter, making her his wife and queen of the Underworld. This caused Demeter to lament and stop crops from growing, until Zeus intervened to have Persephone return part of each year. The realm of Hades included rivers like Acheron and Styx, the dog Cerberus guarding the entrance, and places like Elysium for heroes and Tartarus for punishment of sinners.

1. Pluto (Hades)

2. Cronus m. Rhea
Hestia Hades Poseidon Demeter Hera Zeus
Hades was son of Cronus
and Rhea, and brother to
Zeus and Poseidon
He was the god of the
Underworld and
husband of Persephone
(Proserpina)

3. The Abduction of Persephone
• Persephone is the daughter of Zeus and
Demeter At the will
of Zeus,
Hades
abducted
her,
bursting
through a
cleft in the
earth
The Abduction of
Persephone, Peter
Paul Rubens (1577-

4. The Abduction of Persephone
• When Demeter found
out, she spent a year
lamenting, during which
time the earth would not
produce food
• She would have
destroyed the entire
human race by famine if
Zeus had not noticed and
convinced Hades to bring
Persephone up from the
murky depths

5. The Abduction of Persephone
Before she left, Hades
fed a pomegranate
seed to Persephone so
that she would have to
return to the Underworld
for 1/3 of each year

6. The Abduction of Persephone
Upon the return
of Persephone,
Demeter
restored the
fertility of the
Earth
The Return of Persephone, Frederic Leighton
(1891)

7. The Abduction of Persephone
And so Persephone became the wife of
Hades and the queen of the Underworld

8. The Realm of Hades
• The realm of Hades is
the misty and gloomy
abode of the dead,
where all mortals go.
• All mortals are judged
after death and are either
rewarded or cursed.
• The earliest surviving
account of the realm
appears in Book xi of the
Odyssey

9. The Realm of Hades
• The five rivers of the realm of Hades are:
• Acheron (the river of sorrow, or woe)
• Cocytus (lamentation, or wailing)
• Phlegethon (fire)
• Lethe (oblivion, or forgetfulness)
• Styx (hate), The Styx forms the boundary
between the upper and lower worlds.

10. The Realm of Hades
• It was a
custom to
bury the
dead with a
coin in the
mouth to
provide the
ferryman
Charon with
his fare to
cross the
Acheron and
Charon’s Crossing, Alexander Litovchenko

11. The Realm of Hades
The
ferocious
dog
Cerberus,
usually
depicted
with three
heads,
guards the
entrance to
the realm of Cerberus, by William Blake
the dead

12. The Realm of Hades
• In the Odyssey, it is
vaguely implied that all
mortals end up together
pretty much in the same
place, without distinction
– the Asphodel
Meadows
• A special ‘hell’ for
sinners may also be
implied, but these
sinners are extraordinary
figures of mythology that
dared crimes against the
gods

13. The Realm of Hades
In Book 6 of the Aeneid, Vergil paints a
clearer picture of the Underworld
After crossing the Acheron River, Aeneas
reaches a kind of neutral zone, the
Asphodel Meadows, a place for the
untimely dead (infants, unjustly
condemned, victims of suicide, and
unhappy lovers-- where Aeneas meets
Dido)

14. The Realm of Hades
Aeneas and Sibyl in the Underworld, Jan Brueghel the Elder

15. The Realm of Hades
From here
Aeneas Beyond, the
and Sibyl road divides
move to and leads in
the Fields two
of directions –
Mourning, to the right
reserved extends to
for Elysium,
warriors and the left
who fell in leads to

16. The Realm of Hades
• There are three judges of the Underworld:
• Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Aeacus
• Most myths held Minos as the judge of
those who had been given the death
penalty on a false charge
He decides whether
a soul should go to
Elysium or Tartarus

17. The Realm of Hades
Once sentenced to Tartarus,
Rhadamanthus would decide on the
punishment for the damned
Other myths
state that
Rhadamanthus
presided over
the virtuous in
Elysium

18. The Realm of Hades
• Tartarus is a gloomy pit, or an abyss used as a
dungeon of torment and suffering that resides
beneath the underworld, encircled by the River
Phlegethon (Fire)
Vergil’s Tartarus is
not a hell just for
heroic sinners of
mythological
antiquity; in it all
who are guilty
suffer punishment

19. Inhabitants of the Realm of Hades
The Danaides
• They were the fifty
daughters of Danaus that
were to marry the fifty sons
of his twin brother Aegyptus
• They were ordered by their
father to kill their husbands
which they all did with the
exception of one
• The punishment for the 49
who went through with the
killings was to attempt in
vain to carry water in
containers that have no real

20. Inhabitants of the Realm of Hades
In an attempt to purify
Ixion Ixion,’s sins Zeus
received him as a
guest, yet Ixion
repaid by attempting
to violate Hera
• Ixion was expelled
from Olympus and
was bound to a fiery
wheel that would
spin for eternity

21. Inhabitants of the Realm of Hades
Sisyphus
Sisyphus was a
king who outwitted
Death and, for telling
Zeus’ secret, was
punished in the
Underworld by
rolling a huge stone
up a hill forever

22. Inhabitants of the Realm of Hades
Tantalus abused the Tantalus
privilege of eating with the
gods-
He invited His
the gods to punishment
dine with was to suffer
him and cut everlasting
up his son thirst and
and served hunger in
the parts at the
a feast Underworld

23. Inhabitants of the Realm of Hades
Tityus
Tityus was a son
of Zeus who was
killed by Apollo for
his attempt to rape
Leto.
He was punished
in the Underworld
by vultures
devouring his liver
forever

24. • Elysium (the Elysian Fields) of the
Underworld was the final resting place of
the souls of the heroic and the virtuous.
• The inhabitants of Vergil’s Paradise hold
the typical ancient ethics: devotion to
humankind, to country, to family, and to the
gods