The most recent class dealt with the ‘A’ team of the Graeco-Roman gods. These are the twelve larger-than-life anthropomorphic gods who lived on Mt. Olympus. Their Latin names are familiar to most people – Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, Apollo and Diana, Mars, Venus, Vulcan, Bacchus, Neptune, Ceres and Mercury. However, their conduct was nothing to be imitated by humans.
Jupiter was always seducing human women; Juno was forever trying to kill the women that her husband Jupiter had seduced. Diana often played cruel pranks on humans while Apollo and Minerva brought disease and sickness to them. Mars and Minerva brought brutal war. Neptune caused earthquakes and Mercury was a thief who stole from both the gods and humans. Venus was the promiscuous goddess of sexual desire but in Roman eyes she was also the goddess of agreements. Perhaps these are much the same thing really. Bacchus was the god of abandoned intoxication. Only Ceres, the goddess of cereal crops, was unreservedly good.
Vesta, the other good goddess, she who ruled the hearth, the family and domestic life, left Olympus so that Bacchus could take her place.
The only Olympian god who did not live on Mt. Olympus was the chthonic god of death, riches and the underworld. No-one liked to mention him. Who knows? He might take into his head to appear. Euphemistically, the Greeks called him Pluton, the god of riches; the Romans called him Dis Pater, the father of spirits, or Pluto, the god of riches. We, who do not believe in such superstitions, know him as Hades or Thanatos, the god of death.
Jupiter was always seducing human women; Juno was forever trying to kill the women that her husband Jupiter had seduced. Diana often played cruel pranks on humans while Apollo and Minerva brought disease and sickness to them. Mars and Minerva brought brutal war. Neptune caused earthquakes and Mercury was a thief who stole from both the gods and humans. Venus was the promiscuous goddess of sexual desire but in Roman eyes she was also the goddess of agreements. Perhaps these are much the same thing really. Bacchus was the god of abandoned intoxication. Only Ceres, the goddess of cereal crops, was unreservedly good.
Vesta, the other good goddess, she who ruled the hearth, the family and domestic life, left Olympus so that Bacchus could take her place.
The only Olympian god who did not live on Mt. Olympus was the chthonic god of death, riches and the underworld. No-one liked to mention him. Who knows? He might take into his head to appear. Euphemistically, the Greeks called him Pluton, the god of riches; the Romans called him Dis Pater, the father of spirits, or Pluto, the god of riches. We, who do not believe in such superstitions, know him as Hades or Thanatos, the god of death.
John Barry
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