Eukarpia (theonym)

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Eukarpia on a mosaic from Antioch (Worcester Art Museum) Mosaics, Worcester Art Museum - IMG 7578.JPG
Eukarpia on a mosaic from Antioch (Worcester Art Museum)

In ancient Greek religion and myth, Eukarpia ("well-fruited" or "She of the rich harvest") was a divine personification of fertility, or an epithet or cult title for a deity. It is also found as a personal name for women (as Eukarpides for men). [1]

Ancient Greek religion religion in ancient Greece

Ancient Greek religion encompasses the collection of beliefs, rituals, and mythology originating in ancient Greece in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices. These groups varied enough for it to be possible to speak of Greek religions or "cults" in the plural, though most of them shared similarities.

Greek mythology body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks

Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks. These stories concern the origin and the nature of the world, the lives and activities of deities, heroes, and mythological creatures, and the origins and significance of the ancient Greeks' own cult and ritual practices. Modern scholars study the myths in an attempt to shed light on the religious and political institutions of ancient Greece and its civilization, and to gain understanding of the nature of myth-making itself.

Personification

Personification is an anthropomorphic metaphor in which a thing or abstraction is represented as a person. The type of personification discussed here excludes passing literary effects such as "Shadows hold their breath", and covers cases where a personification appears as a character in literature, or a human figure in art. The technical term for this, since ancient Greece, is prosopopoeia. In the arts many things are commonly personified. These include numerous types of places, especially cities, countries and the four continents, elements of the natural world such as the months or Four Seasons, Four Elements, Four Winds, Five Senses, and abstractions such as virtues, especially the four cardinal virtues and sins, the nine Muses, or death.

In poetry, the name is an epithet of Aphrodite, Demeter, and Dionysus. [2] In Gonnoi, Thessaly, Eukarpia appears as a name for invoking Ge (Earth). [3]

Aphrodite is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, beauty, pleasure, passion and procreation. She is identified with the planet Venus, which is named after the Roman goddess Venus, with whom Aphrodite was extensively syncretized. Aphrodite's major symbols include myrtles, roses, doves, sparrows, and swans.

Demeter Greek goddess of the harvest, grains, and agriculture

In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Demeter is the goddess of the grain, agriculture, harvest, growth, and nourishment, who presided over grains and the fertility of the earth. Her cult titles include Sito (Σιτώ), "she of the Grain", as the giver of food or grain, and Thesmophoros, "Law-Bringer", as a mark of the civilized existence of agricultural society.

Dionysus Ancient Greek god of winemaking and wine

Dionysus is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking and wine, of fertility, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre in ancient Greek religion and myth.

In a mosaic from the Tomb of Mnemosyne, Antioch, she is wearing earrings and an arm-baring tunic formed from tesserae of blue-green glass. On her head is a wreath of red and yellow fruit. [4]

Antioch ancient city in Turkey

Antioch on the Orontes was an ancient Greek city on the eastern side of the Orontes River. Its ruins lie near the modern city of Antakya, Turkey, and lends the modern city its name.

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In Greek mythology, Despoina was the daughter of Demeter and Poseidon and sister of Arion. She was the goddess of mysteries of Arcadian cults who was worshipped under the title Despoina, alongside her mother Demeter, one of the central figures of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Her real name could not be revealed to anyone except those initiated to her mysteries. Writing during the second century A.D., Pausanias spoke of Demeter as having two daughters; Kore being born first, before Despoina was born, with Zeus being the father of Kore and Poseidon as the father of Despoina. Pausanias made it clear that Kore is Persephone, although he did not reveal Despoina's proper name.

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Eubuleus mythical character

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References

  1. ↑ Fritz Graf, "Gods in Greek Inscriptions: Some Methodological Questions," in The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations (Edinburgh University Press, 2010), p. 68.
  2. ↑ Graf, "Gods in Greek Inscriptions," pp. 68.
  3. ↑ Graf, "Gods in Greek Inscriptions," p. 68.
  4. ↑ Sheila Campbell, The Mosaics of Antioch (Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1988), p. 77.


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