Greek gods on the Siphnian Treasury, Delphi, ca. 530 BC What is polytheism? People in ancient Greece believed in many gods: they were polytheistic (PA-lee-thee-ISS-tick). It is impossible to say how [...]
Gaia is the earth. In the beginning... Many people in classical Greece believed that at the beginning of time there was only one being, which they called Chaos. (This is not unlike the Jewish [...]
The Furies torment Orestes Red-figure vase from South Italy ca. 380 BC (Naples Archaeological Museum) Scary spirit women In Greek mythology, the Furies were terrifying female spirits of the underworld who frightened men [...]
Eleusinian Mysteries: Demeter, Persephone, and Triptolemos (the boy), an 1899 drawing from a stone carving found at Eleusis . When did the Eleusinian Mysteries start? Beginning at least as early [...]
Persephone project: Hades kidnaps Persephone (Greek painting from the Hellenistic period) Put on a play for your class, or make a short film about Persephone, or write a book or [...]
Greek gods bingo Here's a board to print out for Greek gods bingo. And here are some definitions you could use to call out. When the caller calls a definition, [...]
Dionysos turns a ship into grapevines, and the bad sailors into dolphins (Athenian black-figure vase from the 500s BC) One story about Dionysos, which you can see painted on this [...]
The god Dionysos is the god of wine and grapes What is Dionysos the god of? For the Greeks, Dionysos was a fertility god like Demeter. But while Demeter was [...]
Greek goddess Demeter: A field of wheat growing What does "Demeter" mean? The Greek goddess Demeter is an earth goddess; her name is De, which means earth (the same word as Gaia) [...]
Temple of Apollo at Delphi How old was the shrine at Delphi? Delphi (DELL-fee), in central Greece, seems to have been a sacred shrine even before the Greeks arrived in [...]
