“And Hera we understand to be a happy tempering of the atmosphere, and therefore she is very fruitful; but Athena, as they call Pallas, was reckoned a virgin, because on account of the intense heat she could produce nothing.  And in a similar fashion Artemis is explained:  for her they take as the lowest depth of air, and so they called her a virgin, because she could not bear anything on account of the extreme cold.  And that troubled and drunken composition which arises from the upper and lower vapours they called Dionysus, as troubling the intellect.  And the water under the earth, which is in nature indeed one, but which flows through all the paths of earth, and is divided into many parts, they called Osiris, as being cut in pieces.  And they understand Adonis as favourable seasons, Aphrodite as coition and generation, Demeter as the earth, the Girl (Proserpine) as seeds; and Dionysus some understand as the vine.

E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH