Editing Persephone (section)

===In Orphism===
[[File:Hades abducting Persephone.jpg|thumb|upright=1.5|[[Hades]] abducting Persephone, wall painting in the small royal tomb at [[Vergina]]. [[Macedonia (Greece)|Macedonia]], Greece]]

Evidence from both the ''[[Orphic Hymns]]'' and the [[Totenpass|Orphic Gold Leaves]] demonstrate that Persephone was one of the most important deities worshiped in [[Orphism (religion)|Orphism]].<ref name=bremmer>{{harvnb|Bremmer|2013}} {{pages needed |date=December 2024}}</ref> In the Orphic religion, gold leaves with verses intended to help the deceased enter into an optimal afterlife were often buried with the dead. Persephone is mentioned frequently in these tablets, along with Demeter and Euklês, which may be another name for [[Plouton]].<ref name=bremmer/> The ideal afterlife destination believers strive for is described on some leaves as the "sacred meadows and groves of Persephone". Other gold leaves describe Persephone's role in receiving and sheltering the dead, in such lines as "I dived under the ''kolpos'' [portion of a Peplos folded over the belt] of the Lady, the Chthonian Queen", an image evocative of a child hiding under its mother's apron.<ref name=bremmer/>

In Orphism, Persephone is believed to be the mother of the first Dionysus. In Orphic myth, Zeus came to Persephone in her bedchamber in the underworld and impregnated her with the child who would become his successor. The infant Dionysus was later dismembered by the [[Titan (mythology)|Titans]], before being reborn as the second Dionysus, who wandered the earth spreading his mystery cult before ascending to the heavens with his second mother, [[Semele]].<ref name=Edmonds-2011/> The first, "Orphic" Dionysus is sometimes referred to with the alternate name Zagreus ({{langx|grc|Ζαγρεύς}}). The earliest mentions of this name in literature describe him as a partner of Gaia and call him the highest god. The Greek poet [[Aeschylus]] considered Zagreus either an alternate name for Hades, or his son (presumably born to Persephone).<ref>{{harvnb|Aeschylus|loc= [https://archive.org/details/aeschyluswitheng02aescuoft/page/458/mode/2up?q=228 fragment 228]}}; {{harvnb|Gantz|1996|p= 118}}.</ref> Scholar [[Timothy Gantz]] noted that Hades was often considered an alternate, cthonic form of Zeus, and suggested that it is likely Zagreus was originally the son of Hades and Persephone, who was later merged with the Orphic Dionysus, the son of Zeus and Persephone, owing to the identification of the two fathers as the same being.<ref>{{harvnb|Gantz|1996|p= 118}}</ref> However, no known Orphic sources use the name "Zagreus" to refer to Dionysus. It is possible that the association between the two was known by the 3rd century&nbsp;BC, when the poet [[Callimachus]] may have written about it in a now-lost source.<ref>{{harvnb|Gantz|1996|pp=118–119}}; {{harvnb|West|1983|pp=152–154}}; {{harvnb|Linforth|1941|loc=[https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015008294699;view=1up;seq=335 pp. 309–311]}}.</ref> In Orphic myth, the Eumenides are attributed as daughters of Persephone and Zeus.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Mastros |first=Sara |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rvSuDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA151 |title=Orphic Hymns Grimoire |date=2019 |publisher=Lulu.com |isbn=978-1-7330961-7-1 |language=en |access-date=9 December 2022 |archive-date=10 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230210100756/https://books.google.com/books?id=rvSuDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA151 |url-status=live }}</ref> Whereas Melinoë was conceived as the result of rape when Zeus disguised himself as Hades in order to mate with Persephone, the Eumenides' origin is unclear.<ref>{{harvnb|Edmonds III|2013|p=178 }}</ref>