Hesperides: Greek Goddesses of Afternoon


     Hesperides are, in Greek Mythology, the Goddesses of Afternoon. They have an incredible garden! His parents are Nyx and Erebus, both representations of night and darkness, check it out.

Hesperides in Greek Mythology:

     The Hesperides (evening), in Greek Mythology, are primitive spring goddesses who represented the fertilizing spirit of nature, owners of the garden of Hesperides, located at the western end of the world.

     Strictly speaking, the term hespérides designates two distinct groups of deities, which are often confused. The first, and oldest, is that of the three hespérid goddesses, who personify the afternoon light and the evening cycle. According to Hesiod, they are daughters of Nyx (the night) and Erebus (the darkness). There are, however, other versions for his ancestry. One of them gives them as daughters of Ether (heavenly light) and Hemera (daylight).

     The other group is that of the seven hespérides nymphs, or western nymphs, whose origin is also controversial. According to the most current version, they are daughters of the Titan Atlas with the goddess Héspera. They are also described as daughters of Zeus and Themis or of Forcis and Cetus.

The 3 Goddesses:

    The Hesperides Goddesses walk through the skies, taking care to illuminate the whole world with the afternoon light. In this way, they are part of the cycle of the day: Hemera brings the day, the Hespérides bring the evening and Nyx closes the cycle with the night.

  • Hesperia - at twilight - goddess of evening twilight;
  • Eritia - the splendor - goddess of the splendor of the afternoon;
  • Egle - the radiant - goddess of reddish afternoon light.

The 7 Nymphs:

     The Hesperides Nymphs, also called western nymphs, inhabited the far West, not far from the island of the blessed, on the banks of the ocean. They had the gift of prophecy and metamorphosis. They were beautiful, joyful and symbolized the fertility of the soil. They lived in a beautiful palace located in front of the garden of the golden apple trees. As the western world became more well known, the location of the country of the Hesperides with the one next to Mount Atlas was needed.

  • Aretusa.
  • Hesperia;
  • Hesperis;
  • Egeria;
  • Clete;
  • Ciparissa;
  • Cinosura.

The Garden of Hesperides:

     The Garden of Hesperides was considered the most beautiful of all Antiquity. When Hera married Zeus, she received some golden apples from Gaia as a wedding gift. Hera found them so beautiful that she had them planted in her garden, in the far West.

     The garden of the Hesperides was known as the garden of the immortals, as it contained an orchard that housed magical trees from which the golden apples were born, considered sources of eternal youth.

     There were many obstacles to reaching the garden, such as the grotto of the greens and the grotto of the gorgons. The garden itself was populated by monsters that protected it, such as a terrible dragon, son of Forcis and Cetu, and also Ladão, the hundred-headed dragon son of Typhon and Echidna.

     Plínio and Solino report only two mortals (heroes) who found the gardens of the Hesperides: Perseus when he went to face Medusa; and Heracles in one of the famous Twelve works of Hercules.

     The famous "Snitch of Discord" also emerged from the garden of the Hesperides, by which Athena, Hera and Aphrodite submitted to the judgment of Paris.

     The myth of the garden of the Hesperides has its most accurate literary descriptions in Hesiod's Theogony, which refers to the "beautiful, golden apples", and in the choral odes of Euripides, which mentions the "springs of ambrosia" of that "divine land, which generates life "and the" back fawn serpent ", guardian of the golden apples.