Myth Monday - Hekate Goddess of the Crossroads

"But terrors which happen during the night, and fevers, and delirium, and jumpings out of bed, and frightful apparitions, and fleeing away,-all these they hold to be the plots of Hecate, and the invasions the and use purifications and incantations, and, as appears to me, make the divinity to be most wicked and most impious."
From Hippocrates' On the Sacred Disease

Around this time of year -- the Halloween costume-buying season -- interest grows in ancient goddesses connected with withcraft and/or the dead. One such goddess is Hekate (Hecate).

Hekate is connected with the dead in her function as liminal goddess, a deity of doors, gates, rivers and frontiers, and crossroads. The goddess attended transitional events (like Artemis), including the passing of the soul in either direction. In Hekate's benevolent aspects, she kept the ghosts at bay, but when vengeful, she could bring them into the land of the living.

Another liminal deity is the Roman Janus, the god associated with the beginning of the new year. He is shown with two faces, one facing forwards and one backwards (he also had quadrifrontal representations), but Hekate, when not depicted as a single creature, as she was through the early Classical period, perhaps carrying a torch to help light the way for the return of Persephone [see: the Homeric Hymn to Demeter], is shown as trimorphous, perhaps with a torch in each hand. In the accompanying photo, you can see two of her three sculpted forms, but if you look carefully, you may see a third, presumably identical one -- at least before time ravaged its limbs.

To keep Hekate happy, sacrifices called suppers were made to her at her crossroad shrines (hekataia). Sometimes the poor would eat the food left there. As an aside: There is some confusion between the suppers and the discarded pollutants and refuse left at the crossroads.

The following passage from Hesiod tells of Hekate's family and the many honors awarded the goddess:

"Also she bare Asteria of happy name, whom Perses once led to his great house to be called his dear wife. And she conceived and bare Hecate whom Zeus the son of Cronos honoured above all. He gave her splendid gifts, to have a share of the earth and the unfruitful sea. She received honour also in starry heaven, and is honoured exceedingly by the deathless gods. For to this day, whenever any one of men on earth offers rich sacrifices and prays for favour according to custom, he calls upon Hecate. Great honour comes full easily to him whose prayers the goddess receives favourably, and she bestows wealth upon him; for the power surely is with her. For as many as were born of Earth and Ocean amongst all these she has her due portion. The son of Cronos did her no wrong nor took anything away of all that was her portion among the former Titan gods: but she holds, as the division was at the first from the beginning, privilege both in earth, and in heaven, and in sea. Also, because she is an only child, the goddess receives not less honour, but much more still, for Zeus honours her. Whom she will she greatly aids and advances: she sits by worshipful kings in judgement, and in the assembly whom she will is distinguished among the people. And when men arm themselves for the battle that destroys men, then the goddess is at hand to give victory and grant glory readily to whom she will. Good is she also when men contend at the games, for there too the goddess is with them and profits them: and he who by might and strength gets the victory wins the rich prize easily with joy, and brings glory to his parents. And she is good to stand by horsemen, whom she will: and to those whose business is in the grey discomfortable sea, and who pray to Hecate and the loud-crashing Earth-Shaker, easily the glorious goddess gives great catch, and easily she takes it away as soon as seen, if so she will. She is good in the byre with Hermes to increase the stock. The droves of kine and wide herds of goats and flocks of fleecy sheep, if she will, she increases from a few, or makes many to be less. So, then. albeit her mother's only child (17), she is honoured amongst all the deathless gods. And the son of Cronos made her a nurse of the young who after that day saw with their eyes the light of all-seeing Dawn. So from the beginning she is a nurse of the young, and these are her honours."
Hesiod Theogony, translated by Evelyn-White

Hekate References:

• _{"Crossroads," by S. I. Johnston; Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Bd. 88 (1991), pp. 217-224.}
• _{"Double and Multiple Representations in Greek Art and Religious Thought," by Theodora Hadzisteliou Price; The Journal of Hellenic Studies, (1971), pp. 48-69.}
• _{"Excavations in the Athenian Agora," by T. Leslie Shear; American Journal of Archaeology, (1937), pp. 177-189.}
• _{"Hecate: A Transfunctional Goddess in the Theogony?" by Deborah Boedeker; Transactions of the American Philological Association (1983), pp. 79- 93.}
• _{"Hekate, H. J. Rose, and C. M. Bowra," by R. Renehan; The Classical World, (1980), pp. 302-304}
• _{"The Programmatic Message of the 'Kings and Singers' Passage: Hesiod, 'Theogony' 80-103," by Kathryn B. Stoddard; Transactions of the American Philological Association, (2003), pp. 1-16.}
• _{"The Running Maiden from Eleusis and the Early Classical Image of Hekate," by Charles M. Edwards; American Journal of Archaeology, (1986), pp. 307-318.}
• _{"Watching the Skies: Janus, Auspication, and the Shrine in the Roman Forum," by Rabun Taylor; Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, (2000), pp. 1-40.}