Because when your wife’s the goddess of spring and a daughter of a major goddess, you can’t just get her a bouquet and chocolates when you need to say sorry. Also, I love me some Greek mythology. :|
Many thanks to Tuomey, PeppersGhost, Devereaux, thedeadlymoose, ProcyonLotor, Light, Eskobar, DrYucatan, Moohab, Kidd, and Thekillerax for reading and reviewing this for me in chat. As always, I’m sorry if I forgot to mention someone here. Edit: Also DEXANOTE, who originally helped me develop the idea waaaay back in… December 2013, maybe. We were thinking of writing a collab but we never got around to it.
I don’t really like how many aspects of pop culture have routinely typecast Hades as the all-around evil manipulative bad guy. He always struck me as just the uptight, stoic oldest brother, who doesn’t really care about the ridiculous stuff his family gets up to but keeps his head level and concerned with his work.
But then again, for all we know, he spoils Persephone rotten and dotes on her more than her mother does. Gotta hand it to the guy, even though his brothers and nephews are pretty messed up in terms of relationships (look at Zeus, for crying out loud), Hades of the myths stays pretty loyal to Persephone even though he sees her only part of the year. She probably still has some enmity towards him for kidnapping her, though, and he’s obviously still apologizing for it. Even the god of wealth has it tough sometimes.
There’s several Easter eggs scattered around for those who are big on Greek mythology.
- Hades is the god of wealth, so all the precious gems and metals of the earth belong to him. Also he doesn’t really have a green thumb, so he tries his best with the flowers.
- About 8 km from Enna is said to be the place where Persephone was originally kidnapped.
- Another name Hades went by is “Aidoneus”.
- “Butterfly” and “soul” are the same word in Greek.
- Some versions of the myth say that the narcissus was the flower attracted Persephone’s attention before Hades kidnapped her. Narcissus is also said to be sacred to Hades.
- Asphodel is said to be the only thing that grows naturally in the underworld.
- When Orpheus played the lyre for him, Hades was said to have wept tears of iron.
- Also this is kinda a random trivia thing, but in the language of flowers, purple hyacinth means “I’m sorry” or “sorrow”, and thyme means “strength and courage”. Persephone might have taught Hades about that sometime, hmm?
Why does everything disappear all the time? Maybe Persephone picks up all the gifts and brings them to show her mother.
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