|
Pluto (, ') was the ruler of the underworld in classical mythology. The earlier name for the god was Hades, which became more common as the name of the underworld itself. In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pluto represents a more positive concept of the god who presides over the afterlife. ''Ploutōn'' was frequently conflated with ''Ploutos'' (Πλοῦτος, Plutus), a god of wealth, because mineral wealth was found underground, and because as a chthonic god Pluto ruled the deep earth that contained the seeds necessary for a bountiful harvest.〔William Hansen, ''Classical Mythology: A Guide to the Mythical World of the Greeks and Romans'' (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 182.〕 The name ''Ploutōn'' came into widespread usage with the Eleusinian Mysteries, in which Pluto was venerated as a stern ruler but the loving husband of Persephone. The couple received souls in the afterlife, and are invoked together in religious inscriptions. Hades by contrast had few temples and religious practices associated with him, and is portrayed as the dark and violent abductor of Persephone. Pluto and Hades differ in character, but they are not distinct figures and share their two major myths. In Greek cosmogony, the god received the rule of the underworld in a three-way division of sovereignty over the world, with his brothers Zeus ruling the Sky and Poseidon the Sea. His central narrative is the abduction of Persephone to be his wife and the queen of his realm.〔Hansen, ''Classical Mythology,'', p. 180.〕 ''Plouton'' as the name of the ruler of the underworld first appears in Greek literature of the Classical period, in the works of the Athenian playwrights and of the philosopher Plato, who is the major Greek source on its significance. Under the name Pluto, the god appears in other myths in a secondary role, mostly as the possessor of a quest-object, and especially in the descent of Orpheus or other heroes to the underworld.〔Hansen, ''Classical Mythology'', pp. 180–181.〕 ''Plūtō'' ((:ˈpluːtoː); genitive ''Plūtōnis'') is the Latinized form of the Greek ''Plouton''. Pluto's Roman equivalent is Dis Pater, whose name is most often taken to mean "Rich Father" and is perhaps a direct translation of ''Plouton.'' Pluto was also identified with the obscure Roman Orcus, like Hades the name of both a god of the underworld and the underworld as a place. The borrowed Greek name ''Pluto'' is sometimes used for the ruler of the dead in Latin literature, leading some mythology handbooks to assert misleadingly that Pluto was the Roman counterpart of Hades.〔Hansen, ''Classical Mythology'', p. 182, makes the distinction.〕 ''Pluto'' (''Pluton'' in French and German, ''Plutone'' in Italian) becomes the most common name for the classical ruler of the underworld in subsequent Western literature and other art forms. ==Hesiod== The name ''Plouton'' does not appear in Greek literature of the Archaic period.〔Lewis Richard Farnell, ''The Cults of the Greek States'' (Clarendon Press, 1907), vol. 3, p. 281.〕 In Hesiod's ''Theogony'', the six children of Cronus and Rhea are Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Hades, Demeter, and Hestia. The male children divide the world into three realms. Hades takes Persephone by force from her mother Demeter, with the consent of Zeus. ''Ploutos'', "Wealth," appears in the ''Theogony'' as the child of Demeter and Iasion: "fine Plutus, who goes upon the whole earth and the broad back of the sea, and whoever meets him and comes into his hands, that man he makes rich, and he bestows much wealth upon him." The union of Demeter and Iasion, described also in the ''Odyssey'',〔''Odyssey'' 5.125–128: ''And so it was when Demeter of the lovely hair, yielding / to her desire, lay down with Iasion and loved him / in a thrice-turned field'' (translation of Richmond Lattimore).〕 took place in a fallow field that had been ploughed three times, in what seems to be a reference to a ritual copulation or sympathetic magic to ensure the earth's fertility.〔Hesiod, ''Theogony'' 969–74; Apostolos N. Athanassakis, ''Hesiod. Theogony, Works and Days, Shield'' (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983, 2004), p. 56.〕 "The resemblance of the name ''Ploutos'' to ''Plouton'' ...," it has been noted, "cannot be accidental. Plouton is lord of the dead, but as Persephone's husband he has serious claims to the powers of fertility."〔Athanassakis, ''Hesiod'', p. 56.〕 Demeter's son Plutus merges in the narrative tradition with her son-in-law Pluto, redefining the implacable chariot-driver Hades whose horses trample the flowering earth.〔Emily Vermeule, ''Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art and Poetry'' (University of California Press, 1979), pp. 37, 219; Hendrik Wagenvoort, "The Origin of the ''Ludi Saeculares''," in ''Studies in Roman Literature, Culture and Religion'' (Brill, 1956), p. 198.〕 That the underworld god was associated early on with success in agricultural activity is already evident in Hesiod's ''Works and Days'', line 465-469: "Pray to Zeus of the Earth and to pure Demeter to make Demeter's holy grain sound and heavy, when first you begin ploughing, when you hold in your hand the end of the plough-tail and bring down your stick on the backs of the oxen as they draw on the pole-bar by the yoke-straps." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Pluto (mythology)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|