Hebe and Zeus Print

Hebe pours Zeus some elixir of immortality. Hebe, Greek Goddess, was an embodiment of eternal youth, the ideal maiden, cupbearer to the gods. When my daughter saw this painting, she said, "It looks like blood." Yes, yes, it does. According to Barbara Walker's Women's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, "The lives of the very gods were dependent on the miraculous power of menstrual blood. In Greece it was euphemistically called the "supernatural red wine" given to the gods by Hera in her virgin form, as Hebe." This is how they remained immortal. The fountain of youth, blood of a maiden Goddess. This makes sense, considering the understanding of the functions of menstrual blood at the time. "Pliny called menstrual blood the 'material substance of generation', capable of forming 'a curd, which afterwards in process of time quickeneth and groweth to the form of a body.' Aristotle said the same: human life is made of 'coagulum' of menstrual blood. Plutarch said man was made of earth, but the power that made a human body grow was the moon, source of menstrual blood." What is more magic than creating life? The blood of the Goddess, elixir of immortality. Zeus seems to like it.