Demétér

Demeter's siblings were named Hestia, Hera, Hades, Poseidon and Zeus. Their father, Kronos, ate them all after they were born because he feared they would rob him of his power. Only Zeus escaped his devouring. Zeus was rescued by his mother Rhea, who gave birth to him in secret in Crete, and gave Kronos a stone wrapped in swaddling clothes instead of a baby. Eventually, Zeus prevailed in a duel with Cronus, forcing him to release all his siblings. Demeter then went with the other gods to Olympus, where she taught the people to cultivate the fields.

Demeter had a son, Pluto, with Iasion (god of the fertile heart of the earth). She then had a daughter, Persephone, with Zeus.

Zeus promised Persephone to his brother Hades, but Demeter said nothing about it. So one day Hades kidnapped Persephone into the afterlife. Demeter set out to find her, but for nine days and nine nights she could find no trace of her daughter. Then the sun god Helios came to her rescue and told her what had happened. Demeter asked Zeus to force Hades to bring Persephone back into the world. Zeus promised to help only on the condition that Persephone did not see anything in the underworld. Which she did, however, because Hades forced a pomegranate into her mouth, and she could never return to the world.

Demeter sent a crop failure upon the earth, for which people stopped sacrificing to the gods, and Zeus had to take action. He and Hades agreed that Persephone would be with her mother two-thirds of the year and with him one-third of the year. And so it came to pass that while Persephone is in the underworld the land suffers, but once she returns to her mother the land prospers. She returns to her mother in the spring and to Hades in the autumn.