Hestia
Hestia, called Vesta by the Romans, was the Greek goddess of the home and his origins are
far away in history. She was represented by the hearth fire and ruled every aspect of domestic life and of the
family or clan. The Greeks worshipped her as one of their greatest goddesses and they considered her as sort of
"Lar" (home spirit) to whom they were to offer the fire they lighted and by which they sat. If one did
not sacrificed in her name he could be thought a heretic.
She aimed the peace, and Zeus, his youngest brother, honoured her for having avoided a war in the Olympus when,
seeing that Apollo and Poseidon wanted her as wife, she swore by Zeus' head she would remain virgin.
In one opportunity, she was about to lose it when Pryapo, drunk, tried to rape her, but a donkey make her wake
up (symbol of lust and his personal animal after the incident) and she frightened him.
She's the most gentle, right, charitable and benign goddess of the Olympics and she is believed to have taught
the art of building houses to the Greeks.
Later, an order or virgins, the vestals, was to guard the sacred fire of the temples and her most important altars
altogether with the one in the Olympus and the legend says that Romulus and Remus were born from a raped vestal,
Rea Sylvia.
His personality and life was obscure and it is not much what is known about her. Finally, her place in the Parthenon
was occupied by Dionysos.
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