Domain: The hearth, home, family, the sacred fire, the state Symbol: The hearth, the eternal flame Roman Equivalent: Vesta
Overview
Hestia is the goddess of the hearth — the firstborn of Cronus and Rhea, and so the eldest of the Olympians (swallowed first and disgorged last, she is sometimes called both the oldest and the youngest). She presides over the hearth fire at the center of every home and every city, and over the domestic and civic order that radiates outward from it. A virgin goddess who turned down both Poseidon and Apollo, she keeps to the still center while the other gods quarrel and wander.
She is the least storied of the great Olympians precisely because her domain is constancy. A goddess of myth is a goddess of disruption, and Hestia is the one who does not disrupt: her fire is the one that must never go out.
Key Myths
The given-up throne. In the tradition that fixes the Olympians at twelve, Hestia yielded her seat to Dionysus to spare the gods a quarrel — choosing the hearth over the throne, tending the fire of Olympus itself rather than holding court. It is the most Hestia of acts: power declined in favor of keeping the peace.
First and last. In Greek practice she received the first and the final portion of every sacrifice. Every meal and every rite began and ended at the hearth — which is to say with her, the unmoving point around which all devotion turned.
Related
- Vesta — Her Roman counterpart, and the Vestal flame
- Demeter — Sister; grain to her hearth
- Hera — Sister; the household seen from a different angle
- Poseidon — A suitor she refused
- Greek Mythology Index