Winter's Tales (2 page)

Chinese myth

Blind Winter

Viking myth

Five White Eagles

Venezuelan legend

The Hero with Hairy Trousers

Norse legend

Greek myth

When the gods were young, there was no winter.

There was no winter, no spring, no summer and no autumn. Just warmth and growth, with fruit heavy in the trees and grain tall in the fields. Every month brought a new crop to harvest, and everyone ate well.

The goddess Demeter was always busy, because it was her job to encourage all the plants to grow, but she was happy too.

Demeter had a daughter she loved very much: Persephone, whose father was the chief god Zeus. So, with her beloved plants and her beloved child both growing healthy and strong, Demeter was a glowing generous presence on the earth.

Persephone grew into a beautiful young woman: tall, slim and golden, like the wheat in her mother's fields.

One sunny day, Persephone was picnicking with her friends at the edge of a field. They had eaten so much of the earth's goodness – apple pies, cucumber sandwiches, honey cakes – that all her friends were full and sleepy.

But Persephone noticed something in the centre of the field. A plant she had never seen before, dark and glittering in the distance.

She asked her friends if they would come with her to examine the plant, but they yawned and said they would join her later.

So Persephone walked on her own towards the plant. As she got closer, she could see it was covered with black flowers. As she got closer still, she could see silver tips on each black petal. She knew all of her mother's plants, but she had never seen flowers so gloriously dark and sharp.

There were nine blossoms and Persephone decided it wouldn't harm the plant if she picked just one of them to show her mother.

So Persephone reached out to pluck the nearest flower.

But her fingers stuck to the stem. She couldn't break the stem and she couldn't pull her hand away.

The flower trembled. The whole plant shivered. Then the plant jerked and started to sink into the ground, as if something was pulling on the roots.

Persephone yelled for help, but her friends were asleep.

The plant was dragged down into the crumbling earth and Persephone was dragged down after it.

And she landed in the underworld.

She landed at the feet of Hades, the god of the underworld, the king of the dead.

Hades had heard of Persephone's golden beauty and he wanted her to brighten up his dark land. So he had grown the black flowers to tempt her and he had pulled on the roots to steal her away.

“Will you be my queen?” he asked.

Hades offered Persephone the black blossoms as a wedding bouquet and he offered her a table of fragrant food as a wedding feast.

Persephone looked round at the dark glories and riches of the underworld. She heard the whispered histories and knowledge of the dead. She smiled at Hades and she accepted the flowers, but she didn't eat any of the feast, because she suspected eating the food of the underworld could trap her there forever.

Up above, Demeter was starting to panic. Persephone hadn't come home after the picnic, and although Demeter had no idea where her daughter was, she was afraid someone had taken her.

So she rushed up to Olympus and demanded to see Zeus.

“Where is our daughter?” she sobbed.

The most powerful of the gods frowned, then shrugged. He had a lot of children and it was hard to keep track of them all.

But Demeter's grief was growing louder and Zeus was fond of Persephone, so he sent Hermes, the messenger of the gods, to investigate. Hermes returned with rumours of a new queen in the underworld, with hair more golden than a crown.

“That's her!” cried Demeter. “That's Persephone! Bring her back! Please, Zeus, bring our girl back!”

So Zeus sent Hermes down to the underworld, with instructions to ask Hades politely to give the girl back to her mother.

But Hades refused. “She's happy here, aren't you, dear? And she makes me happy. What would she do back at her mother's, anyway? Weed the garden and thin out the carrots? She's wasted there. Tell Zeus I'm keeping her here.”

Hermes took that message back to Zeus, who shrugged and said there was nothing he could do.

Demeter wailed and screamed and stomped around the marble halls of Olympus. Then she calmed down and said in a quiet voice, “If you are going to do nothing, then I will do nothing too. I will do nothing at all.”

And she did indeed do nothing. Demeter refused to help the plants and grass and crops grow.

She sat in a corner, weeping and muttering and refusing to do anything. While she was in such a dark mood, nothing could grow. No grass, no flowers, no fruit, no crops. Nothing grew.

When the grass stopped growing, the animals became thin and hungry.

When the crops failed, the people were soon thin and hungry as well.

Eventually the people had so little food, they stopped sending up offerings to the gods.

The gods became hungry too.

Zeus looked around at the barren hungry
world and decided that he'd better get Persephone back after all.

So he summoned Hermes. “Return to the underworld and demand that Hades hand over Persephone, and make that demand in the name of the highest god, in the name of Zeus the god of thunder…”

Before Hermes started on his journey to the underworld, Hades and Persephone already knew he was coming. When Zeus thundered, everyone heard, so everyone knew what Hermes' mission was.

Hades turned to Persephone, as they sat on their ivory thrones, and held out a handful of blood-red seeds. “You must be hungry, my dear. Please accept these seeds.”

Persephone knew it was time to make a choice.

She could eat the twelve blood-red seeds and stay forever in the underworld, with all the power of the queen of the dead.

Or she could refuse to eat the twelve blood-red seeds and return to the light, to be her mother's daughter forever.

Persephone took the twelve seeds from Hades' white hand.

As she raised the seeds to her lips, Hermes arrived on his feathered feet and announced, “Zeus the thunderer demands the return of his daughter.”

“It's too late,” smiled Hades. “She has already eaten the food of the underworld. She must stay here forever.”

“Not forever,” said Persephone.

She opened her fingers and showed eight blood-red seeds still glowing in the palm of her hand.

“I only ate four of the twelve seeds. So I will stay with you for four months of the year, and I will return to the sunlight and my mother's fields for the rest of the year.”

So now the gods are older, and we have winter.

We have winter for the four months of the year that Persephone is in the underworld, when Demeter grieves for her daughter and refuses to let the plants grow.

Then comes spring, when Persephone
returns and Demeter's joy brings life and growth.

Then summer, when everyone is settled into contented happiness.

Then autumn, when Demeter sinks slowly into sadness as she remembers her daughter must leave again.

And then winter returns, when Demeter grieves once more and no plants grow anywhere.

No plants, except the glittering black flowers that Persephone grows in the underworld.

Norwegian folktale

The King of Denmark wanted a snow bear. Other kings owned lions and tigers and giraffes and unicorns, so he wanted a big fancy pet too. He offered a reward to the first man to bring a snow bear to his palace.

Lars was a farmboy who had always wanted to see the king's palace. So he travelled to Finnmark, in the far north of Norway, and
he tracked a great white snow bear. He laid a trap, baited it with seal meat, then he caught the bear in his net and locked an iron chain round her neck.

He said, “Come on, my beautiful white bear. I will take you to the King of Denmark and you will wear gold chains round your neck, and be admired and fed all sorts of good food. Follow me to Copenhagen, to live a life of gold and warmth and comfort.”