Minthe

In Greek mythology, Minthe (also Menthe, Mintha or Mentha; Greek: Μίνθη or Μένθη) was a naiad associated with the river Cocytus. She was dazzled by Hades and was about to seduce him had not Queen Persephone intervened and metamorphosed Minthe, in the words of Strabo's account, "into the garden mint, which some call hedyosmon (lit. 'sweet-smelling')".^[1] The –nth– element in menthe is characteristic of a class of words borrowed from a pre-Greek language: compare acanthus, labyrinth, Corinth, etc..

In ancient Greece, mint was used in funerary rites, together with rosemary and myrtle, and not simply to offset the smell of decay; mint was an element in the fermented barley drink called the kykeon that was an essential preparatory entheogen for participants in the Eleusinian mysteries, which offered hope in the afterlife for initiates.^[2]

Notes

References

• Graves, Robert, (1955; rev. ed. 1960). The Greek Myths I (London: Penguin) 31.d (p 121), 31.d.note 6 (p. 124).
• Grimal, Pierre, The Dictionary of Classical Mythology, Wiley-Blackwell, 1996, ISBN 978-0-631-20102-1. "Menthe" p. 286
• Kerenyi, Karl, 1967. Eleusis: Archetypal Image of Mother and Daughter, pp. 40, 179f (Princeton: Bollingen)
• Ovid: Metamorphoses X: 728–731
• Smith, William; Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London (1873). "Mintha"
• Strabo, 8.3.14

External links

• The Theoi Project, "MINTHE"