Persephone and Hades' relationship is an important relationship archetype

I started writing this comment as a response to a comment lamenting Persephone’s youth. I am nothing if not long-winded, and this post quickly expanded. In this post I am not necessarily disagreeing with u/limonmello, but her/his post inspired these thoughts.

Broad difference in age and maturity is a major component of Persephone and Hades myth and is consistent with a certain kind of relationship. Hypergamy (women marrying older and/or more wealthy men) is almost universal across societies, but age differences are usually a function of wealth accumulation rates and mortality. When it takes a long time to acquire wealth, men are older at their first marriage. When mortality (especially among women) is high, women marry younger at their first marriage.

Large age disparities were common in the Greek dark ages (according to anthropological archaeology, so not perfect) when the Hades/Persephone myth originates, and have been common in places and times like early modern Italy, or during certain dynasties in China. During times with broad age disparities, older men often married someone not that much younger than them for their first marriage and frequently remarried a woman about the same age as their first wife when he married her, if the first wife died. Sometimes men would be shut out of the “first round” and skip straight to the younger women later in life (as seems to be the case with Hades). An older man marrying a younger woman was advantageous to the man in high mortality eras because it allowed him to have more children making survival to maturity more likely. Marrying a much older man was attractive to younger women because it increased social mobility dramatically.

The age discrepancy is important to the Hades and Persephone myth, because it reflected a real problem that men and women would have experienced in the time when the myth arose. Men who were bypassed in their youth, for whatever reason, would reasonably have concerns about marrying a younger woman and a potential sense of inadequacy like we see in Hades. Even when rationally comprehensible, a young woman might be reluctant to marry an older, established man because he is probably less attractive physically than a younger man (though that doesn’t seem to be an issue in LO). Furthermore, marrying an established man would immediately impose obligations and responsibilities on the younger woman, who might not feel adequate to the task, and smart prospective husbands would have been mindful of the burden. On the other hand, “marrying up” was also a way to skip straight to the “high life,” even if not marrying into royalty. Established husbands probably have a better record to assess how reliable they would be as fathers (such as Hades reliable paternalism to his pets).

The attraction of younger women to older men remains today, and Rachel Smythe has admirably deconstructed it in LO, but modern age differences have an additional component that likely was not as salient in ancient contexts. If you look back through the postings about LO by women, one of the most common sentiment is some variant of the idea “I need a ‘Hades’ in my life.” Realistically, the ‘Hades’ archetype is going to be someone in his mid-30s at the youngest, and more likely in his 40s or older. A ‘Hades’ today would both be emotionally mature—which can come early but rarely does—and financially stable, which in OECD countries almost never happens before middle age. The couple with a broad age discrepancy in modernity also create a relationship which bridges socio-cultural divides that are increasingly salient in an era of constant change. In a single relationship (imagining a 19 year-old woman and a 40 year-old man) you would have the vibrancy of youth combined with the stability of experience. It is unsurprising many “power couples” fit just such a pattern.

The 2000-year disparity in LO may creep people out, but cannot be taken literally. First, relationship differences should be framed in the context of how much time the couple will have together. A 20-30 split in an age where people tend to die at 35 is a big one, but is hardly a difference at all now when people regularly live into their 70s and 80s, because the relationship could last for 40 or 50 years. The undying gods have all of forever to look forward to their partnership (and we speak about Hades and Persephone 3000 years later, so they seem to be doing well). Second, though nominally Hades is 2000 years old, he has the markers of someone in his 40, or young 50s as most. His brothers have been married for some time, and have adult children, but also still have children at home. Hades looks like someone in his early 40s, and its probable that he is supposed to read that way to the reader’s mind. Though nominally a story about a 2000-year age gap, it is about a relationship between a fully formed, but broken adult and emotionally more healthy, precocious woman about half his age.

Perhaps the largest reason that some people object the age disparity is actually Persephone’s youth, but focusing solely on Persephone’s age is imposing a standard on maturity that is novel to our era, and deserves interrogation in light of LO. There has been (on this and other fora) a lot of objection to the idea that 19 or (accounting for an engagement) 20 is old enough for Persephone to consider marriage, but 19 is well within the normal age for women’s first marriage historically and across cultures. Currently there is a trend towards older marriage among women in the west, but the current trend is an outlier, and is frequently regarded as a bad thing. Waiting to marry as a woman delays child bearing outside healthy ages and reduces fecundity. Delayed marriage among men is associated with slower wealth acquisition for both genders, in part because marriage is an important and poorly understood mechanism for wealth building. There is a drop in divorce rates with marriage delays, but the rate begins to climb again after mid-to-late 20s. The difference in happiness between married and single people accounts for some general dissatisfaction among young people, who are less likely to be married in their 20s than than previous generations. Basically, by generationally delaying marriage, the average effect has been to harm health, wealth and happiness, and Persephone is an interesting archetype pushing against current trends.

There is, in modern society, strong cultural biases against hypergamy—marrying up— which Persephone and LO butt up against as well. Alex’ headline says “sleeping her way into the royal family” which is just a sleazy way of saying “trying to marry up.” The trope of the gold digger is similar, and implies that somehow preferring marriage with someone of means is morally bad. There has been an increase in normalization of the “sugar daddy” relationship, but only as a transactional concubinage, not as an equal partner. Persephone in LO encounters all of these biases, even from Hera who suspects that Hades might just be interested in seeing Persephone’s breasts. Ironically, among the gods we’ve met, Persephone is in many ways among the most mature, centered and intelligent and even at 19 is more ready to take leadership. I will not impute to others motives, but there are very few reasons to think that Persephone is inherently unprepared to be Queen and in a marriage, now. She may be better prepared after a year or so, but there is no reason to think she would not grow in to the role once married. While true that many people are not ready to be married at 19, others are incredibly well-developed as people, and entering into a fulfilling relationship is an important next step in their personal development. Persephone gives every indication of being an example of someone who could marry at 19, or not, and be just as good either way. (This is setting aside whether Persephone is emotionally prepared to decide to get married, or in an emotional position to do so give the nastiness with Apollo.)

I hope that Rachel Smythe continues to explore themes about marriage, and challenge comfort zones. Marriage is at the root of the Persephone and Hades story. All societies, but especially western oriented, developed economies face social changes and shifts in marriage patterns constitute a part of many challenges. Not only are Persephone and Hades (as written so far) potential good examples of a romantic relationship, they are also an opportunity to examine how norms surrounding relationships may be causing societal problems, or affecting personal happiness and success. Marriages or relationships between older men and much younger women (and vice versa, though not represented in LO, as far as we know) can be very fulfilling, prosperous and successful for some people. Social norms may blind people to options that would help them and society be better, more successful, happier people.