Hygieia Sentence Examples

Hygieia, goddess of health, passed for his daughter, and is commonly identified with the woman in Greek art who feeds a serpent out of a saucer.

Here the special attribute of the goddess appears to be health; and in later times she was identified with the Greek goddess of health, Hygieia.

Her cult was not introduced at .Epidaurus till a late date, and therefore, when in 420 B.C. the worship of Asclepius was introduced at Athens coupled with that of Hygieia, it is not to be inferred that she accompanied him from Epidaurus, or that she is a Peloponnesian importation at all.

The already existing worship of Athena Hygieia had nothing to do with Hygieia the goddess of health, but merely denoted the recognition of the power of healing as one of the attributes of Athena, which gradually became crystallized into a concrete personality.

At first no special relationship existed between Asclepius and Hygieia, but gradually she came to be regarded as his daughter, the place of his wife being already secured by Epione.

The cult of Hygieia then spread concurrently with that of Asclepius, and was introduced at Rome from Epidaurus in 293, by which time she may have been admitted (which was not the case before) into the Epidaurian family of the god.

While in classical times Asclepius and Hygieia are simply the god and goddess of health, in the declining years of paganism they are protecting divinities generally, who preserve mankind not only from sickness but from all dangers on land and sea.

In works of art Hygieia is represented, together with Asclepius, as a maiden of benevolent appearance, wearing the chiton and giving food or drink to a serpent out of a dish.

He is often accompanied by Telesphorus, the boy genius of healing, and his daughter Hygieia, the goddess of health.

Farnell (Cults, p. 275) points out that at the same time she is certainly looked upon as in some way connected with the health-divinities, since in her temple she is grouped with Asclepius and Hygieia (see Hygieia).