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| "Nott" (Germanic Goddess of Night) by Arbo (19th century) |
When misery comes at first one struggles
against it. One tries to make things right, shake it off, force a smile, rise
above it all and be kind and open hearted. Then hour by hour and day by day one
somehow forgets how to be happy. Dull resentment, a sense of isolation and a
sort of hopeless surrender to melancholia entrenches itself. One stops trying …
and one stops crying. At this point one is lost in misery – yes, Gods of
darkness and depression, it is easy to have faith in you.
But who are these Gods? To start off with
we acknowledge that any God that can give a blessing can take that same
blessing away – thus, for example, Apollo is the God of both healing and disease. In a similar vein, Ovid
tells us that ancient Roman farmers made offerings to the God of wheat leaf rust,
Robigo, not because they wanted Robigo to visit their crops, but to persuade
her to stay away from them. It follows then that if we honour the Gods of
misery, perhaps we can placate them, perhaps they will leave our sides sooner,
though some of us, let’s be honest, take some kind of enjoyment in their
company, lugubrious though it is.
Miseria
and her extended family
The first deity of Misery is surely the
Goddess Miseria herself, numen
(spirit) of misery and wretchedness, Cicero refers to her as a child of Night,
alongside some other unhappy siblings, including Dolus (Deceit), Metus
(Anxiety), Invidentia (Envy), Mors (Death), Tenebrae (Darkness), Querella (Lamentation), Fraus
(Fraud/Delusion) and Pertinacia (Obstinacy). Another deity of misery, said by Hesiod to also be a child of Night, is Discordia – numen of discord (Eris to
the Greeks). A very famous myth relating to her is perhaps a parable explaining
her origins, namely wounded pride/ego. The story goes that, incensed at not being
invited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, Discordia threw a golden apple,
inscribed with the words “for the most beautiful”, amongst the divine wedding guests.
Paris, prince of Troy, was given the task of deciding for whom the apple was
intended. He decided in favour of Venus, but in doing so he insulted Minerva
and Juno, who each claimed the apple as their own – consequently, thereafter
they were said to be enemies of Troy. Meanwhile,
Venus rewarded Paris by uniting him with Helen of Troy – the face that launch'd
a thousand ships – and thereby the Trojan war began.