Epithets which euphemistically address his benign and hospitable aspects include ‘Renowned’, ‘Good Counsellor’, ‘the Beautiful‐haired One’, ‘Of Good Repute’, ‘Leader of the People’, ‘Lord over All’, ‘Receiver of Many’, ‘Host to Many’ and Pluton (‘Wealth’). Other negative epithets are ‘hateful’, ‘implacable and adamant’, ‘tearless’ and ‘malignant’. The ‘wolf's cap of Hades’, worn by Athena in the Iliad, makes its wearers invisible. to ancient etymology, recalls the darkness of his realm. Of the latter, Hades, ‘the invisible one’ acc. The two opposite but complementary aspects of his divinity are reflected in a host of positive and negative epithets. Paradoxically, he was also believed to ‘send up’ good things for mortals from his wealth below.

As the Lord of the dead, he was dark and sinister, a god to be feared and kept at a distance. ‘of the earth’) Zeus’, ‘the chthonian god’, ‘king of those below’, ‘Zeus of the departed’ and ‘the other Zeus’, ‘the god below’, or simply ‘lord’. He was referred to by descriptive circumlocutions as ‘chthonian (lit. Like the Erinyes/Eumenides (‘Angry/Kindly Ones’) and Demeter (‘Earth‐mother’), Hades lacked a proper name. Once inside, they are shrouded in ‘the darkness of pernicious Hades’. Without burial, the dead cannot pass through Hades' gates. The ‘gates of Hades’ are guarded by ‘the terrible hound’, Cerberus, who wags his tail for the new arrivals, but devours those attempting to leave. Aeacus, son of Zeus, ‘keeps the keys to Hades’ the same is said of Pluton. The proverbial ‘road to Hades’ is ‘the same for all’. Cold, mouldering, and dingy, Hades is a ‘mirthless place’. ‘Hades’ refers normally to the god in non‐Attic literature, the word can also designate the Underworld. After Homer, Hades is not only the god of the dead, but also the god of death, even death personified. Son of Cronus and Rhea and husband of Persephone, is ‘Lord of the dead’ and king of the Underworld, the ‘house of Hades’, where he rules supreme.

Hades god of the underworld