Aphrodite - Apollo - Ares - Artemis -Athena - Demeter - Dionysus -Hephaestus - Hera - Hermes - Poseidon -Zeus - Othershome  easy read DIONYSUS (dye-oh-NYE-sus; Roman name Bacchus) was the god of wine. Dionysus was the son of Zeus and the mortal heroine Semele.Dionysus rescued Ariadne after she had been abandoned by Theseus. Dionysus also saved his mother from the Underworld, after Zeus showed her his true nature as storm god and consumed her in lightning. It was Dionysus who granted Midas the power to turn whatever he touched into gold, then was kind enough to take the power back when it proved inconvenient. Aphrodite - Apollo - Ares - Artemis -Athena - Demeter - Dionysus -Hephaestus - Hera - Hermes -Poseidon - Zeus - Others home  easy read  HEPHAESTUS (he-FEE-stus or he-FESS-tus; Roman name Vulcan) was the lame god of fire and crafts or the two together, hence of blacksmiths. Hephaestus was the son of Zeus and Hera or, in some accounts, of Hera alone. He limped because he was born lame, which caused his mother to throw him off Mount Olympus. Or in other accounts he interceded in a fight between Zeus and Hera, and Zeus took him by the foot and threw him from Olympus to the earth far below.Hephaestus accomplished numerous prodigies of craftsmanship, such as the marvelous palaces that he built for the gods atop Mount Olympus, or the armor that he made for Achilles during the siege of Troy (the description of which occupies a great many lines of Homer's epic of the Trojan War). Hephaestus also created the first woman, Pandora, at the command of Zeus, in retaliation for the various tricks by which the Titan Prometheus had benefited mortal men at the expense of the gods. Pandora was given to the Titan's brother, Epimetheus, as his wife. For her dowry she brought a jar filled with evils from which she removed the lid, thereby afflicting men for the first time with hard work and sickness. Only hope remained inside the jar. Aphrodite - Apollo - Ares - Artemis -Athena - Demeter - Dionysus -Hephaestus - Hera - Hermes - Poseidon -Zeus - Othershome  easy read DEMETER (dee-MEE-tur; Roman nameCeres) was the goddess of agriculture. Demeter as the sister of Zeus and the mother of Persephone.Persephone was gathering flowers in a meadow one day when a huge crack opened up in the earth and Hades, King of the Dead, emerged from the Underworld. He seized Persephone and carried her off in his chariot, back down to his his realm below, where she became his queen. Demeter was heartbroken. She wandered the length and breadth of the earth in search of her daughter, during which time the crops withered and it became perpetual winter. At length Hades was persuaded to surrender Persephone for one half of every year, the spring and summer seasons when flowers bloom and the earth bears fruit once more. The half year that Persephone spends in the Underworld as Hades' queen coincides with the barren season. When depicted in art, Demeter is often shown carrying a sheaf of grain.