Hestia was the Greek virgin goddess of the hearth, home, and hospitality. In Greek mythology, she is the eldest daughter of Cronus and Rhea. In her role as a protector of the family and political community, sacrifices and offerings were regularly made to Hestia at the hearth within each private home and at the town or city's public hearth. To the Romans, the goddess was known as Vesta. In the Greek myths, Hestia's parents were Cronus and Rhea and so her younger siblings were Zeus, Hera, Demeter, Poseidon, and Hades. Cronus, paranoid that one of his own children would overthrow his rule, swallowed them all. Zeus, however, was saved by his mother when she gave her husband a rock wrapped in cloth instead of the infant who later returned and made his father cough up his siblings. Hestia never married and remained a virgin, despite the amorous attentions of Apollo, Poseidon, and Priapus, the fertility god. Continue reading from World History
Vesta, in Roman religion, goddess of the hearth, identified with the Greek Hestia. The lack of an easy source of fire in the early Roman community placed a special premium on the ever-burning hearth fire, both publicly and privately maintained; thus, from the earliest times Vesta was assured of a prominent place in both family and state worship. Her worship was observed in every household along with that of the Penates and the Lares, and her image was sometimes encountered in the household shrine. Continue reading from Brittanica
