Harmonia
godHarmonia was the goddess of harmony and concord, daughter of Ares and Aphrodite, whose wedding necklace — forged by Hephaestus — brought disaster on every woman who wore it.
The Myth
Harmonia married Cadmus at a wedding attended by all the gods. Hephaestus gave her a beautiful necklace, but he had forged a curse into it — revenge for Aphrodite's affair with Ares. The necklace brought misfortune to every subsequent owner: Semele (burned by Zeus's lightning), Jocasta (married her own son), Eriphyle (betrayed her husband for it), and others across generations. Harmonia and Cadmus eventually escaped by being transformed into serpents and sent to Elysium.
Symbols
Fun Fact
The word "harmony" comes from this goddess — the concept of balanced, pleasing arrangement in music and life.
Words We Inherited
English words and phrases that trace back to this myth:
Explore Further
Aphrodite
godGoddess of love and beauty, born from the sea foam. Aphrodite's power to inspire desire was so...
Ares
godGod of the brutal, savage side of war. Unlike Athena's strategic warfare, Ares represented the raw...
Cadmus
heroCadmus was the Phoenician prince who founded Thebes, sowed dragon's teeth, and brought the alphabet...
Elysium
placeThe paradise at the edge of the world where heroes and the virtuous spent eternity in perfect...
Hephaestus
godThe divine blacksmith of Olympus, god of fire and the forge. Despite being lame, Hephaestus created...
Semele
heroSemele was a Theban princess who became the mortal mother of Dionysus — destroyed when she insisted...