Limos
The daimon of famine and the gnawing hunger that devastated communities in the ancient world
The Myth of Limos
Limos personified the terrible spectre of famine that haunted the ancient Mediterranean. In Hesiod's Theogony, she is a child of Eris (Strife), placing hunger alongside war and lawlessness as a consequence of discord. Famine was a constant threat in the Greek world, where thin soils, unpredictable rainfall, and limited arable land made food security precarious. A single failed harvest could bring an entire polis to its knees. The myth of Erysichthon provides the most vivid depiction of Limos in action: after Erysichthon cut down Demeter's sacred grove, the goddess sent Limos to inhabit his body. No amount of food could satisfy him; the more he ate, the hungrier he grew, until he consumed his entire fortune and finally devoured himself. Ovid's description of Limos in the Metamorphoses is harrowing: she dwells in a frozen wasteland, gaunt and hollow-eyed, with translucent skin stretched over visible bones. The myth of Limos served as a warning about the consequences of offending the gods who controlled the harvest and about the fragility of the food supply.
Parents
Eris (Strife)
Symbols
Fun Fact
Erysichthon was cursed with such insatiable hunger by Limos that he eventually consumed his own flesh, one of the most disturbing punishments in Greek myth
Words We Inherited
English words and phrases that trace back to this myth. See our full guide to English words from Greek mythology.
Explore Further
Demeter
⚡ godGoddess of the harvest and sacred law
The goddess of grain and agriculture whose grief at losing her daughter created winter and whose mysteries at Eleusis promised life after death.
Demeter
⚡ godGoddess of harvest and the Eleusinian Mysteries
Demeter was the goddess of grain, harvest, and fertility whose grief over Persephone's abduction explained the seasons and whose Mysteries promised hope beyond death.
Demeter
⚡ godGoddess of the harvest, agriculture, fertility, sacred law
Goddess of grain, harvest, and the fertility of the earth. When her daughter Persephone was abducted, Demeter's grief brought winter to the world.
Ceres
⚡ godAgriculture, grain, harvest, fertility
Roman goddess of agriculture and grain, identified with the Greek Demeter
Abduction of Persephone
💭 conceptNarrative
The seizing of Persephone by Hades and its consequences, which explain the origin of the seasons
Hades
⚡ godKing of the dead
The ruler of the Underworld who received the dead, guarded by Cerberus and feared so deeply that Greeks avoided speaking his name.
Erysichthon
🗡 heropunishment
A Thessalian king cursed by Demeter with insatiable hunger after destroying her sacred grove — he devoured everything he owned, then consumed himself.
Ponos
⚡ godToil, hard labour, suffering
The daimon of hard labour and the wearying toil that consumes mortal existence
Penia
⚡ godPoverty, need, want
The daimon of poverty and deprivation who drove mortals to industry through necessity
Ops
⚡ godAbundance, harvest, earth
Roman goddess of abundance and the harvest, wife of Saturn, equivalent to the Greek Rhea
Apollo
⚡ godGod of light, music, prophecy, and plague
Apollo was the most complex Olympian — god of light, music, poetry, prophecy, healing, plague, and rational thought, the divine embodiment of Greek civilisation.
Ares
⚡ godGod of brutal, bloodthirsty warfare
The god of the savage violence of battle — feared, hated, and necessary, embodying the bloodlust that the Greeks recognised but did not admire.