Greek Mythology/Gods/Hades

Hades ("unseen"), the god of the underworld, was the oldest son of the Titans Cronos and Rhea. He had three older sisters, Hestia, Demeter, and Hera, as well as two younger brothers, Poseidon and Zeus. After the Olympian gods, led by Zeus, overthrew the Titans, the three brothers drew lots to determine where each would rule. Zeus got the sky, Poseidon got the seas, and Hades received the underworld, the unseen realm to which the dead go upon leaving the world.

Hades ruled the House of the Dead, also called Hades. Besides Heracles, the only other living persons who ventured to the Underworld were all heroes: Odysseus, Aeneas (accompanied by the Sibyl), Orpheus, and Theseus.

He is married to Persephone, daughter of Demeter, who spends half of each year in the underworld and half in the upper world. Some depictions of Hades say that he tricked her, by offering her pomegranate seeds from one of the trees of his realm. By doing this she would be trapped to Hades forever as no man may have food from the underworld and then leave. Though a detail he may have forgotten was how the other gods would react. It is said that many other gods were angered by this and so it was agreed upon that Persephone would stay in the underworld for half the year while being let out for the rest of the year. While she is in the underworld her mother (Demeter) mourns her giving earth winter.

Misconceptions

Contemporary depictions of Hades sometimes depict him as an evil god. His actual depiction in Greek myth is much more nuanced.