HALLOWEEN 4: The Journey to the Underworld. In myth Kore the maid (aka the Virgin; Persephone; Inanna;) journeys to the Netherworld. Symbolically it is an allegorical representation of the sowing of the cereals; corn and barley. In Greek myth Kore is made to travel and return to the underworld. However in the earlier myth from which this originates, Sumerian Kore is made to stay in the underworld as surety so her brother Dumuzi is released to fertilise the Earth. Dumuzi (later Thracian Dionysos; Egytian Osiris;) represents the virility of Nature, and particularly the verdant corn plant. Particulars of the journey are the time - when the pomegranate fruit ripens and bursts -, and the mode - via the furrow behind the plough -. The pomegranate is a time-marker, very commonly and symbolically, held prominently in an outstretched hand. The plough is a central figure in the myth and is often shown in the hand of Triptolemos the 'thrice-plougher'. The...