G: Gadeiros to Gwyddno 121
Arethusa, who bore another set of daughters, the Hyades; Erythea, mistress of
Earth-powers; Hespera, personification of the planet Venus, whose cycles deter-
mined their ceremonial schedules; and Hestia, virginal keeper of the perpetual
flame at the heart of the universe. Their chief duty was to tend and protect the
Tree of Life at the center of Atlas’ garden, which he left in their care. The Tree
produced unique golden apples which none but the most holy and purified beings
could touch, because they granted immortality to anyone who ate them. To assist
the Hesperides in its protection, a serpent called Ladon entwined about the bough.
Despite these precautions, Heracles managed to steal a golden apple, as one
of the duties he was forced to perform during his 12 labors. It would end up in the
possession of Eris, the goddess of dissension, who had been snubbed by her fellow
deities at the big wedding celebration of Helen and Paris. Aware of Olympian
jealousies, she inscribed only three words on the apple—“For the fairest”—and
surreptitiously rolled it among the immortal guests. From the petty bickering it
generated, the Trojan War, with all its attendant horrors and tragedy, developed.
This myth was cited to demonstrate the calamitous consequences of abusing
spiritual power.
The Hesperides were originally known as Hesperu Caras (Leonard, 178). To
the Guarani Indians, the Caras were light-skinned goddesses who arrived on the
eastern shores of South America after escaping a terrible cataclysm. The same
name and account are known to the Brazilian Goiaz. All white people are still
referred to as Cara-ibas by the Chevantes of Matto Grosso, in Brazil. The mid-
16th-century historian, Gonzalo de Orviedo, learned from the natives of the
West Indies that their islands were synonymous with the Hesperides. From this
and abundant, similar oral evidence he collected throughout Middle America,
de Orviedo was the first researcher to conclude that the indigenous inhabitants
were descended from survivors of the Atlantis catastrophe. Their remote and
isolated native traditions clearly preserved a folk memory of Atlantean visitors.
The Hesperides were Atlantean priestesses of the primeval and most holy
mysteries of Atlantis. Their mystery cult promised immortality for successful ini-
tiates, as signified by the Tree of Life with its snake, a symbol of regeneration
because of the animal’s ability to slough off its old, dead skin and emerge with a
new one. Comparisons with the Garden of Eden in Genesis are unavoidable, and
doubtless represent an Old Testament corruption of the Atlantean original.
The Hesperides are sometimes given as seven in number. As such, they may
correspond to the seven major chakras, or metaphysical energy centers that,
collectively, comprise the human personality. So too, the Tree of Life symbolizes
the spinal column, along which the chakras are arranged. This interpretation
suggests that kundalini yoga originated in Atlantis, from which it spread around
the world. Indeed, the Tree of Life is a theme frequently encountered in many
European and Asian traditions of Atlantis and Lemuria, respectively.
“Ides” of Hesperides means “in the midst of,” or “the all-powerful mid-point,”
implying the ceremonial revolution of the planet Venus, the Greek Hespera,
around the ritual core of the cult. But Hestia may have been the most centrally