Known period of worship circa 400 BC to 400 AD

She is both a moon and grain goddess.

Ceres is arguably the most recent model of the “great mother” whose predecessors include Inana, Istar, Artemis, Kybele and Demeter, on whom she is directly modeled. She is the daughter of Kronos and Rhea and one of the most important consorts of Jupiter. Her daughter in the uper world, Kore, is the goddess of the underworld Proserpina who was abducted by Pluto. She became foster mother to Tripotoemus, an illfated king in the mold of the Mesopotamian Dumuzi, depicted in the classical Greek Eleusinian Mysteries.

Ceres is the Roman equivalent of the Greek goddess, Demeter, and her daughter is Proserpina, a parallel to Demeter’s daughter Persephone. In both traditions, the daughters were abducted and taken to the Underworld. The mothers, distraught by the loss, struck a very special bargain with the lord of the Underworld. According to the bargain made the mothers were allowed their daughters for 9 months of the year and for the remaining 3 months they would have to return to the lord of the Underworld.

Ceres was worshipped at the festivals of Thesmophoia and Cerealia in sanctuaries throughout the Greco-Roman empires.