Plato Scroll › Encyclopedia › Nemesis

Deity

Nemesis

Νέμεσις

personificationOrphic

Goddess of retribution and due measure, who humbles the proud.

Nemesis is the goddess of retribution and due measure — the divine power that resents and punishes excess, above all the overweening pride (hubris) of mortals who rise too high or forget their limits. Her name means 'distribution': she gives to each what is deserved, casting down the arrogant and humbling undeserved good fortune.

As the guardian of cosmic balance against excess, she is close kin to Justice and Themis, and the necessary corrective within the order of fate — the goddess who makes 'nothing too much' not merely a counsel of wisdom but a law of the world.

Epithets

  • Adrasteia Ἀδράστεια — the inescapable
  • Rhamnousia Ῥαμνουσία — of Rhamnous, site of her great temple

See also

Open this entry in the reader · every entry