What does Charon use the money for?

obol
Greek and Latin literary sources specify the coin as an obol, and explain it as a payment or bribe for Charon, the ferryman who conveyed souls across the river that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead.

What did Charon demand?

“You [Psykhe (Psyche) on her journey to the underworld] will reach the lifeless river [Akheron (Acheron)] over which Charon presides. He peremptorily demands the fare, and when he receives it he transports travellers on his stitched-up craft over to the further shore.

What is Charon’s price?

In mythology, the ferryman Charon was paid one obol, representing in weight one half of a scruple of silver (itself 20 grains) or one-sixth of a drachma. It cannot have been a large amount, as the coin was placed under the tongue of the deceased by his family, so he could pay his fare across the River Styx.

What did Greek gods use as money?

drachma, silver coin of ancient Greece, dating from about the mid-6th century bc, and the former monetary unit of modern Greece. The drachma was one of the world’s earliest coins.

How much money does Charon need?

A coin to pay Charon for passage, usually an obolus or danake, was sometimes placed in or on the mouth of a dead person. Some authors say that those who could not pay the fee, or those whose bodies were left unburied, had to wander the shores for one hundred years, until they were allowed to cross the river.

What is an OBOL worth?

An obol is an ancient Greek coin that has one-sixth the value of a drachma. The first silver obols were minted in Aegina, most likely sometime after 600 BCE. Previously, the unit of currency was iron cooking-spits. One obol became the equivalent of one spit.

How did Charon become the ferryman?

The Greeks believed that all human souls, or at least the Greek ones, went to the same place in the underworld, Hades. Charon was the minor god who was assigned the dismal task of being the cosmic ferryman, whose boat carried the souls of the newly dead across the river of death.

When did Greeks start using money?

It is widely acknowledged that the Ancient Greeks, Ancient Chinese, and Ancient Lydians all began using coins around the same time, beginning in the 8th Century BC. Examples of money were found across all three civilizations, which is a strong indicated that they all started to use them around the same time.

Was money used in ancient Greece?

Athens used a currency known as the drachma. Their currency was widely used because of the large trade network that they developed. Often an Athenian coin could be used in other Greek cities and not have to be exchanged for the local currency.

What does Charon mean in Greek mythology?

In Greek mythology and Roman mythology, Charon or Kharon ( / ˈkɛərɒn, – ən /; Greek Χάρων) is a psychopomp, the ferryman of Hades who carries souls of the newly deceased across the river Styx that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead.

How did Charon take the dead to the underworld?

Those who passed away would have to cross the rivers Styx and Acheron to reach the underworld, and Charon would take them on this journey. His fee for carrying the dead across the rivers to the underworld was a single coin, usually an obolus or danake. This coin was placed in the mouth of the deceased prior to burial.

What happened to those who could not pay Charon’s fee?

Those who could not pay Charon’s fee or were buried without a coin were said to have wandered the banks of Acheron for a hundred years, haunting it as ghosts. • Hermes would escort newly deceased souls to the River Acheron where Charon would wait for them on the banks.

What happens to souls that are taken by Charon?

Once their fare had been paid, Charon would carry the soul across the river and into Hades’ realm. There they would face judgement for how they would spend the afterlife, either in in Elysium and the Elysian Fields or in the depths of Tartarus.