HARMONIA, wife of Cadmus. The Theban legends (see Cadmus) have been so modified and systematized by poets and logographers that we must look to Samothrace with its old religious rites for an explanation of the myth. There Harmonia is said to have been the daughter of Zeus and Electra, while her brother Iasion was the founder of the mystic rites which were celebrated annually on the island. When Cadmus came to Samothrace, and was initiated, he received Harmonia as his wife. The gods honoured the wedding with their presence, Athene presented the bride with a peplus and necklace, Electra gave the mystic rites of the mother of the gods. According to the scholiast on Euripides (Phosιι., i.) Cadmus with the aid of Athene carried off Harmonia; and in the mysteries the lost Harmonia is regularly sought for. We have here an exact parallel to the Eleusinian legends. Electra and Harmonia are mere varieties of Demeter and Core. Cadmus like Pluto carries off the bright daughter of the goddess to the world below to spend there the dreary winter. Hence in the Theban tale Cadmus and Harmonia leave Thebes to go away among the Encheleis, the snake people, are themselves changed into serpents, and are finally translated to the Elysian fields. We then understand, too, why (according to Pausanias, ix. 16, 5) Cadmus dwelt at Thebes in the temple of Demeter Thesmophoros. The necklace, wrought by Hephaestus, which Harmonia received as a marriage gift, may be compared with the cestus of Aphrodite; for it is impossible to draw a fast line between Harmonia or Core and Aphrodite. Then it is seen to be the mythic representative of some phenomenon like the halo of dawn or the rainbow. Like the works of the German dwarfs, this necklace carried with it ill-luck, and the legends give it a history of ...