number
Three
The number after two. Fates, worlds, and ritual fires have been grouped in threes; each grouping has its own house.
Also known as triad
Hellenic religion
Three appears in Fate.
Pausanias records cults of the Fates in Greek cities. The triplicity is a traveler’s report of cult, not Hesiod’s genealogy of the Moirai.
from Pausanias · Description of Greece, c. 150–180 CE
appears in · sourced · culturally specific
Three is associated with Fate.
Hesiod names the Moirai as daughters who allot. Three here is a Theogony count, not a Vedic triad of fires.
from Hesiod · Theogony, c. 700 BCE
associated with · sourced · culturally specific
Vedic tradition
Three is associated with Fire.
Vedic ritual knows a set of sacrificial fires. Three here is a ritual architecture, not the Moirai.
from Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton (translation) · The Rigveda, 2014 (this translation); hymns much older
associated with · partially sourced · culturally specific
Vedic tradition contains Three.
Vedic poetry works with grouped threes (fires, worlds, strides). The count is a poetic-ritual habit, not a Greek fate-triad.
from Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton (translation) · The Rigveda, 2014 (this translation); hymns much older
contains · partially sourced · culturally specific
Hermeticism
Three appears in Hermeticism.
Hermes Trismegistus is “thrice-great” in later naming. The three is a title’s boast, not a cosmological law of triads.
from Brian P. Copenhaver (translation) · Corpus Hermeticum, c. 2nd–3rd century CE (Greek treatises)
appears in · partially sourced · culturally specific
Norse tradition
Three appears in Fate.
Snorri’s Gylfaginning names three Norns at Urðarbrunnr who allot fate. The triplicity is Norse mythic allotment, not Pausanias’s Greek cult report and not Yggdrasil’s three roots.
from Snorri Sturluson · Gylfaginning, c. 1220
appears in · sourced · documented
Tree is associated with Three.
Snorri gives Yggdrasil three roots reaching toward different worlds. The three is a structural count in that prose, not the Greek Moirai.
from Snorri Sturluson · Gylfaginning, c. 1220
associated with · sourced · documented
sources
- Description of Greece · Pausanias
Pausanias, Description of Greece.
- The Rigveda · Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton (translation)
Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton, The Rigveda: The Earliest Religious Poetry of India.
- Corpus Hermeticum · Brian P. Copenhaver (translation)
Brian P. Copenhaver, Hermetica (Corpus Hermeticum).
- Theogony · Hesiod
Hesiod, Theogony.
- Gylfaginning · Snorri Sturluson
Snorri Sturluson, Gylfaginning, in the Prose Edda.