Hestiais?unmask

Hestia's name means "hearth, fireplace, altar" and she is the virgin Goddess of the hearth and home. In classical Greek art, she is depicted as a woman simply and modestly cloaked in a head veil. Hestia is famously dutiful, self effacing and non-confrontational: she gave up her seat on the 12 Olympians to Dionysus. And yet, Hestia is considered by some to be the oldest of the Olympians, and the first recipient of any sacrifice.

After successfully uncovering Zeus, the master of disguise, Hestia serves as a palate cleanser. We're looking for a princess who works hard around the home — cleaning, cooking, sweeping. A nonconfrontational princess who serves others and gets her ass kicked rather than kicks ass. If we were greedy, we'd also want her name to be associated with the fireplace. And just as Hestia gave up the twelfth seat on Olympus to Dionysus, the party god, is there a Disney princess famous for running away from a party at midnight?

Hestia isn't good at disguises — she's Cinderella.

Yet Hestia is a virgin goddess, doesn't that conflict with Cinderella's happily ever after? No, because Hestia is a virgin by circumstance. Poseidon and Apollo both wanted her; she swore an oath on Zeus's head to remain unmarried to avoid the quarrel.

In the film, Cinderella only gets married after the first slipper breaks and she says: "That's okay, I have another one." Cinderella's story shows what might happen for Hestia should one of her two suitors ever slip out of the race.

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Extra-diegetic. Hestia is the Goddess of the home and customarily receives both the first and the last portions of every sacrifice, meal, and libation. Cinderella Castle is the centrepiece of Walt Disney World and appears in the Walt Disney Pictures production logo. Every Disney film released for decades opens with the home of Hestia.¹

Footnotes

1. See Walt Disney Pictures. ↩