The Three Fates: Atropos
The crone, in her mythological sense, is most often thought of as a hag or a witch from fairy tales, and folklore warning to children not to stray into the woods or near the river. However, the crone’s second most popular association is with Atropos, whether or not people actually remember that is her name. She is the oldest of three goddesses known as the Fates; the maiden, the mother, and the crone. Usually the people who forget her actual Greek name are posers to Wicca, or Pagan worship. Like the Morrighan –sometimes, because the Morrighan was often a singularity instead, –Atropos was merely one of three faces of a triple goddess. Much of mythology associates the triple goddess representing the fate of all humanity, with the moon, and its various cycles. From new, to half, to full, turns the moon in its cycles, as does the three Fates. The Roman equivalent of Atropos is Morta, although neither system of belief has a specific origin for the Fates. Like pan, the Fates may have been even older than the Greek gods and goddesses.
The first of the three fates was in Greek, Clotho, or what is more popularly known as the virgin, or the “Maiden.” She was also the youngest, and it was her job to spin the threads of life for each individual. Clotho was the middle goddess, known as the “Mother” more popularly; she is often depicted as a pregnant woman. Clotho’s function was to measure the length of each of the threads of life. Atropos, the oldest of the three is depicted just as she is popularly known, as the “Crone.” She was often called the “inevitable” or the “inflexible.” Her name actually meant in Greek, “without turn.” Her function was to decide how the individual would die, and then cut the thread of life. The word for all three goddesses, or the triple goddess, was Moerae. They were also said to be children of Zeus, and the goddess of night, Nyx; though Zeus was their father, even he must adhere to their will. An example of a similar triple deity are the Furies; which are sometimes mistakenly merged with the fates because of their similarities. The Furies were the goddesses of vengeance, also children of Nyx, and supposedly, it’s extremely bad luck to even say their actual name(s) out loud, for fear that they might start following you.