Dike (mythology)

Dike
Goddess of justice and the spirit of moral order and fair judgement
Member of The Horae
An 1886 bas-relief figure of Dike Astraea in the Old Supreme Court Chamber at the Vermont State House
Abode	Mount Olympus
Symbol	Scales / Balance
Personal information
Parents	Zeus and Themis
Siblings	Horae, Eirene, Eunomia, Moirai and several paternal half-siblings
Equivalents
Roman equivalent	Justitia

In Greek mythology, Dike or Dice^[1] (/ˈdaɪkiː/ or /ˈdaɪsiː/;^[2] Greek: Δίκη, díkē, 'custom') is the goddess of justice and the spirit of moral order and fair judgement as a transcendent universal ideal or based on immemorial custom, in the sense of socially enforced norms and conventional rules. According to Hesiod (Theogony, l. 901), she was fathered by Zeus upon his second consort, Themis. She and her mother are both personifications of justice. She is depicted as a young, slender woman carrying a balance scale and wearing a laurel wreath. The constellation Libra (the Scales) was anciently thought to represent her distinctive symbol.

She is often associated with Astraea, the goddess of innocence and purity. Astraea is also one of her epithets, referring to her appearance in the nearby constellation Virgo which is said to represent Astraea. This reflects her symbolic association with Astraea, who, too, has a similar iconography.