Chaos-dragon) followed the motif of the ritual fight between heroes and monsters being a test of valour, and its goal was to force the Chaos-dragon to free the waters it had stopped, to return the cattle stolen by it (representations of two dragons on each side of a bull's head on a Thracian helmet from Băiceni show that the Hero's Chaos-dragon enemy was a stealer of bulls), and to free women abducted by it, that is to ensure nature's fertility, and the continuation of humanity. This journey also represented the transition of the Thracian young warrior from adolescence to manhood, and the transition of the Thracian prince into kingship. A series of metal appliqués from the Letnitsa Treasure fully depict the struggle of against the Chaos-dragon: on one piece is a depiction of the three-headed Chaos-dragon on another piece, a sea-nymph riding a hippocampus represents the freeing of the waters from the Chaos-dragon another piece is decorated with the image of a maiden holding in her hand a mirror, which was a symbol of marriage on another piece is a representation of the Hero receiving a bow, which was a royal insignia the last piece depicted the Hero entering in hierogamy with the Great Goddess herself while the Snake-Goddess blesses the union The royal investiture scenes depicting the goddess, such as the goddess about to give a rhyton to a horseman riding towards her on the plate of the Brezovo gold ring, and the goddess walking leftwards and is followed by a horseman holding a rhyton she has just given him on the Rosovets ring, represent the Hero 's union with the Mother Goddess, an act which ensured the plentifulness of the country, but was also indispensable for him to obtain royal power. The hierogamy scene of the Letnitsa Treasure thus represented the Hero (with whom the king was identified and an earthly substitute for) explicitly entering in a hierogamy with the Great Goddess. This has its origin in the role of as the goddess of the hearth, who therefore presided over the centre of things, the home, the proper, the familiar, and wealth. In this role, possessed the attributes common to the hearth goddess throughout various Indo-European religions: she was bound to the circle of the hearth and never left the home, thus always being a maid but never a wife, and was associated to the snake, and, since