The hearth was the main shrine of the house and the centre of Greek life, having much the same connotation that 'home' does in English, and thus being the focal point of a family house (as the English hearth and fire used to be before it was superseded by the quasi-Greek and Roman goddess Televisia). The actual Greek word hestia may be based on the sta- root that is present in many words denoting a fixed object: the Greek hearth was, after all, fixed as a stationary object in the centre of the room where the family gathered.
Hestia's name, in meaning 'hearth', by implication suggests the low fire burning there, and this is the link with the Hesperides Hestia, whose name conjures up the red glow of the setting sun. The priestesses of Hestia were called the Vestal Virgins. For more about them, see Vesta.
