Botticelli’s iconic painting, The Birth of Venus (1486), shows Aphrodite emerging from a seashell. |
Aphrodite
Roman name: Venus
Aphrodite is the goddess of love, beauty and sexual rapture.
Associated iconography: the dolphin, the dove, the swan, the pomegranate and the lime tree.
Alternative names: the Lady of Kypros (Cyprus), the Lady of Cythera.
Aphrodite’s Birth
The prevailing myth of Aphrodite’s birth claims that she was created when Cronus castrated Uranus, the father of the gods, and threw his genitals into the sea, which foamed around them. From out of this sea foam, or aphros, Aphrodite arose and was swept towards land, alighting at either Cyprus or Cythera (hence her alternative names). According to this story she was the result of parthenogenesis, or virgin birth.
In an alternative myth, Homer states that Aphrodite is the daughter of Zeus (the supreme ruler of Mount Olympus and its gods) and the obscure goddess Dione.
Aphrodite’s Lovers
Zeus married Aphrodite to the reliable blacksmith god, Hephaestus (Vulcan) to prevent the gods from fighting over her hand in marriage. Aphrodite’s husband wrought a precious golden girdle for her to wear, whose magical powers made it impossible for anyone to resist her. She took advantage of this to enjoy love affairs with many gods and mortals.
Ovid describes how Aphrodite’s secret love affair with the god of war, Ares (Mars) was discovered when the jealous Hephaestus covered her bed in invisibly fine nets of bronze to catch the lovers in the act.
Metamorphoses also describes how Aphrodite fell passionately in love with the beautiful mortal Adonis when she was accidentally grazed by one of Eros’ (Cupid’s) arrows. When Adonis was killed by a wild boar that he was hunting, the grief-stricken Aphrodite made a blood-red anemone grow where his blood had stained the ground.
The Iliad describes how Aphrodite’s love for Alexandros (Paris), Helen’s Trojan lover, prolonged and complicated the war.
Other information:
Amongst Aphrodite’s children are Eros (Cupid) the god of love and sexual desire, and Aeneas, the Trojan warrior and hero of Virgil’s epic, the Aeneid.
Aphrodite was attended by the three Charites or Graces: Aglaea (‘Splendour’), Thalia (‘Good Cheer’), and Euphrosyne (‘Mirth’).