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| Aphrodite - Goddess of Love by Sharon George from http://www.epilogue.net/cgi/database/art/view.pl?id=58808 |
Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, lust, beauty, and sexual reproduction. She was also called Kypris and Kytherea after the two places, Cyprus and Cythera, which claimed Her birth. The island of Cythera was a center of Her worship. She was associated with Hesperia, a daughter of Nyx (Night) and Erebus (darkness) who is one of a triad of Goddesses who guard the sacred garden of Hera, and frequently accompanied by the Oreads, nymphs of the mountains. Aphrodite was often shown with the sea, dolphins, doves, swans, pomegranates, apples, myrtle, rose and lime trees, clams, scallop shells and pearls. According to Pausanias, the first people to establish Her worship were the Assyrians, after the Assyrians the Paphians of Cyprus and the Phoenicians who live at Ascalon in Palestine; the Phoenicians taught Her worship to the people of Cythera. Some examples of Her names/titles are:
Acidalia, of the Acidalia spring
Anadyomene, the emerging as in Aphrodite Anadyomene, a painting by Apelles
Kytherea, of Cythera
Despoina, the mistress
Kypris, of Cyprus
Hetaira, the courtesan
Aphrodite Porne, the prostitute, Goddess of lust
Kalligloutos, of the beautiful thighs
Morpho, the shapely, she of the various shapes
Ambologera, she who postpones old age
Aphrodite en kepois, of the gardens
Genetyllis, of motherhood
Epitragidia, she upon the buck (young male goat)
Enoplios, the armed one
Melaina, the black one (similar to Epitymbidia and Melainis)
Melainis, the young black one (similar to Epitymbidia and Melaina)
Skotia, the dark
Anosia, the unholy
Androphonos, the killer of men
Tymborychos, the gravedigger
Epitymbidia, she upon the graves (similar to Melaina and Melainis)
Basilis, the queen
Persephaessa, the queen of the underworld
Praxis, of (sexual) action
Kallipygos, of the beautiful buttocks
Pandemos, common to all, a form worshipped near the agora in Athens
Ourania, the heavenly one
"Foam-arisen" Aphrodite was born of the sea foam near Paphos, Cyprus after Kronos cut off Ouranos' genitals and threw them behind him into the sea, while the Erinyes (Furies) emerged from the drops of blood. Hesiod's Theogony described that the genitals "were carried over the sea a long time, and white foam arose from the immortal flesh; with it a girl grew" to become Aphrodite. Thus it is said that Aphrodite is of an older generation than Zeus. According to Hesiod and the Homeric hymn of Aphrodite, the Goddess after rising from the foam first approached the island of Cythera, and thence went to Cyprus, and as She was walking on the sea-coast flowers sprang up under Her feet. Then Eros and Himeros accompanied Her to where all the other mighty deities were assembled, all of whom were struck with admiration and love when She appeared. Such was Her surpassing beauty that all the gods wished to have Her for their wife.
According to various Greek texts dealing with the origin and nature of their deities, Aphrodite is the personification of the creative powers of nature, and the mother of all living beings. A trace of this notion seems to be contained in the tradition that in the contest of Typhon with the gods, Aphrodite metamorphosed Herself into a fish, which animal was considered to possess the greatest generative powers. (Ovid. Metamorphoses. v. 318) However, according to the popular belief of the classical Greeks and their poets' depictions, She was the mainly the Goddess of love, who excited this passion in the hearts of gods and men, and by this power ruled over all creation.
Iliad (Book V) describes another version of Her origin, one in which She was considered a daughter of Dione, who was the original oracular Goddess at Dodona. In the Iliad, Aphrodite, ventures into battle to protect her son, Aeneas, and is wounded by Diomedes. Distraught at this insult to Her divine person, She returns to Her mother, to sink down at her knee and be comforted. "Dione" seems to be an equivalent of Rhea, the Earth Mother, whom Homer has relocated to Olympus, and refers back to an original Proto-Indo-European pantheon, which has been hypothesized in some anthropological texts, with the chief male god (Dios) represented by the sky and thunder, and the chief female god (feminine form of Dios, which is Dione) represented as the earth or fertile soil. Aphrodite herself was sometimes referred to as "Dione". Once the worship of Zeus had usurped the oak-grove oracle at Dodona, there were poets who claimed him to be the father of Aphrodite.
These differing version of Her origins lead, in Classical times, to the conception of Aphrodite as two seperate Goddesses, Aprhodite Ourania ("heavenly"), and Aphrodite Pandemos ("common"). According to Plato, Aphrodite is two Goddesses, one older the other younger. The older, Ourania, is the one born from the castration of Ouranos; the younger is named Pandemos, and is the daughter of Zeus and Dione. Also according to Plato these two manifestations represented Her role in homosexuality and heterosexuality, respectively. Among the neo-Platonists, Aphrodite Ourania represents the love of body and soul, while Aphrodite Pandemos reprsents "mere" physical love.
Aphrodite had numerous festivals and holy days in the Greco-Roman calendar. Included here are several of them:
First day of the New Moon in April-May
The Roman Veneralia 'feast of love.' Its central symbol was the fertile rabbit, and it celebrated the
return of spring and the potential rebirth of deceased relatives through the women who conceived during the festival's
day and night.
Waxing or Full Moon in April-May
Apaturia, commonly translated "feast of common relationship" although when the word is translated as a title of
Aphrodite it means "keeper of secrets". During the three days of the event black goats were sacrificed to Aphrodite,
indicating that She was considered a deity of fertility and associated with the life-giving (and life-receiving)
powers of the Earth at that time.
I)Day One: Dorpia "supper eve"
The family clans meet in their various homes to feast, greet, and prepare for the rest of the festival.
II)Day Two: Ararhyssis "sacrificing"
Children had a lock of hair dedicated to Aphrodite. Mothers went to a crossroads at the Moon's height to
sacrifice
black goats to Kourotrophos "nurse of youth". Officially this was a rite of Aphrodite, but it may
also be a rite
of Hekate.
III)Day Three: Koureotis "youths"
Children born in the last year were presented by their fathers to be declared legitimate and placed in the registry
of citizens, and the celebrations revolved around giving and receiving flowers.
Spring Equinox
Celebration in honor of Aphrodite as a Great Mother Goddess.
First Sight of the Waxing Moon in June-July
The Aphrodisia, a bathing festival for the statues of Aphrodite and celebration of Aphrodite as Goddess of love,
war, and statescraft. In the course of the festival Her temple was purified, sometimes by anointing the altar and doorways,
with dove's blood. Besides the obligatory feast, there were athletic contests.
End of the Moon in June-July
Adonia, the Greek feast of love, in honor of Aphrodite and Adonis. It was two days long and was celebrated
solely by women. The first day included the bringing out of statues of Adonis laid out like corpses for which all
the customs of funerals at the time were observed. This included the beating of their breasts and crying loudly
in sorrow, to commemorate the cries of Aphrodite at the death of Her chosen love. The second day was a day of
feasts and other celebrations of the return of Adonis to life.
The fourth day of every month was dedicated to Aphrodite.
"To Aphrodite. Ourania (Heavenly), illustrious, laughter-loving (philommeideia) queen,
sea-born (pontogenes), night-loving (philopannyx), of awful mien;
crafty, from whom Ananke (Necessity) first came, producing, nightly, all-connecting dame.
‘Tis thine the world with harmony to join, for all things spring from thee, O power divine.
The triple Moirai (Fates) are ruled by thy decree, and all productions yield alike to thee:
whatever the heavens, encircling all, contain, earth fruit-producing, and the stormy main,
thy sway confesses, and obeys thy nod, awful attendant of Bakkhos [Dionysos] God.
Goddess of marriage, charming to the sight, mother of the Erotes (Loves), whom banquetings delight;
source of Peitho (Persuasion), secret, favouring queen, illustrious born, apparent and unseen;
spousal Lukaina, and to men inclined, prolific, most-desired, life-giving, kind.
Great sceptre-bearer of the Gods, ‘tis thine mortals in necessary bands to join;
and every tribe of savage monsters dire in magic chains to bind through mad desire.
Come, Kyprogenes (Cyprus-Born), and to my prayer incline,
whether exalted in the heavens you shine,
or pleased in odorous Syria to preside,
or over the Aigyptian plains they care to guide,
fashioned of gold; and near its sacred flood, fertile and famed, to fix they blest abode;
or if rejoicing in the azure shores, near where the sea with foaming billows roars,
the circling choirs of mortals thy delight, or beauteous Nymphai with eyes cerulean bright,
pleased by the sandy banks renowned of old, to drive thy rapid two-yoked car of gold;
or if in Kypros thy famed mother fair, where Nymphai unmarried praise thee every year,
the loveliest Nymphai, who in the chorus join, Adonis pure to sing, and thee divine.
Come, all-attractive, to my prayer inclined, for thee I call, with holy, reverent mind."
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