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Ancient goddess spotlight: Aphrodite
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Birth of Venus by Eugène Emmanuel Amaury-Duval
~Goddess of Love and Beauty~
Aphrodite (pronounced a-fro-dye-tee) is a goddess with whom many are familiar -- the famous and often notorious goddess of love and beauty. Alas, she is more multidimensional than most would believe from Hollywood theatrics. Pre-dating the Greek pantheon, she is believed to have originated in the near east, perhaps as a mutated form of the Eastern Mediterreanean Ashtoreth or Ashtarte.
Alternatively and most prominently however, she is described according to Greek mythology as either born of Zeus (the Olympian king of the gods) or born of the sky and sea. Whereas ancient writer and thinker Homer links her with the line of Zeus as his daughter, Hesoid maintains an older version of the tale in which she emerges from the sea foam created when the god Kronos, the father of Zeus, castrates his own father Uranus and throws the detatched penis into the ocean. Similar to Indic goddess of love and beauty Lakshmi who is also born from the sea, Aphrodite is perceived as one of the most important Olympian deities -- older and wiser than Zeus himself.
Thus it is fitting that Aphrodite's birth at least pre-dates the other Olympians, a residual indicator of her former all-encompassing identity as a great goddess of life, fertility, love, sex, and war to name a few of her specialties.
Also called Cyprus and Venus (her Roman counterpart), she is also known to have ironically governed the minds of chaste Roman women. A goddess of chaste and unchaste love and passion, Venus / Aphrodite was often referred to as a queen in her own right, though she was never married to a king of sorts.
In fact, according to Greek mythology, when Aphrodite appears in Olympus, Zeus marries her off to the lame -- and therefore undesirable -- divine blacksmith Hephaestus, otherwise known as the god of smithcraft, who makes her lots of beautiful jewelry. Nevertheless, Aphrodite's greater passions are reserved for Ares, the god of War.
According to one particular myth, after Hephaestus appears to have left their shared dwelling one day, Ares arrives and the two lovers find themselves passionately entangled in Hephaestus' net, at which point the cuckolded god emerges from hiding and calls upon the other gods to witness the betrayal. To his chagrin, they do not condemn Aphrodite, offering that they would rather find themselves in Ares' position. Similarly, the blacksmith ultimately chooses to remain married to the love goddess notwithstanding, as he would rather keep her as his wife than not have her at all.
As can be expected, Ares is not the sole consort of the love goddess, as she is believed to have bedded mortal men as well -- some of whom survived her intensity while others did not. One particular human consort of hers known as Adonis, for example, subsequently dies after their union. Yet she is not exactly a black widow spider, as some are believed to survive to father her half-mortal children. In The Iliad for instance, she gives birth to the Trojan Aeneas through her union with Anchises.
A great mother goddess to boot (representing the "Great Mother" Cybele in Homeric Hymn V), she is best known as a parent to her immortal son Eros (Roman counterpart Cupid), the little god of love who is often depicted as a cherub or male child with wings and bow and arrow. Similar to the Indic goddess Lakshmi in terms of giving birth to the love god, Aphrodite's identity intersects those of many other goddesses of antiquity.
Autonomous, powerful, and unbounded by the rules of other Olympian goddesses, she is similar to goddesses of matrilineal societies, having been free from all patriarchal control including the imposition of chastity and abstinence. Furthermore, Aphrodite's sexuality was considered entirely divine and was correspondingly celebrated by the ancient Greeks in many ways, including ceremonies performed by her very own priestesses -- 'sacred prostitutes' in her temple at Corinth.
Unique in her ability to remain untainted by her amorous involvements and ever pure, beautiful, and regal regardless of her promiscuity, Aphrodite is portrayed as her own agent in every way. Powerful beyond the abilities of many deities, she can subdue even the most violent god of the pantheon -- Ares -- with the gravity of her magnetic appeal and inherent majesty.
Associated with birds and snakes like almost every other ancient female deity world-wide, Aphrodite is also said to have ridden on swans -- a flawless image of earthly yet ethereal magic and beauty.
Nevertheless, like other Olympian gods and goddesses, she is not entirely spotless in all of her epic enounters and often seems human in various mythological stories, hence her previous marital infidelity. Similar to her immortal contemporaries in her taste for dramatic entertainment, she often interferes with the lives of humans.
In one particular story for instance, Aphrodite acquires the name "golden Aphrodite," which is derived from a seemingly harmless event that eventually leads to the collapse of Troy. In the beginning of the tale, a marriage ceremony between a Greek hero and his divine bride is disrupted by the goddess Eris (deity of strife), who throws a golden apple inscribed "for the fairest" into the crowd of guests. Consequently, three goddesses, Athena, Hera, and Aphrodite all claim the vain prize and do not relent their entitlement.
In order to solve the stalemate and select the rightful owner of the apple, the most beautiful mortal man -- Paris of Troy -- is ultimately assigned to choose the most beautiful goddess of them all.
In efforts to garner the golden apple, each goddess subsequently offers the mortal a unique bribe: Hera offers greatness, Athena offers success in war, and Aphrodite offers the most beautiful mortal woman in the world. Choosing Aphrodite, Paris is thus given the affections of Helen, who later becomes 'Helen of Troy,' inspiring the Trojan War.
Sources:
The Goddess Oracle by Amy Sophia Marashinsky (2002)
Whence the Goddesses: A Source Book by Miriam Robbins Dexter (1990)
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