From Manual of Mythology, by Alexander S. Murray; Revised Edition, Philadelphia: David McKay, Publisher, 1895; pp. 105-110.
[105]
APHRODITE (VENUS).
(Head of the Statue from Melos. Paris.)
Was the goddess of love in that wide sense of the word which in early times embraced also the love of animals, and the love which was thought to be the cause of productiveness throughout nature. Accordingly we find in her character, side by side with what is beautiful and noble, much that is coarse and unworthy. In the best times of Greece the refined and beautiful features of her worship were kept in prominence, both in poetry and art; but these, when times of luxury succeeded, had to give way to impurities of many kinds.
The feelings awakened by observing the productive power 106 of nature had, it would seem, given rise to a divine personification of love in very remote early times among the nations of the East. The Phœnicians called this personification Astartē, and carried her worship with them wherever they established factories or markets in Greece, in the islands of the Mediterranean, and on to Italy. The early Greeks coming in contact with these traders, and obtaining from them a knowledge of coinage, weights, measures, and other necessaries of commerce and trade — including, it is said, a system of writing — appear to have transferred some of the functions of the oriental goddess to their own Aphrodite, as, for instance, the function of protecting commerce. The earliest known Greek coins — those of Ægina — the weights of which correspond accurately with the oriental standard, have the figure of a tortoise, the well-known symbol of Aphrodite.
How much else of the character of their goddess the Greeks may have derived from the Phœnicians it would be impossible to say. But the extraordinary zeal with which she continued to be worshipped in Cyprus, Cytherea, Corinth, Carthage, Sicily, and wherever in early times the Phœnicians had made settlements, may signify that others of her functions besides that of protecting commerce had been borrowed from the oriental goddess. The older Aphrodite worshipped in Greece previous to the introduction of Phœnician elements in her character is described as a daughter of zeus and Dionē, and through her mother was associated with the ancient worship at Dodona.
The younger goddess, on the other hand, is described ( Hesiod, Theogony, 188-206) as the offspring of Uranus, born amidst the foam of the sea, first stepping on land in Cyprus, and styled Anadyomenē, or “she who came out of the sea.” Under the title of Urania she was regarded as a personification of that power of love which was thought to unite heaven, earth, and sea into one harmonious system, 107 and as such was distinguished from Aphrodite Pandemos, the personification of love among men. As the goddess born of the foam of the sea, she naturally came to be held in veneration by the fishermen and sailors on the coast as the goddess of the smiling sea, and the cause of prosperous voyages. hence it was the custom in the island of Ægina to follow up the sacrifice and banquet in honor of Poseidon [Neptune] with a festival of great rejoicing and excitement in honor of Aphrodite. In Cnidus she was styled and worshipped as goddess of the peaceful sea; a character which is symbolized by the dolphin grequently given her as an attribute. The island of Cythera (Cerigo) derived its name from one of her titles, Cytherea, the belief being that she ahd appeared there before landing on Cyprus.
The earlier and pure Greek phase of her character, in which she is called a daughter of Zeus and Dione, was that of a goddess who presides over human love; she is described as accompanied by her son Eros (Amor or Cupid), the Charitēs (Graces), the Horæ [Seasons], Himeros (God of the desire of love), Pothos (God of the anxieties of love), and Peitho (Suadela [Persuasion], the soft speech of love). But her special favorites was the young rosy shepherd Adonis; and when he was killed by a wild boar, her grief wa sso great that she would not allow the lifeless body to be takn from her arms until the gods consoled her by decreeing that her lover might continue to live half the year, during the spring and summer, on the earth, while she might spend the othe rhalf with him in the lower world, beside Persephone (Proserpine); a reference to the change of seasons, which finds its explanation in the fact of Aphrodite being also goddess of gardens and flowers. Her presence in nature was felt in spring, her absence in winter. This change of the seasons was further observed and celebrated by a festival in honor of Adonis, in the course of which a figure of him was produced, and the 108 ceremony of burial, with weeping and songs of wailing, gone through; after which a joyful shout was raised, “Adonis lives, and is risen again!” She was called Adonaia and Adonias, with reference to this love passage. Next to him her chief favorite was Anchises, to whom she bore Æneus, who through his son Ascanius, or Julius, became as the story goes, the founder of the great Julian family in Rome. With regard to the story of Pygmalion, the Adonis of Cyprus, into whose statue of her she breathed life on the occasion of one of her festivals, perhaps the same meaning is intended to be conveyed as in the alternate life and death of Adonis — that is, the alternate fervor and coldness of love, or the alternate bloom and frost of nature.
The husband of Aphrodite was Hephæstus (Vulcan), whose manner of punisher her when he found her in company of Ares [Mars] has already been related. Among her children, but not by Hephæstus, were Eros {Amor}, and Anteros [the god of requited love], Hymen, and Hermaphroditus.
![Black and white photograph of a statue of Venus [Aphrodite], gowned and with her hand reaching behind her holding her stole,
.](../images/Venus2C.jpg)
Fig. 19. —.Venus [Aphrodite]. (Capitol, Rome.)
But if she had favors for some she had strong antipathies for others, and proved this spirit on Hippolytus, whom she slew; on Polyphontē, whom she changed into an owl; on Arsinoë, whom she turned to stone; and Myrrha, whom she transformed into a myrtle tree. Of her strife and competition 109 with Hera [Juno] and us for the prize of beauty, which the Trojan prince, Paris, awarded to her, we shall give an account alter on, in connection with the narrative of the Trojan war.
As a result of her power to untie by means of love all beings, whether in heaven, or earth, or in blackest Tartarus, she came to be viewed as a goddess presiding over married life and marriage ceremonies. She had a number of temples in the island of Cyprus, but none of them so splendidly decorated as that in the town of Paphos, whither thousands of visitors streamed to take part in the annual festival and rejoicings in her honor. There also she had an oracle, and, as Urania, was worshipped jointly with Ares (Mars); the latter fact showing that her connection with this god was founded in the religious belief of the people. At times, and particularly in her very ancient sanctuary in the island of Cythere, as also in Sparta, Argos, and on the Acropolis of Corinth, she was represented armed.
The worship of Venus did not become general in Rome till later times. A festival, called Veneralia, was held in her honor every year, a great part of the ceremony consisting of nocturnal dances and passionate enjoyment in gardens and among blooming arbors. She had a temple on the Capitol [Venus Genetrix], and one of the Colline gates was consecrated to her. The month of April was held sacred to her, for then the flowers bud and plants shoot; or, as the Greek myth expresses it, Adonis comes back from the under-world.
The symbols of Aphrodite were the dove, ram, hard, dolphin, swan, and tortoise, with the rose, as a flower, the myrtle tree, and other beautiful plants, the apple and fruits of various kinds.