Aphrodite essays

Aphrodite essays "Muse, tell me the deeds of golden Aphrodite the Cyprian, who stirs up sweet passion in the gods and subdues the tribes of mortal men and birds that fly in air and all the many creatures that the dry land rears, and all that the sea: all these love the deeds of rich-crowned Cytherea." (Hom.Hym.5.5) Aphrodite was beautiful. She was often depicted with flowers and vegetation surrounding her golden aura, representing her connection with fertility. According to the poet Hesiod, Aphrodite was one of the twelve Olympians. The literal meaning of her name is foam born, as she was born from the sea foam that surrounded the immortal flesh, which was the result of the castration of Kronos (Theogony 190). That explains why the Renaissance artist Botticelli depicted her on a giant scallop shell. The Theogony is just one explanation of her creation, which she was born from Kronos alone, and not from a sexual union. As a result she is "characterized as the goddess of pure love that has its end not [at] physical satisfaction but [at] spiritual gratification (CCM)." In contrast to the Theogynys explanation, Homer, who is most famous for the Odyssey and Iliad, tells of her birth as the result of the relations between Zeus and Dione; thus connecting her as the "goddess of sex and procreator of children, whose concerns are of the body and not of the mind, the spirit or the soul (CCM)". These different myths of her creation are just the beginning of the many discrepancies throughout her eternal existence. In Rome, the goddess Venus, was primarily the patroness of vegetable gardens. It was not until the end of the third century B.C., when the cult of Aphrodite began, that Venus took on Aphrodites attributes and legends. Aphrodite is celebrated most predominately in Cyprus where according to the Theogony, she was origionally found. Her most famous cults on Cyprus were within Paphos and Amathus, where she was worshipped for sexual reproduction; ...