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Aphrodite - the Goddess of Love

© Linda Casselman

In honour of this month of love and upcoming Valentine's Day, I've decided to take a break from our exploration of the worlds on the cosmic world tree from Norse Mythology to have a look at the Greek Goddess of Love, Aphrodite.

Most of us are familiar with Boticelli's famous painting "The Birth of Venus," where the beautiful, ethereal goddess is washed ashore on Cypress in a seashell amid a shower of roses, protected by Zephyrus, the west wind, and Flora, the goddess of spring. Click here for a larger view of the image.

Indeed, Botticelli did take his inspiration for this piece from Greek and Roman mythology, for the story of the goddess' birth is as follows:

In their struggle for power, the Titan Cornos cut off the penis of his father Ouranos with a sharp sickle, and threw it into the sea. Ouranos' immortal body part floated in the sea foam, where over time, the goddess Aphrodite (Venus, roman) took form inside of the drifting member and grew to womanhood, when she was finally washed ashore at Paphos, Cyprus. Actually, there were many sanctuaries dedicated to the goddess dotted on these islands, suggesting that she was originally a goddess from west Asia that was introduced into Greece by the sea-traders.

Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, and fertility, just like her roman counterpart Venus. Unlike Venus, however, Aphrodite also embodies affectionate love, the kind of love and attachment one feels towards friends, family members and even cherished pets, instead of merely sexual love or Eros.

One of the odd things about the myths surrounding Aphrodite is that the ancient Greeks married their beautiful mythological goddess to the crippled and not-so-good-looking smith god, Hephaistos. Being the goddess of both love and sexual desire, Aphrodite was certainly not a faithful wife, for she had passionate love affairs with others like the gods Dionysus and Ares.

Myth tells us that Hephaistos was so enraged by Aphrodite's affair with Ares that he fashioned a net of gold that he used to trap the pair in the act. Poor Hephaistos, the other gods only laughed at his shame.

Indeed, Aphrodite was a passionate goddess who had many lovers and caused a good deal of strife among both the gods and humans alike. Let's continue our look at Aphrodite, the goddess of love, next time as well, by seeing how she had a part to play in starting the famous Trojan War.

The copyright of the article Aphrodite - the Goddess of Love in Mythology is owned by Wayne Kreger. Permission to republish Aphrodite - the Goddess of Love in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.