APHRODITE, known as the Greek goddess of love and beauty, the counterpart of the Roman Venus. Although her myth and cult were essentially Semitic, she soon became hellenized and was admitted to a place among the deities of Olympus. Some mythologists hold that there already existed in the Greek system an earlier goddess of love, of similar attributes, who was absorbed by the Asiatic importation; and one writer even altogether denies the oriental origin of Aphrodite. No satisfactory etymology of the name has been given ; although the first part is usually re ferred to aphros ("the sea foam"), it is equally probable that it is of Eastern origin.
Among the Semitic peoples (with the notable exception of the Hebrews) a supreme female deity was worshipped under different names—the Assyrian Ishtar, the Phoenician Ashtoreth (Astarte), the Syrian Atargatis (Derketo), the Babylonian Belit (Mylitta), the Arabian Ilat (Al-ilat). Roscher holds that all these were originally moon-goddesses. This view, however, is not generally accepted on the ground that, in Semitic mythology, the moon is always a male divinity; and that the full moon and crescent, found as attributes of Astarte, are due to a misinterpretation of the sun's disc and cow's horns of Isis. On the other hand, there is some evidence in ancient authorities (Lucian, De Dee Syria, 4) that Astarte and the moon were considered identical.
This oriental Aphrodite was worshipped as the bestower of all animal and vegetable fruitfulness, and under this aspect especially as a goddess of women. This worship was degraded by repulsive practices (e.g., religious prostitution, self-mutilation), which subsequently made their way to centres of Phoenician influence, such as Corinth and Mount Eryx in Sicily. In this connexion may be mentioned the idea of a divinity, half male, half female, uniting in itself the active and passive functions of creation, a symbol of luxuriant growth and produc tivity. Such was the bearded Aphrodite of Cyprus, called Aphroditos by Aris tophanes according to Macrobius. (Satur nalia, iii. 8.2 ; see also The oriental Aphrodite was closely related to the sea and the element of moisture ; in fact, some consider that she made her first appearance on Greek soil rather as a marine divinity than as a nature-goddess. A cc or ding to Syrian ideas, as a fish-goddess, she represented the fructifying power of water. Her con nexion with the sea may be explained by the influence of the moon on the tides and the idea that it came up from the ocean. (See ANADYOMENE.) She is con nected with the lower world, and came to be looked upon as one of its divinities.
Thus, Ishtar descends to the kingdom of Ilat the queen of the dead, to find the means of restoring her favourite Tam muz (Adon, Adonis) to life. During her stay, all animal and vegetable productivity ceases, to begin again with her return to earth. This legend, which strikingly resembles that of Persephone, probably refers to the decay of vegetation in winter, and the re-awakening of nature in spring (see HYA CINTHUS). The lunar theory connects it with the disappearance of the moon at the time of change or during an eclipse.
Another aspect of her character is that of a warlike goddess, armed with spear or bow, sometimes wearing a mural crown, as sovereign lady and protectress of the locality where she was worshipped. Her attributes were the ram, the he-goat, the dove, certain fish, the cypress, myrtle and pomegranate, the animals being symbolical of fertility, the plants remedies against sterility.
The worship of Aphrodite was introduced at an early date into Cyprus, Cythera and Crete by Phoenician colonists, whence it spread over the whole of Greece, and as far west as Italy and Sicily. In Crete she has been identified with Ariadne, who, accord ing to one story, was put ashore in Cyprus, where she died and was buried in a grove called Ariadne-Aphrodite. Cyprus was regarded as her true home by the Greeks, and Cythera was one of the oldest seats of her worship. In both these islands there lingered a definite tradition of a connexion with the cult of the oriental Aphrodite Urania.
Aphrodite as the goddess of all fruitfulness in the animal and vegetable world is especially prominent. In the Homeric hymn to Aphrodite she is described as ruling over all living things on earth, in the air, and in the water, even the gods being subject to her influence. She is the goddess of gardens, especially worshipped in spring near lowlands and marshes favourable to the growth of vegetation. Her character as a goddess of vegetation is clearly shown in the cult and ritual of Adonis (q.v.) and Attis (q.v.). In the animal world she is the goddess of sexual impulse; amongst men, of birth, marriage and family life. Farnell points out that this cult of Aphrodite, as the patroness of married life, is probably a native development of the Greek religion, the oriental legends representing her by no means as an upholder of the purer rela tions of man and woman. As the goddess of the grosser form of love she inspires both men and women with passion, or the re verse. Upon her male favourites (Paris, Theseus) she bestows the fatal gift of seductive beauty, which generally leads to disastrous results in the case of the woman (Helen, Ariadne), and acts as an intermediary for bringing lovers together. Natur ally, a personality invested with such charms was regarded as the ideal of womanly beauty, but it is remarkable that the only probable instance in which she appears as such is as Aphrodite Morpho ("the shapely") at Sparta. The function of Aphrodite as the patroness of courtesans represents the most degraded form of her worship as the goddess of love, and is certainly of Phoeni cian or Eastern origin. In Corinth there were more than a thousand of these prostitutes or hierodouloi ("temple slaves") and wealthy men dedicated their most beautiful slaves to the serv ice of the goddess.
Like her oriental prototype, the Greek Aphrodite was closely connected with the sea. Thus, in the Hesiodic account of her birth, she is represented as sprung from the foam (aphros) which gathered round the mutilated member of Uranus, and her name has been explained by reference to this. Further proof may be found in many of her titles—Anadyomene ("rising from the sea") Euploia ("giver of prosperous voyages") ; Galenaia ("goddess of fair weather") in the attribute of the dolphin, and the veneration in which she was held by seafarers. Aphrodite Aineias, the protectress of the Trojan hero, is probably also an other form of the maritime goddess of the East, which originated in the Troad. The title Ephippos is connected with the legend of Aeneas, who is said to have dedicated to his mother a statue that represented her on horseback. Remembering the importance of the horse in the cult of the sea-god Poseidon, it is natural to asso ciate it with Aphrodite as the sea-goddess, although it may be explained with reference to her character as a goddess of vegeta tion, the horse being an embodiment of the corn-spirit (J. G. Frazer, The Golden Bough, ii., p. 281, 1900).
Like Ishtar, Aphrodite was connected with the lower world. Thus, at Delphi there was an image of Aphrodite Epitymbia ("Aphrodite of the tomb"), to which the dead were summoned to receive libations; the epithets Tymborychos ("grave-digger"), Muchia ("goddess of the depths"), Melainis ("the dark one''), the grove of Ariadne-Aphrodite at Amathus, and the myth of Adonis, point in the same direction.
The cult of the armed Aphrodite probably belongs to the ear lier period of her worship in Greece, and down to the latest period of Greek history she retained this character in some of the Greek states. The cult is found not only where oriental influence was strongest, but in places remote from it, such as Sparta, where she was known by the name of Areia ("the warlike") . It is possible that the frequent association of Aphrodite with Ares is to be ex plained by an armed Aphrodite early worshipped at Thebes, the most ancient seat of the worship of Ares.
The most distinctively oriental title of the Greek Aphrodite is Urania, the Semitic "queen of the heavens." It has been explained by reference to the lunar character of the goddess, but more probably signifies "she whose seat is in heaven." Her cult was first established in Cythera, probably in connexion with the purple trade, and at Athens it is associated with the legendary Porphyrion, the purple king. At Thebes, Harmonia (who has been identified with Aphrodite herself) dedicated three statues, of Aphrodite Urania, Pandemos, and Apostrophia ("averter"). There is no doubt that Pandemos was originally an extension of the idea of the goddess of family and city life to include the whole people, the political community. Hence the name was supposed to go back to the time of Theseus, the reputed author of the reorganization of Attica and its demes. Aphrodite Pandemos was held in equal regard with Aphrodite Urania; she was called Somme ("holy") and was served by priestesses upon whom strict chastity was enjoined. In time, however, the meaning of the term underwent a change, probably due to the philosophers and moral ists, by whom a radical distinction was drawn between Aphrodite Urania and Aphrodite Pandemos. According to Plato (Sym posium, 18o), there are two Aphrodites, "the elder, having no mother, who is called the heavenly Aphrodite—she is the daughter of Uranus; the younger, who is the daughter of Zeus and Dione —her we call common." But there is no doubt that the cult of Aphrodite was on the whole as pure as that of any of the other divinities, and although a distinction may have existed in later times between the goddess of legal marriage and the goddess of free love, these titles do not express the idea. Aphrodite Urania was represented in Greek art on a swan, a tortoise or a globe; Aphrodite Pandemos as riding on a goat, symbolical of wantonness.
To her oriental attributes the following may be added : the sparrow and hare (productivity), the wry-neck (as a love-charm, of which Aphrodite was considered the inventor), the swan and dolphin (as a marine divinity), the tortoise (explained by Plu tarch as a symbol of domesticity, but connected by Gruppe with the marine deity), the rose, the poppy, and the lime tree.
In ancient art Aphrodite was at first represented clothed, sometimes seated, but more frequently standing; then naked, rising from the sea, or after the bath. Finally, all idea of the divine vanished, and the artists merely presented her as the type of a beautiful woman, with oval face, full of grace and charm, languishing eyes and laughing mouth, which replaced the dignified severity and repose of the older forms. The most famous of her statues in ancient times was that at Cnidus, the work of Prax iteles, which was imitated on the coins of that town, and subse quently reproduced in various copies, such as the Vatican and Munich. Of existing statues the most famous is the Aphrodite of Melos (Venus of Milo), now in the Louvre, which was found on the island in 1820 amongst the ruins of the theatre; the Capitoline Venus at Rome and the Venus of Capua, represented as a goddess of victory (these two exhibit a lofty conception of the goddess) ; the Medicean Venus at Florence, found in the porticus of Octavia at Rome and (probably wrongly) attributed to Cleomenes; the Venus stooping in the bath, in the Vatican; and the Callipygus at Naples, a specimen of the most sensual type.