Aphrodite: Goddess of Greece
The most well-known and documented incarnation of our Mediteranian Goddess is Aphrodite. Aphrodite was the Greek Goddess of love, beauty, and sex. There are different myths depicting her birth. In some, she is the daughter of Zeus and in others, she is born from the castrated remains of the titan Ouranous that were thrown into the sea (Either way her father was a sky deity like Ishtar). Given the modern image of Aphrodite on screen and in books, you may be wondering how two powerful war goddesses evolved into a being who only cared about her looks and getting couples together. The thing you may not know though: Aphrodite was a war goddess.
Cyprus was the center and start of Aphrodite’s cult. Her worship was spread to the neighboring islands including Cythera south of Lakonia, the home of Sparta. Sparta was one of the first mainland cities to worship this new goddess. She was known as Aphrodite Areia (Aphrodite of war). Statues can be found where she was presented fully armored and armed. She was also considered the wife of Ares, the god of war. This may confuse those who know the goddess as married to Hephestus while cheating on him with Ares, but let me present my theory on how and why that happened.
A society such as Sparta which was egalitarian and a warrior people would not have been bothered by a goddess of sex and war. Other Greek cities at that time were patriarchal and misogynistic. Many already worshiped another war goddess, Athena, who aligned their values better. So, to spread her worship Aphrodite’s nature had to be changed. Her domain of war was stripped from her and to further distance her from her original form her husband was altered to Hephestus. But, the memory of her original husband gave birth to the myths about her affair with Ares. Much of this is my own theory, but I do believe that is why our strong war goddess was changed so significantly.
With her new image, Aphrodite took Greece by storm. As almost everyone can relate to her domains of love and beauty her cult could be found in every corner of the peninsula. Given her popularity, when a new empire invaded Greece rather than stop her worship they simply made it their own.
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Join us next month for the last stop in our journey, the Roman goddess Venus.