Aphrodite

The Goddess of love.

Blessings

Aphrodite gives to her worshippers the blessings of joy, passion, freedom, whimsy, and appreciation of beauty in all of its forms. She presides over all types of love – from the primal stirring of the loins to the noblest kind of patriotism and love of the Gods. The bonds of friendship and family and lovers are especially sacred to her. She brings together instead of tears apart, creates as opposed to destroys.

God Of

  • Love
  • Sex

Primary Cult Centers

  • Amathus
  • Cnidos
  • Corinth
  • Cyprus
  • Paphos

Epithets

  • Aligena – Sea Born
  • Ambologera – She Who Postpones Old Age
  • Anaduomene – Rising from the Sea
  • Androphonos – Killer of Men
  • Anosia – Unholy
  • Apostrophia – She Who Turns Herself Away
  • Areia – of Ares
  • Basilis – Queen
  • Eleemon – Merciful
  • Enoplios – Bearing Weapons
  • Epipontia – On the Sea
  • Epitragidia – She Upon the Buck
  • Epitumbidia – She Upon the Graves
  • Euplois – Fair Sailing
  • Genetullis – Genetrix
  • Heteira – Courtesan
  • Kallipugos – of the Beautiful Buttocks
  • Kallisti – the Fairest
  • Khruse – Golden
  • Kupris – Cyprian
  • Kuprogenes – Cyprus-born
  • Kuthereia – Kytherean
  • Melainis – Black
  • Morpho – Shapely
  • Ourania – Heavenly
  • Pandemos – of All People
  • Pasiphaessa – the Far-Shining
  • Pelagia – of the Sea
  • Philomeides – Laughter-Loving
  • Porne – Fleshy; Prostitute
  • Skotia – Dark
  • Summakhia – Ally in War
  • Tumborukhos – Gravedigger

Symbols

Seashell, roses, mirror

Animals

Dove, swan, sparrow, lynx

Sacrifices

Copper, emerald, turquoise, rose, myrtle, clover, benzoin, sandalwood, apple

Festivals

  • Adonia (celebrated on different dates) .
  • Aphrodisia (5 Hekatombaion (July-August)) .
  • Fourth (4th each month) Hermes, Aphrodite and Eros’ sacred day

Ways to honor

The best way to honor Aphrodite is to love. If you are in a relationship, remember why you originally fell in love with that person. Then show them: seduce them all over again! If you’re not, find someone to love. Or help other people to do so. Become a match-maker. Be flirtatious. Make your surroundings beautiful with perfumes, flowers, elegant fabrics, and exotic foods. Learn new sexual techniques. Write erotic stories or poetry, or take naughty pictures of yourself or a loved one. Support sex-workers. Promote safer sex practices.

More…

Articles

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Ancient Hymns and Texts

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Modern Hymns and Devotions

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Primary Sources

  • Apollodorus’ Library 1.3.3, 1.4.4, 1.9.17, 3.4.2, 3.14.3-4, 3.549
  • Apollonius Rhodius’ Argonautica 2.25-155
  • Aristophanes’ Lysistrata 392-398
  • Euripides’ Hippolytus Herodotus’ Histories 1.105, 1.131, 1.199, 3.8, 4.59, 4.67
  • Hesiod’s Theogony 188-206, 975, 986-991
  • Homer’s Iliad, 3.373-425, 5.311-430, 14.187-221, 21.416-433, 23.185-187
  • Homer’s Odyssey, 4.259-264, 8.266-69, 20.67-78
  • Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 5, 6, 10
  • Hyginus’ Fabulae 14-15, 40, 58, 92, 94, 147-148, 185
  • Hyginus’ Poetica Astronomica 2.7, 2.16, 2.30, 2.43
  • Ovid’s Metamorphoses 4.169-192, 4.285-388, 4.531-538, 5.331, 10.519-739, 10.639-707
  • Papyri Graeci Magicae 4.3209-3254, 4.1265-1274, 7.215-218
  • Pausanias’ Description of Greece 1.3.1, 1.19.2, 2.4.6, 5.11.8, 7.23.2, 9.27.2, 10.26.1, 10.30.1-2
  • Pindar’s Pythian Odes 4.213-219 and Fragments 122
  • Plato’s Symposium
  • Plutarch’s Roman Questions 2
  • Sappho’s Hymn to Aphrodite
  • Vergil’s Aeneid
  • Vergil’s Georgics 3.267-268
  • Xenophon’s Symposium 8, 9

Links

Modern Books

Aphrodite