VENUS WAS THE ROMAN GODDESS OF LOVE,BEAUTY AND VICTORY.SHE WAS SO IMPORTANT TO ROMANS THAT THEY CLAIMED HER THEIR ANCESTRESS.SHE CAME TO SYMBOLIZE ROME'S IMPERIAL POWER.HER SON AENEAS FLED FROM TROY TO ITALY,HE BECAME THE ANCESTOR OF REMUS AND REMULUS WHO FOUNDED ROME.
In myth, Venus-Aphrodite was born of sea-foam. Roman theology presents
Venus as the yielding, watery female principle, essential to the
generation and balance of life. Her male counterparts in the Roman
pantheon, Vulcan and Mars, are active and fiery.In Rome's foundation myth, this victorious Venus was the divine mother of the Trojan prince Aeneas, and thus a divine ancestor of the Roman people as a whole, in her form as Venus Genetrix. Another temple to Venus Erycina as a fertility deity was established in a traditionally plebeian district just outside the Colline Gate, beyond the pomerium.
Like the Greek goddess Aphrodite whose mythology she inherited, the Roman goddess Venus assumed the divine responsibility for love, beauty, and sexuality, not to mention marriage, procreation, and domestic bliss. The latter is suggested by the root word for her name "venes" which forms the root of the word venenum (poison) suggesting love potions and charms. This Goddess also represented motherhood, domesticity and prosperity. It is perhaps for this reason, that brides to be made offerings to her and why mosaics with images of this Goddess were often found in the home.In Greek mythology, Aphrodite was the goddess of love (equivalent to the Roman Venus, Egyptian Goddess Isis, the Phoenician Astarte and the Babylonian Ishtar).She is known as the Daughter of Heaven and Sea, the child of Uranus and Gaia.Her story tells of fertility, love and pleasure.Venus is the goddess of Love and Beauty. She along with her son Cupid (Eros) became a metaphor for sexual love.Venus represents the feminine aspect in all of us. She is the creational Earth Mother.Often seen as the bright, silvery morning or evening star, and is the brightest object in the sky after the sun and the moon.She is said to be either a daughter of Zeus or to have sprung from the foam of the sea.In the first version - Hesiod, she was older than Olympians. When the Titan Cronus severed his father's (Uranus) genitals and flung into the sea, the blood and semen caused foams to gathered and floated across the sea to the island of Cyprus. There Aphrodite rose out of the sea from the foam (hence her name came from the word aphros, which means foams). She had experienced no infancy or childhood. She was grown, young woman. The Clam Shell version.In the second version by Homer, she was known as the daughter of Zeus and the Oceanid Dione. The Cherubs Version.She was married to Hephaestus (Vulcan) but had numerous affairs with gods and mortals, the most notorious of these, the goddess' long affair with Ares (Mars) god of war. She was the mother of Eros (Cupid), Deimus (Fear), Phobus (Panic) and Harmonia, wife of Cadmus.One of her mortal son, was Aeneas, by her lover was Anchises, king of Dardania. Anchises was crippled by thunderbolt from Zeus, when he revealed that he made love to the goddess.She supported the Trojans during the war, not only because Paris awarded the apple to her as the fairest, but that Aeneas also fought with the Trojans. She tried to rescue her son, when Diomedes wounded him. Diomedes also wounded her and drove her off the battlefield. Her epithets were Acidalia, Anadyomene (born to the sea), Cyprian, Cypris, Cythereia, Eriboea (Periboea), Erycina, Euploios (fair voyage), Paphia (sexual love), Pelagia, and Pontia.Her favorite haunts were Cyprus and Cythera. Aphrodite favorite animals were the dove, sparrow, swallow, swan and turtle.She was the unfaithful wife of Hephaestus, the god of fire, and the mother of Eros. Aphrodite surpassed all the other goddesses in beauty, and hence received the prize of beauty from Paris. She likewise had the power of granting beauty and invincible charm to others.In the vegetable kingdom the myrtle, rose, apple, and poppy, among others, were sacred to Aphrodite, as,in the animal world, were the sparrow, dove, swan, and swallow.Venus married and bore children but did not stay focused on her home affairs. In fact, she concentrated almost completely on her extramarital affairs. Her many lovers include Aries, the God of War, and the handsome Adonis.The goddess loved to pamper herself and cultivate her beauty. Her symbol represents the hand-held vanity mirror that Venus used to admire her beauty. Truly, Venus has become the symbol for feminity itself.enus - Aphrodite - playing one day with her boy Cupid (Eros), wounded her bosom with one of his arrows. She pushed him away, but the wound was deeper than she thought.So, in a way, it’s accurate to say that Venus was the mother of Rome. However, Venus had strong ties to Greek mythology, too. The Romans thought she was the same goddess as Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love. They adopted many of Aphrodite’s symbols, such as roses and myrtle, to represent Venus. Myrtle was so important to this goddess that, during her festival, worshipers and even statues of her wore myrtle wreaths.
Venus became a popular subject of painting and sculpture during the
Renaissance period in Europe. As a "classical" figure for whom nudity
was her natural state, it was socially acceptable to depict her
unclothed. As the goddess of sexuality, a degree of erotic beauty in her
presentation was justified, which appealed to many artists and their
patrons. Over time, Venus came to refer to any artistic depiction in
post-classical art of a nude woman, even when there was no indication
that the subject was the goddess.
Before it healed she beheld Adonis, and was captivated with him. She no longer took any interest in her favourite resorts - Paphos, and Cnidos, and Amathos, rich in metals.She absented herself even from heaven, for Adonis was dearer to her than heaven. Him she followed and bore him company. She who used to love to recline in the shade, with no care but to cultivate her charms, now rambles through the woods and over the hills, dressed like the huntress Diana; and calls her dogs, and chases hares and stags, or other game that it is safe to hunt, but keeps clear of the wolves and bears, reeking with the slaughter of the herd.She charged Adonis, too, to beware of such dangerous animals. "Be brave towards the timid," said she; "courage against the courageous is not safe. Beware how you expose yourself to danger and put my happiness to risk. Attack not the beasts that Nature has armed with weapons. I do not value your glory so high as to consent to purchase it by such exposure. Your youth, and the beauty that charms Venus, will not touch the hearts of lions and bristly boars. Think of their terrible claws and prodigious strength! I hate the whole race of them. Do you ask me why?"Then she told him the story of Atalanta and Hippomenes, who were changed into lions for their ingratitude to her.Having given him this warning, she mounted her chariot drawn by swans, and drove away through the air. But Adonis was too noble to heed such counsels.The dogs had roused a wild boar from his lair, and the youth threw his spear and wounded the animal with sidelong stroke.The beast drew out the weapon with his jaws, and rushed after Adonis, who turned and ran; but the boar overtook him, and buried his tusks in his side, and stretched him dying upon the plain.Venus, in her swan-drawn chariot, had not yet reached Cyprus, when she heard coming up through mid-air the groans of her beloved, and turned her white-winged coursers back to Earth.As she drew near and saw from on high his lifeless body bathed in blood, she alighted and, bending over it, beat her breast and tore her hair. Venus’s festival took place on April 1. It was called the Veneralia. Aside from draping Venus in flowers, followers also carefully washed her statue, and promised to fulfill the moral obligations of good Roman wives and husbands. Many men and women also asked her advice on matters of the heart.Other symbols of Venus included the scallop shell, doves, dolphins, pomegranates, pearls, mirrors, and girdles. Many of these were also adopted from Aphrodite. So was her origin story; she was said to be born of seafoam.One of the most famous works of Western art depicts this event: Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. It portrays her as standing on a large shell, her hair covering her, surrounded by other mythical figures. This artwork from hundreds of years after the Romans worshiped Venus shows how important her mythology continued to be even after the fall of Rome.Plenty of other artworks also depict Venus, her birth, and her other myths. In fact, painting Venus was so popular that, after the classical era, any unclothed female figure came to be called a ‘Venus’.Later on in the Roman empire, Venus became even more important to Rome. She got new festivals on August 12 and October 9, and a shrine on a famous hill in Rome. Why? Well, Julius Caesar claimed her as his ancestor. Many other famous Roman politicians began to vie for her favor, and eventually, as Caeser became the head of a dynasty, she became associated with his legacy.Venus was married to Vulcan, the god of fire and the forge. Vulcan was notoriously ugly – one of the ugliest of the gods. But he loved her so much that he created a golden carriage to pull her around. The carriage was drawn by doves to match Venus’s own beauty.Venus was also the mother of Cupid, the god of love. Next time you see a picture of Cupid – maybe on Valentine’s day – you can think of his mother, Venus.Despite her identification with Aphrodite, Venus was a native Roman goddess who was not adopted from anywhere. Her name is exactly the same as a Roman word for a particular kind of love. That name can be traced all the way back to the language before Latin, to a word meaning “to desire or love”. It’s clear that Venus was with the Romans for a long time.Because she was the goddess of love, Venus was very important to new brides. They made offerings to her before they got married. Some people also say that they gave their childhood toys to her when they left home to get married.
Carthage had been founded by a woman named Dido, and she was still queen at the time of Aeneas' arrival. She was very beautiful, and a widow. As Aeneas was a widower, Juno saw this as a perfect opportunity to have Dido and Aeneas fall in love with each other, thereby keeping Aeneas from ever reaching Italy. However, Venus intervened first, and had Cupid shoot an arrow into Dido. Then Venus disguised herself as a huntress and told Aeneas and his best friend, Achetes to go to Carthage to meet the queen. Venus also clouded them in a mist so that they could reach the queen without being harmed or detained. Upon seeing Aeneas, Dido, known for having a heart of stone, fell deeply in love.
