Venus

Not to be confused with Venus, the planet.

Venus is the Roman goddess of love and beauty, identified with the Greek Aphrodite. Roman poets such as Virgil and Ovid tell her myths in the Greek form, and Rome honoured her in particular as the mother of Aeneas, from whom the Romans, and the Julian family of Julius Caesar, traced their descent. April was her month (Ovid, Fasti 4.13–14).

Origins and Symbolism of Venus

The Birth of Venus

The Greek poets give Aphrodite two origins. In Hesiod she is born from the white foam that rose around the severed genitals of Uranus when they fell into the sea; she came ashore first at Cythera and then at Cyprus, and is called “foam-born” (Hesiod, Theogony 188–200). In Homer she is the daughter of Zeus and Dione, and throws herself into her mother’s lap when Diomedes wounds her (Iliad 5.370–371). The Roman poets follow both. Virgil makes Venus the daughter of Jupiter, who kisses her as his child (Aeneid 1.254–256), and Ovid derives her name from the foam of the sea (Fasti 4.61–62).

Symbols and Attributes

The myrtle is her tree: Virgil sets “the myrtle for beautiful Venus” beside the laurel of Apollo (Eclogue 7.62), and Ovid says that the Roman women who honour her on 1 April wash under the green myrtle, because Venus once hid behind a myrtle bush when satyrs saw her drying her hair on the shore (Fasti 4.139–144). Doves are her birds; Aeneas recognises two doves as “his mother’s birds” and follows them to the golden bough (Aeneid 6.190–196). Her son Cupid is her strength: in Virgil she calls him “my strength, my great power” (Aeneid 1.664), and in Ovid “my arms, my hands, my power”, and tells him to take the arrows “with which you conquer all” (Metamorphoses 5.363–367).

Roles and Influence

Goddess of Love and Beauty

Hesiod says that Eros and Desire went with the newborn Aphrodite, and that her share among gods and men is girls’ whispers, smiles and deceptions, sweet delight, and gentle love (Theogony 201–206). Ovid describes Venus as the force behind all attraction. She taught people to join in pairs, and she keeps birds, animals and fish breeding; she brought people refinement and care of their appearance, and love-songs under shut doors came from her (Fasti 4.91–114).

Venus and Victory

Romans also honoured Venus for victory. Pompey dedicated a temple of Venus Victrix and held games with fighting elephants to mark it (Pliny the Elder, Natural History 8.7). Pliny also says that Postumius Tubertus, the first general to enter Rome with an ovation, wore a wreath of the myrtle of Venus Victrix, and that ovation wreaths were made of myrtle ever after (Natural History 15.38). After the disaster at Lake Trasimene in 217 BC, the dictator Quintus Fabius Maximus vowed a temple to Venus Erycina, which was dedicated on the Capitol soon afterwards (Livy 22.9.10, 22.10.10, 23.30.13, 23.31.9).

Myths Involving Venus

Marriage to Vulcan

In Virgil, Venus is the wife of Vulcan (the Greek Hephaestus). She goes to his golden bedchamber to ask him to forge arms for her son Aeneas, and Vulcan yields to her (Aeneid 8.370–392).

Affair with Mars

Her affair with Mars (the Greek Ares) is told in the Odyssey, where the singer Demodocus sings how the two first made love secretly in Hephaestus’ house (Odyssey 8.266–270). In Ovid, the Sun sees them and tells Vulcan; Vulcan makes a net of fine bronze chains and catches the lovers in the bed, and the gods laugh at them (Metamorphoses 4.171–189). Hesiod names the children of Aphrodite and Ares as Phobos (Fear), Deimos (Terror) and Harmonia, whom Cadmus married (Theogony 933–937). Cupid is not counted among them in Hesiod; the Roman poets call him Venus’ son without naming his father (Aeneid 1.664).

Venus and Anchises

Aeneas was the son of Venus and the Trojan Anchises. In the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, the goddess appeared to Anchises as an unmarried girl and told him that she was not a goddess but a mortal, the daughter of Otreus, who ruled all Phrygia (Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 81–83, 108–112). She later revealed herself, told him not to fear, and foretold that their son would be named Aeneas (Hymn to Aphrodite 192–199). In Virgil, Venus protects Aeneas throughout: she meets him in Libya disguised as a huntress (Aeneid 1.314–320), appears to him as his mother during the fall of Troy (Aeneid 2.589–593), and arranges his arms (Aeneid 8.370–392).

Venus, Paris and Troy

Virgil names the Judgement of Paris and the insult to her beauty as one of the reasons Juno hated Troy (Aeneid 1.26–27); see The Judgement of Paris for the story. Venus rescued Paris from Menelaus in the Iliad (Iliad 3.380–382). Ovid says that Venus fought for Troy and was wounded in the hand by a spear, and that she beat the two other goddesses before a Trojan judge (Fasti 4.119–122).

Venus and Adonis

In Ovid, Cupid scratches his mother with an arrow by accident, and she falls in love with the beautiful Adonis. She warns him to avoid dangerous animals, but a boar kills him while hunting; Venus sprinkles his blood with nectar and a blood-red flower springs from it, short-lived, shaken off by the winds that give it its name, the anemone or “wind-flower” (Metamorphoses 10.519–528, 10.708–739).

Pygmalion

Ovid tells that the sculptor Pygmalion carved an ivory woman and fell in love with her. At the festival of Venus on Cyprus he prayed at her altar for a wife “like my ivory girl”, and Venus brought the statue to life (Metamorphoses 10.243–249, 10.270–294).

Venus in Roman Culture

Venus as the Ancestral Mother

Because Aeneas was her son, Venus was the mother of the Roman line. Ovid traces the descent through Anchises, Aeneas and Iulus to the Julian house, and adds that Romulus always called Venus and Mars his parents (Fasti 4.31–58). Virgil has Jupiter promise that a Trojan Caesar will be born, “Julius, a name handed down from great Iulus” (Aeneid 1.286–288). Caesar’s temple of Venus Genetrix received his breastplate of British pearls (Pliny the Elder, Natural History 9.57), and Augustus held games in honour of Venus Genetrix soon after Caesar’s death (Natural History 2.23).

Temples and Worship

During the Samnite Wars, Quintus Fabius Gurges built a temple of Venus near the Circus with the fines of women convicted of adultery (Livy 10.31.9). A second temple of Venus Erycina was dedicated later at the Porta Collina (Livy 40.34.3). On 1 April Roman women honoured Venus by taking off their necklaces and washing her statue, and bathing under myrtle; Fortuna Virilis was honoured the same day (Ovid, Fasti 4.133–150). Ovid also explains how she got her title as the goddess who turns hearts (verso corde): when chastity declined in Rome, the Romans consulted the Sibyl of Cumae, who ordered temples for Venus (Fasti 4.157–160).

Astronomical Significance

The Planet Venus

The brightest planet was named for her. Pliny says that when it rises before the sun it is called Lucifer, and when it shines in the west it is called Vesper (Natural History 2.6).

Venus Sources

Hesiod, Theogony 188–206, 933–937. Homer, Iliad 3.380–382, 5.370–371; Odyssey 8.266–270. Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 81–83, 108–112, 192–199. Virgil, Eclogue 7.62; Aeneid 1.26–27, 1.254–256, 1.286–288, 1.314–320, 1.664–666, 2.589–593, 6.190–196, 8.370–392. Ovid, Metamorphoses 4.171–189, 5.363–367, 10.243–294, 10.519–739; Fasti 4.1–160. Livy 10.31.9, 22.9.10, 22.10.10, 23.30.13, 23.31.9, 40.34.3. Pliny the Elder, Natural History 2.6, 2.23, 8.7, 9.57, 15.38.

See Also: Aphrodite, Vulcan, Mars, Aeneas, Anchises, Adonis, Paris, Judgement of Paris, Planets