The gate of the year

Figure on the left:

11) Bronze statue of Aphrodite, dating to about 200-150 B.C., now in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA, USA. The artwork shows the goddess Aphrodite holding in her hand an apple: the mythological reference is to the episode in which the young Paris is asked to express his judgment about who was the most beautiful among the goddesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite. According to the legend, while Peleus and Thetis (Achilles’ parents) celebrated their marriage, the goddess Eris (the Discord) appeared suddenly. She was the only deity who was not invited at the feast. She threw among the gods, with an angry gesture, an apple with the inscription “To the most beautiful one”, provoking the competition between the three goddesses. The choice of Paris was favorable to Aphrodite, because the goddess had promised him the love of Helen, the most beautiful woman in the world. This event was the premise for the long epic of the Trojan War, the expedition conducted by the Greeks to return back to his legitimate husband, Menelaus king of Sparta, the beautiful Helen, escaped with Paris to Troy. Thus it is emphasized Aphrodite’s particular relationship with war, though she was the goddess of eros and love. Indeed, among the few amorous adventures attributed to the goddess, the most well-known was her relationship with Ares, the god of war, when she was married with Hephaestus, the blacksmith god (Odyssey, VIII, 266-366).
As evidence of this association of the goddess with war, one can mention the representations of an armed Aphrodite, of which there is notice in some localities of the Hellenic world. If Aphrodite is the goddess who elicits eros in every form (heterosexual and homosexual) and in every context (among spouses and lovers), she was also a goddess with an association with the world of death. An agreement with Persephone, the Mistress of the World of the Dead, permits her to share the love of the beautiful Adonis. During one part of the year he should have to spend his time with Aphrodite, while the other part was to be devoted to Persephone. These tales emphasize the profound interlacement and irrepressible complementarity the Greeks foresaw between the vital force, the generative power, and death. Such a connection was further confirmed by Aphrodite’s cult attested in Delphi, the site where the great temple dedicated to Apollo was located, under the name of Aphrodite Epitymbia (“Who stays on the graves”): near her statue ceremonies were celebrated during which the souls of the dead were evoked (Cassola 1994, p. 234).

[Source: http://gwenminor.com/?tag=getty-villa]

Figure on the right:

Black stone, an aniconic image of the goddess from the temple of Aphrodite at Paphos, now in the nearby Museum harbored in the old Palace of the House of Lusignan, Paphos, Greece. According to tradition, the goddess Aphrodite was born from the sea foam on the shores of the island of Cyprus, and in this island, at Paphos, was located one of the most prominent sites of her worship. Here the goddess was venerated under the shape of a black piece of stone, probably since the most ancient past. From the Neolithic period onward, to megaliths was attributed a sacral value, they were regarded as symbols/manifestations of fertility and points of contact with the world of the dead

[Source: http://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=16715]




Female Symbols

Back

Figure on the left: 11) Bronze statue of Aphrodite, dating to about 200-150 B.C., now in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA, USA. The artwork shows the goddess Aphrodite holding in her hand an apple: the mythological reference is to the episode in which the young Paris is asked to express his judgment about who was the most beautiful among the goddesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite. According to the legend, while Peleus and Thetis (Achilles’ parents) celebrated their marriage, the goddess Eris (the Discord) appeared suddenly. She was the only deity who was not invited at the feast. She threw among the gods, with an angry gesture, an apple with the inscription “To the most beautiful one”, provoking the competition between the three goddesses. The choice of Paris was favorable to Aphrodite, because the goddess had promised him the love of Helen, the most beautiful woman in the world. This event was the premise for the long epic of the Trojan War, the expedition conducted by the Greeks to return back to his legitimate husband, Menelaus king of Sparta, the beautiful Helen, escaped with Paris to Troy. Thus it is emphasized Aphrodite’s particular relationship with war, though she was the goddess of eros and love. Indeed, among the few amorous adventures attributed to the goddess, the most well-known was her relationship with Ares, the god of war, when she was married with Hephaestus, the blacksmith god (Odyssey, VIII, 266-366). As evidence of this association of the goddess with war, one can mention the representations of an armed Aphrodite, of which there is notice in some localities of the Hellenic world. If Aphrodite is the goddess who elicits eros in every form (heterosexual and homosexual) and in every context (among spouses and lovers), she was also a goddess with an association with the world of death. An agreement with Persephone, the Mistress of the World of the Dead, permits her to share the love of the beautiful Adonis. During one part of the year he should have to spend his time with Aphrodite, while the other part was to be devoted to Persephone. These tales emphasize the profound interlacement and irrepressible complementarity the Greeks foresaw between the vital force, the generative power, and death. Such a connection was further confirmed by Aphrodite’s cult attested in Delphi, the site where the great temple dedicated to Apollo was located, under the name of Aphrodite Epitymbia (“Who stays on the graves”): near her statue ceremonies were celebrated during which the souls of the dead were evoked (Cassola 1994, p. 234). [Source: http://gwenminor.com/?tag=getty-villa] Figure on the right: Black stone, an aniconic image of the goddess from the temple of Aphrodite at Paphos, now in the nearby Museum harbored in the old Palace of the House of Lusignan, Paphos, Greece. According to tradition, the goddess Aphrodite was born from the sea foam on the shores of the island of Cyprus, and in this island, at Paphos, was located one of the most prominent sites of her worship. Here the goddess was venerated under the shape of a black piece of stone, probably since the most ancient past. From the Neolithic period onward, to megaliths was attributed a sacral value, they were regarded as symbols/manifestations of fertility and points of contact with the world of the dead [Source: http://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=16715]