The Latin theonymVenus and the common nounvenus ('love, charm') stem from aProto-Italic form reconstructed as*wenos- ('desire'), itself fromProto-Indo-European (PIE)*wenh₁-os ('desire'; cf.MessapicVenas,Old Indicvánas 'desire').[1][2]
Derivatives includevenustus ('attractive, charming'),venustās ('charm, grace'),venerius ('of Venus, erotic'),venerāre ('to adore, revere, honor, venerate, worship'), andvenerātiō ('adoration').[1]Venus is alsocognate with Latinvenia ('favour, permission') andvēnor ('to hunt') through to common PIE root*wenh₁- ('to strive for, wish for, desire, love').[1][3]
Venus has been described as perhaps "the most original creation of the Roman pantheon",[5]: 146 and "an ill-defined and assimilative" native goddess, combined "with a strange and exotic Aphrodite".[a] Her cults may represent the religiously legitimate charm and seduction of the divine by mortals, in contrast to the formal, contractual relations between most members of Rome's official pantheon and the state, and theunofficial, illicit manipulation of divine forces through magic.[5]: 13–64 [7] The ambivalence of her persuasive functions has been perceived in the relationship of the root*wenos- with its Latin derivativevenenum ('poison'; from*wenes-no 'love drink' or 'addicting'),[8] in the sense of "a charm, magicphiltre".[9]
Venus seems to have had no origin myth until her association with Greek Aphrodite. Venus-Aphrodite emerged, already in adult form, from thesea foam (Greekαφρός,aphros) produced by the severed genitals ofCaelus-Uranus.[10] Romantheology presents Venus as the yielding, watery female principle, essential to the generation and balance of life. Her male counterparts in the Roman pantheon,Vulcan andMars, are active and fiery. Venus absorbs and tempers the male essence, uniting the opposites of male and female in mutual affection. She is essentially assimilative and benign, and embraces several otherwise quite disparate functions. She can give military victory, sexual success, good fortune and prosperity. In one context, she is a goddess of prostitutes; in another, she turns the hearts of men and women from sexual vice to virtue.Varro's theology identifies Venus with water as an aspect of the female principle. To generate life, the watery matrix of the womb requires the virile warmth of fire. To sustain life, water and fire must be balanced; excess of either one, or their mutual antagonism, is unproductive or destructive.[11]: 12, 15–16, 24–26, 149–50
Prospective brides offered Venus a gift "before the wedding"; the nature of the gift, and its timing, are unknown. The wedding ceremony itself, and the state of lawful marriage, belonged toJuno – whose mythology allows her only a single marriage, and no divorce from her habitually errant spouse,Jupiter – but Venus and Juno are also likely "bookends" for the ceremony; Venus prepares the bride for "conubial bliss" and expectations of fertility within lawful marriage. Some Roman sources say that girls who come of age offer their toys to Venus; it is unclear where the offering is made, and others say this gift is to theLares.[12] In dice-games played withknucklebones, a popular pastime among Romans of all classes, the luckiest, best possible roll was known as "Venus".[13]
Venus and Mars, with Cupid attending, in a wall painting fromPompeii
Like other major Roman deities, Venus was given a number ofepithets that referred to her different cult aspects, roles, and her functional similarities to other deities. Her "original powers seem to have been extended largely by the fondness of the Romans for folk-etymology, and by the prevalence of the religious ideanomen-omen which sanctioned any identifications made in this way."[6]: 457 [b]
Venus Acidalia, inVirgil'sAeneid (1.715–22, asmater acidalia).Servius speculates this "rare" and "strangely recondite epithet" as reference to a mooted "Fountain of Acidalia" (fons acidalia) where theGraces (Venus's daughters) were said to bathe; but he also connects it to the Greek word for "dart", "needle", "arrow", whence "love's arrows" and love's bitter "cares and pangs".Ovid usesacidalia only in the latter sense.Venus Acidalia is likely a literary conceit, formed by Virgil from earlier usages in whichacidalia had no evident connection to Venus. It was almost certainly not a cultic epithet.[15]
Venus Anadyomene (Venus "rising from the sea"), based on a once-famous painting by the Greek artistApelles showing the birth of Aphrodite from sea-foam, fully adult and supported by a more-than-lifesized scallop shell. The Italian Renaissance painterSandro Botticelli used the type in hisThe Birth of Venus. Other versions of Venus's birth show her standing on land or shoreline, wringing the sea-water from her hair.[16]
Venus Barbata ("Bearded Venus"), mentioned inServius's commentary on Virgil'sAeneid.[17]Macrobius'sSaturnalia describes a statue of Venus inCyprus, bearded, with male genitalia but in female attire and figure (see alsoAphroditus). Her worshippers cross-dressed - men wore women's clothes, and women wore men's. Macrobius says that Aristophanes called this figureAphroditos. The Latin poetLaevius wrote of worshipping "nurturing Venus" whether female or male(sive femina sive mas).[18] Several examples of Greek and Roman sculpture show her in theattitudeanasyrmene, from the Greek verbanasyromai, "to pull up one's clothes"[19] to reveal her male genitalia. The gesture traditionally heldapotropaic or magical power.[20]
VenusCaelestis (Celestial or Heavenly Venus), used from the 2nd century AD for Venus as an aspect of a syncretised supreme goddess.Venus Caelestis is the earliest known Roman recipient of ataurobolium (a form of bull sacrifice), performed at her shrine inPozzuoli on 5 October 134. This form of the goddess, and the taurobolium, are associated with the "Syrian Goddess", understood as a late equivalent toAstarte, or the RomanMagna Mater, the latter being another supposedly Trojan "Mother of the Romans", as well as "Mother of the Gods".[21]
Venus Calva ("Venus the bald one"), a legendary form of Venus, attested only by post-Classical Roman writings which offer several traditions to explain this appearance and epithet. In one, it commemorates the virtuous offer by Roman matrons of their own hair to make bowstrings during a siege of Rome. In another, kingAncus Marcius's wife and other Roman women lost their hair during an epidemic; in hope of its restoration, unafflicted women sacrificed their own hair to Venus.[5]: 83–89 [c]
Venus Cloacina ("Venus the Purifier"); a fusion of Venus with the Etruscan water goddessCloacina, who had an ancient shrine above the outfall of theCloaca Maxima, originally a stream, later covered over to function as Rome's main sewer. The rites conducted at the shrine were probably meant to purify the culvert's polluted waters andnoxious airs.[24][25] In some traditions, Titus Tatius was responsible for the introduction of lawful marriage to Rome, and Venus-Cloacina promoted, protected and purified sexual intercourse between married couples.[26]
Venus Euploia (Venus of the "fair voyage"), also known asVenus Pontia (Venus of the Sea"), because she smooths the waves for mariners. She is probably based on the influential image of Aphrodite byPraxiteles, once housed in atemple by the sea but now lost. Most copies of its Venus image would have been supported by dolphins, and worn diadems and carved veils, inferring her birth from sea-foam, and a consequent identity as Queen of the Sea, and patroness of sailors and navigation. Roman copies would have embellished baths and gymnasiums.[30][16]
Venus Frutis honoured by all the Latins with a federal cult at the temple namedFrutinal in Lavinium.[31][d] Inscriptions found at Lavinium attest the presence of federal cults, without giving precise details.[e]
Venus Felix ("Lucky Venus"), probably a traditional epithet, combining aspects of Venus andFortuna, goddess of both good and bad fortune and personification of luck, whose iconography includes the rudder of a ship, found in some Pompeian examples of the regalVenus Physica. A form of Venus usually identified as Venus Felix was adopted by the dictatorSulla to legitimise his victories over his domestic and foreign opponents during Rome's late Republican civil and foreign wars; Rives finds it very unlikely that Sulla would have imposed this humiliating connection on unwilling or conquered domestic territories once allied to Samnium, such as Pompei.[34]The emperorHadrian built a temple toVenus Felix et Roma Aeterna on theVia Sacra. The same epithet is used fora specific sculpture at the Vatican Museums.
Venus Heliopolitana ("Venus ofHeliopolis Syriaca"), a Romano-Syrian form of Venus atBaalbek, variously identified withAshtart,Dea Syria andAtargatis, though inconsistently and often on very slender grounds. She has been historically identified as one third of a so-calledHeliopolitan Triad, and thus a wife to presumed sun-god "Syrian Jupiter" (Baal) and mother of "Syrian Mercury" (Adon). The "Syrian Mercury" is sometimes thought as another sun-god, or a syncretised form ofBacchus as a"dying and rising" god, and thus a god of Springtime. No such Triad seems to have existed prior to Baalbek's 15 BC colonisation by Augustus's veterans. It may be a modern scholarly artifice.[35]
Venus Kallipygos ("Venus with the beautiful buttocks"), a statue, and possibly a statue type, after a lost Greek original. FromSyracuse, Sicily.[36]
Venus Libertina ("Venus theFreedwoman"), probably arising through the semantic similarity and cultural links betweenlibertina (as "a free woman") andlubentina (possibly meaning "pleasurable" or "passionate"). Further titles or variants acquired by Venus through the same process, or through orthographic variance, include Libentia, Lubentina, and Lubentini.Venus Libitina links Venus to a patron-goddess offunerals and undertakers,Libitina, who also became synonymous with death; a temple was dedicated to Venus Libitina in Libitina's grove on theEsquiline Hill, "hardly later than 300 BC".[f]
Julius Caesar, with Venus holdingVictoria on reverse, from February or March 44 BC
Crispina, wife ofCommodus, with enthroned Venus Felix holding Victory on reverse
Venus Murcia ("Venus of the Myrtle"), merging Venus with the little-known deityMurcia (or Murcus, or Murtia). Murcia was associated with Rome's Mons Murcia (theAventine's lesser height), and had a shrine in theCircus Maximus. Some sources associate her with the myrtle-tree. Christian writers described her as a goddess of sloth and laziness.[38]
Venus Obsequens ("Indulgent Venus"[39]), Venus's first attested Roman epithet. It was used in the dedication of her first Roman temple, on August 19 in 295 BC during theThird Samnite War byQuintus Fabius Maximus Gurges. It was sited somewhere near the Aventine Hill and Circus Maximus, and played a central role in theVinalia Rustica. It was supposedly funded by fines imposed on women found guilty ofadultery.[11]: 89
Venus Physica, Venus as a universal, natural creative force that informs the physical world. She is addressed as "Alma Venus" ("Mother Venus") byLucretius in the introductory lines of his vivid, poetic exposition ofEpicurean physics and philosophy,De Rerum Natura. She seems to have been a favourite of Lucretius's patron,Memmius.[40]
Venus Physica Pompeiana was Pompeii's protective goddess, antedating Sulla's imposition of a colonia namedColonia VeneriaCornelia after his family and Venus, following his siege and capture of Pompeii from theSamnites. Venus also had a distinctive, local form asVenus Pescatrice ("Venus the Fisher-woman") a goddess of the sea, and trade. For Sulla's claims of Venus's favour, seeVenus Felix above).[41][42] Pompeii's Temple of Venus was built sometime in the 1st century BC, before Sulla's colonisation.[43] This local form of Venus had Roman,Oscan and local Pompeiian influences.[44] LikeVenus Physica,Venus Physica Pompeiana is also a regal form of "Nature Mother" and a guarantor of success in love.[45]
Venus Verticordia ("Venus the Changer of Hearts"), celebrated at theVeneralia for her ability to transform untethered desire (libido) intopudicitia, sexuality expressed within socially permitted bounds, hence marriage.
Venus Victrix ("Venus the Victorious"), a Romanised aspect of the armed Aphrodite that Greeks had inherited from the East, where the goddessIshtar "remained a goddess of war, and Venus could bring victory to aSulla or a Caesar".[46]Pompey vied with his patron Sulla and with Caesar for public recognition as her protégé. In 55 BC he dedicated a temple to her at the top of histheater in theCampus Martius. She had a shrine on theCapitoline Hill, and festivals on August 12 and October 9. A sacrifice was annually dedicated to her on the latter date. In neo-classical art, her epithet as Victrix is often used in the sense of 'Venus Victorious over men's hearts' or in the context of theJudgement of Paris (e.g.Canova'sVenus Victrix, a half-nude reclining portrait ofPauline Bonaparte).
The first known temple to Venus wasvowed toVenus Obsequens byQ. Fabius Gurges in the heat of a battle against theSamnites. It was dedicated in 295 BC, at a site near theAventine Hill, and was supposedly funded by fines imposed on Roman women for sexual misdemeanours. Its rites and character were probably influenced by or based on GreekAphrodite's cults, which were already diffused in various forms throughout ItalianMagna Graeca. Its dedication date connectsVenus Obsequens to theVinalia rustica festival.[6]: 456 [g]
In 217 BC, in the early stages of theSecond Punic War withCarthage, Rome suffered a disastrous defeat at thebattle of Lake Trasimene. TheSibylline oracle suggested that Carthage might be defeated if the Venus ofEryx (Venus Erycina), patroness goddess of Carthage's Sicilian allies, could be persuaded to change her allegiance. Rome laid siege to Eryx and promised its goddess a magnificent temple as reward for her defection. Theycaptured her image, brought it to Rome and installed it in a temple on theCapitoline Hill, as one of Rome's twelvedii consentes. Shorn of her more overtly Carthaginian characteristics,[h] this "foreign Venus" became Rome'sVenus Genetrix ("Venus the Mother"),[29]: 80, 83 [47][48] Roman tradition made Venus the mother and protector of the Trojan princeAeneas, ancestor of the Romans, so as far as the Romans were concerned, this was the homecoming of an ancestral goddess to her people. Soon after, Rome's defeat of Carthage confirmed Venus's goodwill to Rome, her links to its mythical Trojan past, and her support of its political and military hegemony.[i]
The Capitoline cult to Venus seems to have been reserved to higher status Romans. A separate cult toVenus Erycina as a fertility deity,[50] was established in 181 BC, in a traditionally plebeian district just outsideRome's sacred boundary, near theColline Gate. The temple, cult and goddess probably retained much of the original's character and rites.[50][52]: 4, 8, 14 Likewise, a shrine to Venus Verticordia ("Venus the changer of hearts"), established in 114 BC but with links to an ancient cult of Venus-Fortuna, was "bound to the peculiar milieu of the Aventine and the Circus Maximus" – a strongly plebeian context for Venus's cult, in contrast to her aristocratic cultivation as aStoic andEpicurian "all-goddess".[j]
Towards the end of theRoman Republic, some leading Romans laid personal claims to Venus's favour. The general anddictatorSulla adoptedFelix ("Lucky") as a surname, acknowledging his debt to heaven-sent good fortune and his particular debt toVenus Felix, for his extraordinarily fortunate political and military career.[k] His protégéPompey competed for Venus's support, dedicating (in 55 BC) a large temple toVenus Victrix as part of his lavishly appointed newtheatre, and celebrating his triumph of 54 BC with coins that showed her crowned with triumphal laurels.[49]: 22–23
Pompey's erstwhile friend, ally, and later opponentJulius Caesar went still further. He claimed the favours ofVenus Victrix in his military success andVenus Genetrix as a personal, divine ancestress – apparently a long-standing family tradition among theJulii. When Caesar was assassinated, his heir,Augustus, adopted both claims as evidence of his inherent fitness for office, and divine approval of his rule.[l] Augustus's new temple toMars Ultor, divine father of Rome's legendary founderRomulus, would have underlined the point, with the image of avenging Mars "almost certainly" accompanied by that of his divine consort Venus, and possibly a statue of thedeceased and deified Caesar.[29]: 199–200
Vitruvius recommends that any new temple to Venus be sited according to rules laid down by theEtruscanharuspices, and built "near to the gate" of the city, where it would be less likely to contaminate "the matrons and youth with the influence of lust". He finds the Corinthian style, slender, elegant, enriched with ornamental leaves and surmounted byvolutes, appropriate to Venus's character and disposition.[m] Vitruvius recommends the widest possible spacing between the temple columns, producing a light and airy space, and he offers Venus's temple in Caesar's forum as an example of how not to do it; the densely spaced, thickset columns darken the interior, hide the temple doors and crowd the walkways, so that matrons who wish to honour the goddess must enter her temple in single file, rather than arm-in arm.[n]
In 135 AD the EmperorHadrian inaugurateda temple to Venus andRoma Aeterna (Eternal Rome) on Rome'sVelian Hill, underlining the Imperial unity of Rome and its provinces, and making Venus the protectivegenetrix of the entire Roman state, its people and fortunes. It was the largest temple in Ancient Rome.[58][29]: 257–58, 260
Fresco with a seated Venus, restored as a personification of Rome in the so-called "Dea Barberini" ("Barberini goddess"); Roman artwork, dated first half of the 4th century AD, from a room near the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Laterano
Venus was offeredofficial (state-sponsored) cult in certainfestivals of the Roman calendar. Her sacred month was April (LatinMensis Aprilis) which Roman etymologists understood to derive fromaperire, "to open", with reference to the springtime blossoming of trees and flowers.[o] In theinterpretatio romana of theGermanic pantheon during the early centuries AD, Venus became identified with the Germanic goddessFrijjo, giving rise to the loan translation "Friday" fordies Veneris.
Veneralia (April 1) was held in honour ofVenus Verticordia ("Venus the Changer of Hearts"), andFortuna Virilis (Virile or strong Good Fortune[citation needed])), whose cult was probably by far the older of the two. Venus Verticordia was invented in 220 BC, in response to advice from a Sibylline oracle during Rome'sPunic Wars,[p] when a series ofprodigies was taken to signify divine displeasure at sexual offenses among Romans of every category and class, including several men and threeVestal Virgins.[11]: 105–09 The statue of Venus Verticordia was dedicated by a young woman, chosen as the mostpudica (sexually pure) in Rome by a committee of Roman matrons. At first, this statue was probably housed in the temple ofFortuna Virilis, perhaps as divine reinforcement against the perceived moral and religious failings of its cult. In 114 BCVenus Verticordia was given her own temple.[60] She was meant to persuade Romans of both sexes and every class, whether married or unmarried, to cherish the traditional sexual proprieties andmorality known to please the gods and benefit the State. During her rites, her image was taken from her temple to the men's baths, where it was undressed and washed in warm water by her female attendants, then garlanded with myrtle. Women and men asked Venus Verticordia's help in affairs of the heart, sex, betrothal and marriage. ForOvid, Venus's acceptance of the epithet and its attendant responsibilities represented a change of heart in the goddess herself.[q][61]
Vinalia urbana (April 23), a wine festival shared by Venus andJupiter, king of the gods. It offered opportunity to supplicants to ask Venus's intercession with Jupiter, who was thought to be susceptible to her charms, and amenable to the effects of her wine. Venus was patroness of "profane" wine, for everyday human use. Jupiter was patron of the strongest, purest, sacrificial grade wine, and controlled the weather on which the autumn grape-harvest would depend. At this festival, men and women alike drank the new vintage of ordinary, non-sacral wine (pressed at the previous year'svinalia rustica) in honour of Venus, whose powers had provided humankind with this gift. Upper-class women gathered at Venus's Capitoline temple, where a libation of the previous year's vintage, sacred to Jupiter, was poured into a nearby ditch.[62] Common girls (vulgares puellae) and prostitutes gathered at Venus's temple just outside the Colline gate, where they offered her myrtle, mint, and rushes concealed in rose-bunches and asked her for "beauty and popular favour", and to be made "charming and witty".[63]
Vinalia Rustica (August 19), originally a rusticLatin festival of wine, vegetable growth and fertility. This was almost certainly Venus's oldest festival and was associated with her earliest known form,Venus Obsequens. Kitchen gardens and market-gardens, and presumably vineyards were dedicated to her.[r] Roman opinions differed on whose festival it was. Varro insists that the day was sacred to Jupiter, whose control of the weather governed the ripening of the grapes; but the sacrificial victim, a female lamb (agna), may be evidence that it once belonged to Venus alone.[s][t]
A festival ofVenus Genetrix (September 26) was held under state auspices from 46 BC ather Temple in theForum of Caesar, in fulfillment of a vow byJulius Caesar, who claimed her personal favour as his divine patroness, and ancestral goddess of theJulian clan. Caesar dedicated the temple during his extraordinarily lavish quadruple triumph. At the same time, he waspontifex maximus and Rome's senior magistrate; the festival is thought to mark the unprecedented promotion of a personal, family cult to one of the Roman state. Caesar's heir, Augustus, made much of these personal and family associations with Venus as an Imperial deity.[65][u] The festival's rites are not known.
As with most major gods and goddesses inRoman mythology, the literary concept of Venus is mantled in whole-cloth borrowings from the literaryGreek mythology of her counterpart, Aphrodite, but with significant exceptions. In some Latin mythology,Cupid was the son of Venus andMars, the god of war. At other times, or in parallel myths and theologies, Venus was understood to be the consort ofVulcan or as mother of the "second cupid", fathered byMercury.[w]Virgil, in compliment to his patronAugustus and thegens Julia, embellished an existing connection between Venus, whomJulius Caesar had adopted as his protectress, and the Trojan princeAeneas, refugee from Troy's destruction and eventual ancestor of the Roman people. Virgil's Aeneas is guided toLatium by Venus in her heavenly form, the morning star, shining brightly before him in the daylight sky; much later, she lifts Caesar's soul to heaven.[x] InOvid'sFasti Venus came to Rome because she "preferred to be worshipped in the city of her own offspring".[67] In Virgil's poetic account ofOctavian's victory at the sea-battle of Actium, the future emperor is allied with Venus,Neptune andMinerva. Octavian's opponents,Antony,Cleopatra and the Egyptians, assisted by bizarre and unhelpfulEgyptian deities such as "barking"Anubis, lose the battle.[68]
Cupid (lust or desire) and Amor (affectionate love) are taken to be different names for the same Roman love-god, the son of Venus, fathered byMercury,Vulcan or Mars.[69] Childlike or boyish winged figures who accompany Venus, whether singly, in pairs or more, have been variously identified as Amores,Cupids,Erotes or forms of GreekEros. The most ancient of these is Eros, whomHesiod categorises as aprimordial deity, emerging fromChaos as a generative power with neither mother nor father. Eros was thepatron deity ofThespiae, where he was embodied as ananiconic stone as late as the 2nd century AD. From at least the 5th century BC he also had the form of an adolescent or pre-adolescent male, atElis (on thePeloponnese) and elsewhere in Greece, acquiring wings, bow and arrows, and divine parents in the love-goddess Aphrodite and the war-god Ares. He had temples of his own, and shared others with Aphrodite.[70][71]
Fragmentary base for an altar of Venus and Mars, showing cupids orerotes playing with the war-god's weapons andchariot. From the reign ofTrajan (98–117 AD)
At Elis, and inAthens, Eros shared cult with a twin, named Anteros.Xenophon'sSocraticSymposion 8. 1, features a dinner-guest witheros (love) for his wife; in return, she hasanteros (reciprocal love) for him. Some sources suggest Anteros as avenger of "slighted love". InServius's 4th century commentary on Virgil'sAeneas, Cupid is a deceptive agent of Venus, impersonating Aeneas's son and makingDido, queen ofCarthage, forget her husband. When Aeneas rejects her love, and covertly leaves Carthage to fulfill his destiny as ancestor of the Roman people, Dido is said to invoke Anteros as "contrary to Cupid". She falls into hatred and despair, curses Rome, and when Aeneas leaves, commits suicide.[y][72][71]
Ovid's Fasti, Book 4, invokes Venus not by name but as "Mother of the Twin Loves", thegemini amores.[z] "Amor" is the Latin name preferred by Roman poets andliterati for the personification of "kindly" love. Where Cupid (lust) can be imperious, cruel, prone to mischief or even war-like, Amor softly persuades.Cato the Elder, having aStoic's outlook, sees Cupid as a deity of greed and blind passion, morally inferior to Amor. The Roman playwrightPlautus, however, has Venus, Cupid and Amor working together.[71]
In Roman cult inscriptions and theology, "Amor" is rare, and "Cupido" relatively common. No Roman temples seem dedicated to Cupid alone but the joint dedication formulaVenus Cupidoque ("Venus and Cupid") is evidence of his cult, shared with Venus at her Temple just outside the Colline Gate and elsewhere. He would also have featured in many private household cults. In private and public areas alike, statues of Venus and Mars attended by Cupid, or Venus, Cupid and minorerotes were sometimes donated by wealthy sponsors, to serve both religious and artistic purposes.[73][74] Cupid's roles in literary myth are usually limited to actions on behalf of Venus; inCupid and Psyche, one of the stories withinThe Golden Ass, by the Roman authorApuleius, the plot and its resolution are driven by Cupid's love for Psyche ("soul"), his filial disobedience, and his mother's envy.[71]
A medallion painting from the House of Marcus Fabius Rufus inPompeii, Italy, executed in theSecond Style and depicting the Greco-Roman goddess Venus-Aphrodite inregalia, withdiadem andscepter; it is dated to the 1st century BC.
Images of Venus have been found in domestic murals, mosaics and household shrines (lararia).Petronius, in hisSatyricon, places an image of Venus among theLares (household gods) of thefreedmanTrimalchio'slararium.[75]
The Venus types known asVenus Pompeiana ("Venus of Pompeii") andVenus Pescatrice ("Venus the Fisher-woman") are almost exclusive to Pompeii. Both forms of Venus are represented within Pompeian homes of the well-off, withVenus Pompeiana more commonly found in formal reception spaces, typically depicted in fullregalia, draped with a mantle, standing rigidly upright with her right arm across her chest. Images ofVenus Pescatrice tend to be more playful, usually found in less formal and less public "non-reception" areas: here, she usually holds afishing rod, and sits amidst landscape scenery, accompanied by at least onecupid.[76]
Venus'ssigns are for the most part the same as Aphrodite's. They includeroses, which were offered in Venus'sPorta Collina rites,[aa] and above all,myrtle (Latinmyrtus), which was cultivated for its white, sweetly scented flowers, aromatic, evergreen leaves and its various medical-magical properties. Venus's statues, and her worshipers, wore myrtle crowns at her festivals.[77] Before its adoption into Venus's cults, myrtle was used in the purification rites ofCloacina, the Etruscan-Roman goddess of Rome'smain sewer; later, Cloacina's association with Venus's sacred plant made herVenus Cloacina. Likewise, Roman folk-etymology transformed the ancient, obscure goddessMurcia into "Venus of the Myrtles, whom we now call Murcia".[78][ab]
Myrtle was thought a particularly potentaphrodisiac. As goddess of love and sex, Venus played an essential role at Roman prenuptial rites and wedding nights, so myrtle and roses were used in bridal bouquets. Marriage itself was not a seduction but a lawful condition, underJuno's authority; so myrtle was excluded from thebridal crown. Venus was also a patroness of the ordinary, everyday wine drunk by most Roman men and women; the seductive powers of wine were well known. In the rites toBona Dea, a goddess of female chastity,[ac] Venus, myrtle and anything male were not only excluded, but unmentionable. The rites allowed women to drink the strongest, sacrificial wine, otherwise reserved for the Roman gods and Roman men; the women euphemistically referred to it as "honey". Under these special circumstances, they could get virtuously, religiously drunk on strong wine, safe from male intrusion and Venus's temptations. Outside of this context, ordinary wine (that is, Venus's wine) tinctured with myrtle oil was thought particularly suitable for women.[79]
Venus's long association with wine reflects the inevitable connections between wine, intoxication and sex, expressed in the proverbial phrasesine Cerere et Baccho friget Venus (loosely translated as "without food and wine, Venus freezes"). It was used in various forms, notably by the Roman playwright,Terence, probably by others before him, and certainly into the early modern era. Although Venus played a central role in several wine festivals, the Roman god of wine wasBacchus, identified with GreekDionysus and the early Roman wine-godLiber Pater (Father of Freedom).[80]
Roman generals given anovation, a lesser form ofRoman triumph, wore a myrtle crown, perhaps to purify themselves and their armies of blood-guilt. The ovation ceremony was assimilated to Venus Victrix ("Victorious Venus"), who was held to have granted and purified its relatively "easy" victory.[81][49]: 63, 113
Venus riding aquadriga ofelephants, fresco fromPompeii, 1st century ADStatue of Venus of the Capitoline type, Roman, 2nd century AD, from Campo Iemini, housed in the British Museum
Roman and Hellenistic art produced many variations on the goddess, often based on thePraxitlean typeAphrodite of Cnidus. Many female nudes from this period of sculpture whose subjects are unknown are in modern art history conventionally called "Venus", even if they originally may have portrayed a mortal woman rather than operated as acult statue of the goddess.
Venus is remembered inDe Mulieribus Claris, a collection of biographies of historical and mythological women by theFlorentine authorGiovanni Boccaccio, composed in 1361–62. It is notable as the first collection devoted exclusively to biographies of women in Western literature.[82]
Medieval representation of Venus, sitting on a rainbow, with her devotees who offer their hearts to her, 15th century.
Venus, setting fire to the castle where the Rose is imprisoned, in the medieval French romanceRoman de la Rose. In this story Venus is portrayed as the mother ofCupid
Venus became a popular subject ofpainting andsculpture during theRenaissance period in Europe. As a "classical" figure for whomnudity was her natural state, it was socially acceptable to depict her unclothed. As the goddess ofsexuality, 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.
In the field ofprehistoric art, since the discovery in 1908 of the so-called "Venus of Willendorf" smallNeolithic sculptures of rounded female forms have been conventionally referred to asVenus figurines. Although the name of the actual deity is not known, the knowing contrast between the obese and fertilecult figures and the classical conception of Venus has raised resistance to the terminology.[citation needed]
^Eden (1963)[6]: 458ff discusses possible associations betweenAstarte or the "Venus ofEryx" and thebrassica speciesE. sativa, which the Romans considered an aphrodisiac.
^For further exposition ofnomen-omen (ornomen est omen) see[14]
^Ashby (1929) finds the existence of a temple to Venus Calva "very doubtful"; see[22]
^"At the midway between Ostia and Antium lies Lavinium that has a sanctuary of Aphrodite common to all Latin nations, but which is under the care of the Ardeans, who have entrusted the task to intendants".[32]
^"Sp. Turrianus Proculus Gellianus ... pater patratus ... Lavinium sacrorum principiorum p(opuli) R(omani) Quirt(ium) nominisque Latini qui apud Laurentis coluntur".[33]
^Eden (1963)[6]: 457 states that Varro rationalises the connections as"lubendo libido, libidinosus ac Venus Libentina et Libitina"[37]
^Schilling (1954)[5]: 87 suggests that Venus began as an abstraction of personal qualities, later assuming Aphrodite's attributes.
^Her Sicillian form probably combined elements of Aphrodite and a more warlike Carthaginian-Phoenician Astarte
^Venus's links with Troy can be traced to the epic, mythic history of theTrojan War, and theJudgement of Paris, in which the Trojan princeParis chose Aphrodite overHera andAthena, setting off a train of events that led to war between the Greeks and Trojans, and eventually to Troy's destruction. InRome's foundation myth, Venus was the divine mother of the Trojan prince Aeneas, and thus a divine ancestor of the Roman people as a whole.[49]: 23 The Punic Wars saw many similar introductions of foreign cult, including the Phrygian cult toMagna Mater, who also had mythical links to Troy. See also[29]: 80.
^The aristocratic ideology of an increasingly Hellenised Venus is "summarized by the famous invocation toVenus Physica inLucretius' poem."[53]
^Plutarch's original Greek translates this adopted surname, Felix, as Epaphroditus (Aphrodite's beloved); see[54]
^"At the battle of Pharsalus, Caesar also vowed a temple, in best republican fashion, to Venus Victrix, almost as if he were summoning Pompey's protectress to his side in the manner of anevocatio. Three years after Pompey's defeat at the battle of Actium, Caesar dedicated his new Roman Forum, complete with a temple to his ancestorVenus Genetrix, "apparently in fulfillment of the vow". The goddess helped provide a divine aura for her descendant, preparing the way for Caesar's own cult as adivus and the formal institution of theRoman Imperial cult.[55]
^Immediately after these remarks, Vitruvius prescribes the best positioning for temples to Venus's two divine consorts, Vulcan and Mars. Vulcan's should be outside the city, to reduce the dangers of fire, which is his element; Mars's too should be outside the city, so that "no armed frays may disturb the peace of the citizens, and that this divinity may, moreover, be ready to preserve them from their enemies and the perils of war."[56]
^The widely spaced, open style preferred by Vitruvius iseustylos. The densely pillared style he criticises ispycnostylos.[57]
^The origin is unknown, but it might derive fromApru, an Etruscan form of Greek Aphrodite's name.[59]
^Romans considered personal ethics or mentality to be functions of the heart.
^Vegetable-growers may have been involved in the dedications as a corporate guild.[6]: 451
^For associations of kind between Roman deities and their sacrificial victims, seeVictima.
^Varro explicitly denies that the festival belongs to Venus;[64] that implies he was aware of opposite scholarly and / or commonplace opinion. Lipka (2009) offers this apparent contradiction as an example of two Roman cults that offer "complementary functional foci".[51]: 42
^Sulla may have set some form of precedent, but there is no evidence that he built her a Temple. Caesar's associations with Venus as both a personal and state goddess may also have been propagated in the Roman provinces.[34]
^Sometimes interpreted as Eros-Cupid, as a symbol of the sexual union between the goddess and Anchises, but perhaps alluding also to the scene in theAeneid whenDido holds Cupid disguised as Ascanius in her lap as she falls in love with Aeneas.
^Cicero,On the nature of the Gods, 3.59 - 3.60; "The first Venus is the daughter of the Sky and the Day; I have seen her temple at Elis. The second was engendered from the sea‑foam, and as we are told became the mother by Mercury of the second Cupid. The third is the daughter of Jupiter and Dione, who wedded Vulcan, but who is said to have been the mother of Anteros by Mars. The fourth was conceived of Syria and Cyprus and is called Astarte; it is recorded that she married Adonis."
^Venus as a guide and protector of Aeneas and his descendants is a frequent motif in the Aeneid. See discussion throughout Williams (2003).[66]
^Cicero presents Anteros as a "third Cupid", fathered by Mars and birthed by a "third Venus", the huntressDiana (more usually described asvirgin). See Cicero,On the nature of the Gods, 3.59-3.60
^Ovid,Fasti, 4, 1:Amores, 3. 15. 1:Heroides, 7. 59: 16. 203. See also Catullus C. 3. 1, 13. 2: Horace, 1. 19. 1 :4. 1. 5.
^Eden (1963),[6]: 456 citingOvid.Fasti. 4:869–70, cf. I35–I38. Ovid describes the rites observed in the early Imperial era, when the temple environs were part of the Gardens of Sallust.
^de Simone, Carlo (2017). "Messapic". In Klein, Jared; Joseph, Brian; Fritz, Matthias (eds.).Handbook of Comparative and Historical Indo-European Linguistics. Vol. 3. Walter de Gruyter. p. 1843.ISBN978-3-11-054243-1.
^Mallory, J.P.; Adams, D.Q., eds. (1997).Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. Taylor & Francis. p. 158.ISBN1-884964-98-2.
^Vénus – figurine (photograph). Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon. Retrieved19 February 2021.
^abcdSchilling, R. (1954).La religion romaine de Venus depuis les origines jusqu'au temps d' Auguste. Paris, FR: Editions E. de Boccard.
^abcdefghEden, P.T. (1963). "Venus and the Cabbage".Hermes.91:448–59.
^R., Schilling (1962). "La relation Venus venia".Latomus.21:3–7.
^abcdStaples, Ariadne (1998).From Good Goddess to Vestal Virgins: Sex and category in Roman religion. Routledge.
^Hersch, Karen K.,The Roman Wedding: Ritual and Meaning in Antiquity, Cambridge University Press, 2010, pp. 66–67, 231-266.
^Whoever threw "Venus" had the right to appoint a "King of the Feast"; the "Venus" throw was also known as the "Basilicus" (from the Greek "king"). See article by James Yates, M.A., F.R.S., and primary sources on entryTalus, pp. 1095‑1096 of William Smith, D.C.L., LL.D.: A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, John Murray, London, 1875.
^O'Hara, James J. (1990). "The significance of Vergil's Acidalia Mater, and Venus Erycina in Catullus and Ovid".Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.93:335–42.doi:10.2307/311293.JSTOR311293.
^abMarcovich, Miroslav (1996). "From Ishtar to Aphrodite".Journal of Aesthetic Education.30 (2):43–59.doi:10.2307/3333191.JSTOR3333191.
^Venerem igitur almum adorans, sive femina sive mas est, as quoted by Macrobius,Saturnalia 3.8.3.
^Penner, Todd C., Stichele, Caroline Van der, editors,Mapping Gender in Ancient Religious Discourses, p. 22, 2007, Brill, isbn 90-04-15447-7
^Dominic Montserrat, "Reading Gender in the Roman World," inExperiencing Rome: Culture, Identity, and Power in the Roman Empire (Routledge, 2000), pp. 172–173.
^Pliny the Elder, remarking Venus as a goddess of union and reconciliation, identifies the shrine with a legendary episode in Rome's earliest history, in which the Romans, led byRomulus, and theSabines, led byTitus Tatius and carrying branches of myrtle, met there to make peace following therape of the Sabine women. Also cited in Wagenvoort, p. 180.
^McGinn, Thomas A.J. (1998).Prostitution, Sexuality, and the Law in Ancient Rome. Oxford University Press. p. 25.
^abcdeBeard, M.;Price, S.; North, J. (1998).Religions of Rome: A history, illustrated. Vol. 1. Cambridge University Press.
^Christie's online catalogueessay, citing Vermuele and Brauer,Stone Sculptures, The Greek, Roman and Etruscan Collections of the Harvard University Art Museums, pp. 50-51
^Paulus-Festus s. v. p. 80 L:Frutinal templum Veneris Fruti
^CIL X 797; cited inLiou-Gilles, B. (1996). "Naissance de la ligue latine. Mythe et culte de fondation".Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire.74 (1): 85.
^Havelock, Christine Mitchell,The Aphrodite of Knidos and Her Successors: A Historical Review of the Female Nude in Greek Art, University of Michigan Press, 2007, pp 100–102, ISBN 978-0-472-03277-8
^Beard, Mary (2008).The fires of Vesuvius : Pompeii lost and found. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. p. 280.ISBN978-0-674-02976-7.OCLC225874239.
^Orlin, Eric (2007), in Rüpke, J, ed.A Companion to Roman Religion, Blackwell publishing, p. 62.
^abcBeard, Mary (2007).The Roman Triumph. The Belknap Press.
^ab Lipka gives a foundation date of 181 BC for Venus's Colline temple.[51]: 72–73
^abLipka, Michael (2009).Roman Gods: A conceptual approach. Brill.
^abOrlin, Eric M. (2002). "Foreign cults in republican Rome: Rethinking the pomerial rule".Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome.47. University of Michigan Press:1–18.doi:10.2307/4238789.JSTOR4238789.
^Torelli, Mario (1992).Typology and Structure of Roman Historical Reliefs. University of Michigan Press. pp. 8–9.
^Carter, Jesse Benedict (1900). "The cognomina of the goddess 'Fortuna'".Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association.31: 66.doi:10.2307/282639.JSTOR282639.
^See entry "Cupid" inThe Classical Tradition, edited by Anthony Grafton, Glenn W. Most, and Salvatore Settis (Harvard University Press, 2010), pp. 244–246; cf Cicero,On the nature of the Gods, 3.59-3.60.
^O'Hara, James J. (1990). "The significance of Vergil's Acidalia Mater, and Venus Erycina in Catullus and Ovid".Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.93:335–338.doi:10.2307/311293.JSTOR311293.
^O'Hara, James J. (1990). "The significance of Vergil's Acidalia Mater, and Venus Erycina in Catullus and Ovid".Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.93:335–338.doi:10.2307/311293.JSTOR311293.
^Clark, Anna,Divine Qualities: Cult and Community in Republican Rome, Oxford University Press, 2007, p. 177.
^Leonard A. Curchin, Leonard A., "Personal Wealth in Roman Spain,"Historia 32.2 (1983), p. 230
^Versnel, H.S. (1994). "Transition and reversal in myth and ritual".Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion. Vol. 2. Brill. p. 262; see alsoVersnel, H.S. (April 1992). "The Festival for Bona Dea and the Thesmophoria".Greece & Rome. Second Series.39 (1): 44.doi:10.1017/S0017383500023974.S2CID162683316, citingPlutarch.Quaestiones Romanae. 20. For the total exclusion of myrtle (and therefore Venus) at Bona Dea's rites, seeBona Dea article.
^Bull, Malcolm,The Mirror of the Gods, How Renaissance Artists Rediscovered the Pagan Gods, Oxford UP, 2005, pp. 218_219ISBN978-0195219234
^Brouwer, Henrik H.J. (1997).Bona Dea : The sources and a description of the cult. E.J. Brill. p. 337.ISBN978-9004086067, citingPliny the Elder, Natural History, Ch 23, line 152–58; and Book 15, Ch.38, line 125
^Boccaccio, Giovanni (2003).Famous Women. I Tatti Renaissance Library. Vol. 1. Translated by Virginia Brown. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. xi.ISBN0-674-01130-9.
^Beard, M.,Price, S., North, J.,Religions of Rome: Volume 2, a Sourcebook, illustrated, Cambridge University Press, 1998, 2.1a, p. 27
Champeaux, J. (1987).Fortuna. Recherches sur le culte de la Fortuna à Rome et dans le monde romain des origines à la mort de César. II. Les Transformations de Fortuna sous le République. Rome: Ecole Française de Rome, pp. 378–395.
Eden, P.T., "Venus and the Cabbage",Hermes, 91, (1963), pp. 448–459.
Hammond, N.G.L. and Scullard, H.H. (eds.) (1970).The Oxford Classical Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (p. 113)
Langlands, Rebecca (2006).Sexual Morality in Ancient Rome. Cambridge University Press.ISBN978-0-521-85943-1.[1]
Lloyd-Morgan, G. (1986). "Roman Venus: public worship and private rites." In M. Henig and A. King (eds.),Pagan Gods and Shrines of the Roman Empire (pp. 179–188). Oxford: Oxford Committee for Archaeology Monograph 8.
Nash, E. (1962).Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Rome Volume 1. London: A. Zwemmer Ltd. (pp. 272–263, 424)
Schilling, R. (1982) (2nd ed.).La Religion Romaine de Vénus depuis les origines jusqu'au temps d'Auguste. Paris: Editions E. de Boccard.
Schilling, R., in Bonnefoy, Y., and Doniger, W. (Editors),Roman and European Mythologies, (English translation), University of Chicago Press, 1991. pp. 146.[2]
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Simon, E. (1990).Die Götter der Römer. Munich: Hirmer Verlag. (pp. 213–228).
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Turcan, Robert (2001).The Cults of the Roman Empire. Blackwell.ISBN0631200460.
Wagenvoort, Hendrik, "The Origins of the goddess Venus" (first published as "De deae Veneris origine",Mnemnosyne, Series IV, 17, 1964, pp. 47 – 77) inPietas: selected studies in Roman religion, Brill, 1980.
Weinstock, S. (1971).Divus Julius. Oxford; Clarendon Press. (pp. 80–90)
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