Seminar Groups: Week 4

• Seminar week 4: The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite– Tuesday 22nd October

• Group A: 5-6pm S0.20 Addy-Laverick• Group B: 6-7pm S0.19 Learoyd-Hurst-Platt• Group C: 7-8pm SO.19 Sharples-Worboys

Sex Goddesses: Aphrodite & Eos

Lecture overview

• The connection between sex and the sacred – how did goddesses help the Greeks deal with female desire?

• Who is Aphrodite? Birth and role in myth• Aphrodite and the sacred – Adonia• Sacred Prostitution – myth or reality?• What is Eos? • Eos is pursuit of love

Birth of Aphrodite

• Varied accounts of birth in Hesiod and Homer

• Born out of the sea foam and severed testicles of Ouranos – Hesiod

• Homer – she is the daughter of Zeus and Dione

Aphrodite’s infidelity

Odyssey, 8.306-20

The trap set by Hephaistos for Aphrodite and Ares

Hephaistos demands the return of his wooing gifts

Judgement of Paris

No details in The Iliad, recorded in Kypria

A myth that evolves over time

The Matchmaker

• Iliad – 14.188-223• Hera asks Aphrodite for a loan of strips of

material she wears close to her breast

• Aphrodite is the matchmaker – makes the gods fall in love with mortals

• Her affair with Anchises in Zeus’ revenge

Aphrodite’s other love - Adonis

Red-figure hydria, 450-400

The Adonia

• Women’s festival – attended by courtesans and citizen women

• Celebrations held in private houses• The Gardens of Adonis

Cult of AphroditeCults throughout Greece

Evidence that Aphrodite acted as a healing goddess

Aphrodite worshipped in different epiphets; Aphrodite Hetaria (Companion)

Aphrodite and Prostitutes

• Evidence of prostitutes at the temples of Aphrodite – Machon, temple at Corinth

• Dedication by hetariai to Aphrodite at Samos, Aphrodite in the reeds, Alexis of Samos

Sacred Prostitution – Myth or reality?

• Mistranslation?• False accusation?• A historical reality?

Sacred Prostitution at Pyrgi

Eos (Dawn) – the sex predator

Eos and Tithonos

Menelaus and Helen

Zeus pursuing a female

Eos pursuing Kephalos

Youth running toward man

Red-figure krater

The grieving mother Eos carrying her son, Memnon

Red-figure pelike

Seminar Groups: Week 4

• Seminar week 4: The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite– Tuesday 22nd October

• Group A: 5-6pm S0.20 Addy-Laverick• Group B: 6-7pm S0.19 Learoyd-Hurst-Platt• Group C: 7-8pm SO.19 Sharples-Worboys