Who's Who Greek Myth: Aphrodite

Like Athena, Aphrodite had a most unconventional birth, rising from the foam that bubbled up in the sea around the severed penis of Ouranos, castrated by his son Kronos with the complicity of his wife, Gaia, who had seen all her children killed because of her husband's fear of being unseated by them.

The beautiful Aphrodite was said to emerge from the water on the beach at Paphos in Cyprus.

Shrines to her are also found at Knidos on the Asia Minor coast and on the island of Lesvos (Mytilini). This goddess had a magic girdle which made people fall in love with whoever wore it.

She was quite amorous, one of her famous affairs that with Ares, when the lovers were ensnared in nets of chain fashioned by her husband, the crippled smith, Hephaistos, after learning of his wife's adulterous acts.

There are many stories about the wiles and machinations of Aphrodite. She represents love, beauty and fertility. Some believe that she may have been a West Asia deity brought to Greece by sea traders. Her greatest love was for Adonis, who was also a West Asian deity with festivals dedicated to him in many parts of the eastern Mediterranean.