Who Is Aphrodite? Origin, Powers and Key Facts

Aphrodite is a In the Public Domain comic book character, with over 554 comic issue appearances. Aphrodite is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, beauty, pleasure, passion and procreation. Aphrodite was syncretized with the Roman goddess Venus. Aphrodite's major symbols include myrtles, roses, doves, sparrows, and swans.

Who is Aphrodite?

The cult of Aphrodite was largely derived from that of the Phoenician goddess Astarte , a cognate of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar , whose cult was based on the Sumerian cult of Inanna . Aphrodite's main cult centers were Cythera, Cyprus, Corinth, and Athens. Her main festival was the Aphrodisia, which was celebrated annually in midsummer. In Laconia, Aphrodite was worshipped as a warrior goddess. She was also the patron goddess of prostitutes, an association which led early scholars to propose the concept of "sacred prostitution" in Greco-Roman culture, an idea which is now generally seen as erroneous. In Hesiod's Theogony , Aphrodite is born off the coast of Cythera from the foam ( aphrós ) produced by Uranus 's genitals, which his son Cronus has severed and thrown into the sea. In Homer's Iliad , however, she is the daughter of Zeus and Dione. Plato , in his Symposium 180e, asserts that these two origins actually belong to separate entities: Aphrodite Ourania (a transcendent, "Heavenly" Aphrodite) and Aphrodite Pandemos (Aphrodite common to "all the people").

Key facts

Aphrodite is of god/eternal origin and first appeared in "Justice Society: "Two New Members Win Their Spurs"". The character is published by In the Public Domain. With 554 recorded issue appearances, Aphrodite ranks among the most featured characters in comics.