Download - Seminar Groups: Week 4
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?
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