Goddess · Character in Homer’s Odyssey
Aphrodite
Love goddess of Demodocus' song
Beauty's own benchmark; caught in the net and laughing soonest after.
The goddess of love, caught with Ares under her husband's net in the song sung before Odysseus, and gone in her laughing way to her grove at Paphos as soon as the net is loosed. Penelope's beauty is measured against hers: 'like Artemis, or golden Aphrodite' is the poem's highest praise of a woman.
Bonds
- Ares loves Aphrodite — the affair the gods laughed at
- Aphrodite wife of Hephaestus — wed to the lame smith
- Hephaestus husband of Aphrodite — married to the faithless goddess
Appears in
- Book IV Conference of Telemachus and Menelaus
- Book VIII Festivals in Honor of Odysseus
- Book XVII Return of Odysseus to His Palace
- Book XVIII Combat of Odysseus and Irus
- Book XIX Odysseus Recognized by Eurycleia
- Book XX The Last Banquet of the Suitors
Scenes
- A Double Wedding — Book IV. Menelaus’s daughter weds Achilles’s son
- Helen’s Drug and Tales of Troy — Book IV. Helen’s drug, Menelaus recalls Troy
- Hephaestus’s Snare — Book VIII. Hephaestus forges net to trap lovers
- Gods Gather to Laugh — Book VIII. Gods gather, laugh at trapped lovers
- Apollo, Hermes, Poseidon — Book VIII. Apollo teases Hermes, Poseidon pleads
- Ares and Aphrodite Freed — Book VIII. Hephaestus frees Ares and Aphrodite, who flee
- Reunion with Penelope — Book XVII. Telemachus defers Penelope’s questions
- Penelope’s Divine Beauty — Book XVIII. Divine Athena beautifies sleeping Penelope
- Melantho’s Taunt — Book XIX. Melantho mocks Odysseus, he rebukes her
- Penelope’s prayer to Artemis — Book XX. Penelope begs Artemis for death after dream