Aphrodite, the Unforgiving: Hippolytus, Eos, Diomedes, Psyche

 

  Aphrodite, the Unforgiving: Hippolytus, Eos, Diomedes, Psyche

Few dared to resist the power of Aphrodite, and she had mercy for none of 

them. Hippolytus preferred Artemis to her and vowed to eternal innocence. Aphrodite made his stepmother Phaedra fall in love with him, which resulted in the death of both her and Hippolytus.

After Aphrodite found out that Eos had slept with Ares, she cursed her to be perpetually – and unhappily – in love. Diomedes wounded the goddess during the Trojan War, and suddenly his wife Aegiale started sleeping around with his enemies.

Psyche would have gone through an even worse ordeal, but, fortunately for her, Eros – Aphrodite’s avenger – shot himself instead of her and fell in love with Psyche instead.

Sources

Few poems are more beautiful than Lucretius’ invocation of Aphrodite at the beginning of “On the Nature of Things.” Compare this to the longest of the three Homeric Hymns dedicated to Aphrodite, the 5th one. Finally, Aphrodite is a constant companion of Aeneas in Virgil’s “Aeneid.”