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101-422: Alvíss comes to Thor to claim Thor's daughter as his bride, saying that she had been promised to him earlier. Thor refuses as he had not been at home at the time, then tells Alvíss that he may take the young woman if he can correctly answer all of Thor's questions. The dwarf's replies act as an exhaustive list of the sentient mythological entities among men, Æsir , Vanir , jötnar , dwarfs, and elves . For example,

202-612: A Punic statue of Astarte captured from Eryx , in Sicily , and worshiped in Romanised form by the elite and respectable matrons at a temple on the Capitoline Hill . A later temple, outside the Porta Collina and Rome's sacred boundary , may have preserved some Erycine features of her cult. It was considered suitable for "common girls" and prostitutes . Venus Euploia (Venus of

303-571: A fishing rod , and sits amidst landscape scenery, accompanied by at least one cupid . Venus' signs are for the most part the same as Aphrodite's. They include roses , which were offered in Venus' Porta Collina rites, and above all, myrtle (Latin myrtus ), which was cultivated for its white, sweetly scented flowers, aromatic, evergreen leaves and its various medical-magical properties. Venus' statues, and her worshipers, wore myrtle crowns at her festivals. Before its adoption into Venus' cults, myrtle

404-461: A name shared with Freyr . The Heimskringla book Ynglinga saga (chapter 4) provides an euhemerized account of the Æsir–Vanir War . As a peace agreement, the two sides agreed to trade hostages. The Vanir sent Njörðr and Freyr to the Æsir, and in turn the Æsir sent Hœnir and Mímir to the Vanir. Upon receiving Mímir , the Vanir sent the "cleverest amongst them", Kvasir . In Vanaheimr,

505-421: A Romano-Syrian form of Venus at Baalbek , variously identified with Ashtart , Dea Syria and Atargatis , though inconsistently and often on very slender grounds. She has been historically identified as one third of a so-called Heliopolitan Triad , and thus a wife to presumed sun-god "Syrian Jupiter" ( Baal ) and mother of "Syrian Mercury" ( Adon ). The "Syrian Mercury" is sometimes thought as another sun-god, or

606-653: A colonia named Colonia Veneria Cornelia after his family and Venus, following his siege and capture of Pompeii from the Samnites . Venus also had a distinctive, local form as Venus Pescatrice ("Venus the Fisher-woman") a goddess of the sea, and trade. For Sulla's claims of Venus' favour, see Venus Felix above). Pompeii's Temple of Venus was built sometime in the 1st century BC, before Sulla's colonisation. This local form of Venus had Roman, Oscan and local Pompeiian influences. Like Venus Physica , Venus Physica Pompeiana

707-517: A crystal cup full of mead, noting that she never thought that she would love one of the Vanir. The Vanir are mentioned in the Prose Edda books Gylfaginning and Skáldskaparmál . In chapter 23 of Gylfaginning , the enthroned figure of High relates that Njörðr was raised in Vanaheimr . High says that during the Æsir–Vanir War , the Vanir sent Njörðr as a hostage to the Æsir, and the Æsir sent to

808-456: A fertility deity, was established in 181 BC, in a traditionally plebeian district just outside Rome's sacred boundary , near the Colline Gate . The temple, cult and goddess probably retained much of the original's character and rites. Likewise, a shrine to Venus Verticordia ("Venus the changer of hearts"), established in 114 BC but with links to an ancient cult of Venus-Fortuna, was "bound to

909-660: A goddess of sloth and laziness. Venus Obsequens ("Indulgent Venus" ), Venus' first attested Roman epithet. It was used in the dedication of her first Roman temple, on August 19 in 295 BC during the Third Samnite War by Quintus Fabius Maximus Gurges . It was sited somewhere near the Aventine Hill and Circus Maximus, and played a central role in the Vinalia Rustica . It was supposedly funded by fines imposed on women found guilty of adultery . Venus Physica , Venus as

1010-403: A large temple to Venus Victrix as part of his lavishly appointed new theatre , and celebrating his triumph of 54 BC with coins that showed her crowned with triumphal laurels. Pompey's erstwhile friend, ally, and later opponent Julius Caesar went still further. He claimed the favours of Venus Victrix in his military success and Venus Genetrix as a personal, divine ancestress – apparently

1111-456: A libation of the previous year's vintage, sacred to Jupiter, was poured into a nearby ditch. Common girls ( vulgares puellae ) and prostitutes gathered at Venus' temple just outside the Colline gate, where they offered her myrtle, mint, and rushes concealed in rose-bunches and asked her for "beauty and popular favour", and to be made "charming and witty". Vinalia Rustica (August 19), originally

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1212-489: A long-standing family tradition among the Julii . When Caesar was assassinated, his heir, Augustus , adopted both claims as evidence of his inherent fitness for office, and divine approval of his rule. Augustus' new temple to Mars Ultor , divine father of Rome's legendary founder Romulus , would have underlined the point, with the image of avenging Mars "almost certainly" accompanied by that of his divine consort Venus, and possibly

1313-526: A magnificent temple as reward for her defection. They captured her image, brought it to Rome and installed it in a temple on the Capitoline Hill , as one of Rome's twelve dii consentes . Shorn of her more overtly Carthaginian characteristics, this "foreign Venus" became Rome's Venus Genetrix ("Venus the Mother"), Roman tradition made Venus the mother and protector of the Trojan prince Aeneas , ancestor of

1414-417: A man and a woman with a leafy bough between them, facing or embracing one another. The human figures are almost always clothed and are sometimes depicted with their knees bent. Scholar Hilda Ellis Davidson says that it has been suggested that the figures are partaking in a dance, and that they may have been connected with weddings and linked to the Vanir, representing the notion of a divine marriage, such as in

1515-430: A metrical alternative to Æsir but with the caveat that "These observations should not, however, be considered to present a solution to the riddle of vanir ". In a collection of papers in honor of Simek, Frog (2021) states support for Simek's proposal. However, Simek's proposal has been rejected by several scholars, including Clive Tolley, Leszek P. Słupecki, Jens Peter Schjødt, and Terry Gunnell. Tolley argues that

1616-457: A narrative may have existed for complex social reasons ( structuralists ) among the early Indo-European peoples, and thereafter spread to their descendants. Notable proponents of the historicist position include Karl Helm , Ernst Alfred Philippson , Lotte Motz , and Lotte Headegger, whereas notable proponents of the structuralist view include Georges Dumézil , Jan de Vries , and Gabriel Turville-Petre . The structuralist view has generally gained

1717-599: A once-famous painting by the Greek artist Apelles showing the birth of Aphrodite from sea-foam, fully adult and supported by a more-than-lifesized scallop shell. The Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli used the type in his The Birth of Venus . Other versions of Venus' birth show her standing on land or shoreline, wringing the sea-water from her hair. Venus Barbata ("Bearded Venus"), mentioned in Servius ' commentary on Virgil's Aeneid . Macrobius 's Saturnalia describes

1818-542: A poem by the 11th century skald Þórðr Sjáreksson is provided where Njörðr is described as a Vanr. In chapter 7, poetic names for Freyr are listed, including names that reference his association with the Vanir; "Vanir god", "descendant of Vanir", and "a Van". Freyja is also repeatedly cited as a Vanr. In chapter 20, some of Freyja's names are listed and include "Van-deity" and "Van-lady", and chapter 37 provides skaldic verse referring to Freyja as "Van-bride". In chapter 75, names for pigs are provided, including "Van-child",

1919-406: A rustic Latin festival of wine, vegetable growth and fertility. This was almost certainly Venus' oldest festival and was associated with her earliest known form, Venus Obsequens . Kitchen gardens and market-gardens, and presumably vineyards were dedicated to her. Roman opinions differed on whose festival it was. Varro insists that the day was sacred to Jupiter, whose control of the weather governed

2020-473: A shrine on the Capitoline Hill , and festivals on August 12 and October 9. A sacrifice was annually dedicated to her on the latter date. In neo-classical art, her epithet as Victrix is often used in the sense of 'Venus Victorious over men's hearts' or in the context of the Judgement of Paris (e.g. Canova 's Venus Victrix , a half-nude reclining portrait of Pauline Bonaparte ). The first known temple to Venus

2121-488: A stanza describes the events of the Æsir–Vanir War , noting that during the war the Vanir broke the walls of the stronghold of the Æsir, and that the Vanir were "indomitable, trampling the plain". In Vafþrúðnismál , Gagnráðr (the god Odin in disguise) engages in a game of wits with the jötunn Vafþrúðnir . Gagnráðr asks Vafþrúðnir where the Van god Njörðr came from, for though he rules over many hofs and hörgrs , Njörðr

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2222-486: A statue of Venus in Cyprus , bearded, with male genitalia but in female attire and figure (see also Aphroditus ). Her worshippers cross-dressed - men wore women's clothes, and women wore men's. Macrobius says that Aristophanes called this figure Aphroditos . The Latin poet Laevius wrote of worshipping "nurturing Venus" whether female or male ( sive femina sive mas ) . Several examples of Greek and Roman sculpture show her in

2323-595: A statue of the deceased and deified Caesar . Vitruvius recommends that any new temple to Venus be sited according to rules laid down by the Etruscan haruspices , and built "near to the gate" of the city, where it would be less likely to contaminate "the matrons and youth with the influence of lust". He finds the Corinthian style, slender, elegant, enriched with ornamental leaves and surmounted by volutes , appropriate to Venus' character and disposition. Vitruvius recommends

2424-412: A syncretised form of Bacchus as a "dying and rising" god , and thus a god of Springtime. No such Triad seems to have existed prior to Baalbek's 15 BC colonisation by Augustus' veterans. It may be a modern scholarly artifice. Venus Kallipygos ("Venus with the beautiful buttocks"), a statue, and possibly a statue type, after a lost Greek original. From Syracuse , Sicily. Venus Libertina ("Venus

2525-503: A tale involving king Sveigðir 's visit to Vanaheimr, where he meets a woman by the name of Vana and the two produce a child named Vanlandi (whose name means "Man from the Land of the Vanir"). While not attested as Vanir, the gods Heimdall and Ullr have been theorized as potential members of the group. In the Prose Edda , a name listed for boars is "Van-child". Scholars have theorized that

2626-731: A temple to Venus and Roma Aeterna (Eternal Rome) on Rome's Velian Hill , underlining the Imperial unity of Rome and its provinces, and making Venus the protective genetrix of the entire Roman state, its people and fortunes. It was the largest temple in Ancient Rome. Venus was offered official (state-sponsored) cult in certain festivals of the Roman calendar . Her sacred month was April (Latin Mensis Aprilis ) which Roman etymologists understood to derive from aperire , "to open", with reference to

2727-730: A temple to Venus Felix et Roma Aeterna on the Via Sacra . The same epithet is used for a specific sculpture at the Vatican Museums . Venus Genetrix ("Venus the Mother"), as a goddess of motherhood and domesticity, with a festival on September 26, a personal ancestress of the Julian lineage and, more broadly, the divine ancestress of the Roman people. Julius Caesar dedicated a Temple of Venus Genetrix in 46 BC. This name has attached to an iconological type of statue of Aphrodite/Venus . Venus Heliopolitana ("Venus of Heliopolis Syriaca "),

2828-699: A temple was dedicated to Venus Libitina in Libitina's grove on the Esquiline Hill , "hardly later than 300 BC". Venus Murcia ("Venus of the Myrtle"), merging Venus with the little-known deity Murcia (or Murcus, or Murtia). Murcia was associated with Rome's Mons Murcia (the Aventine's lesser height ), and had a shrine in the Circus Maximus . Some sources associate her with the myrtle-tree. Christian writers described her as

2929-518: A twin, named Anteros. Xenophon 's Socratic Symposion 8. 1, features a dinner-guest with eros (love) for his wife; in return, she has anteros (reciprocal love) for him. Some sources suggest Anteros as avenger of "slighted love". In Servius ' 4th century commentary on Virgil's Aeneas , Cupid is a deceptive agent of Venus, impersonating Aeneas' son and making Dido , queen of Carthage , forget her husband. When Aeneas rejects her love, and covertly leaves Carthage to fulfill his destiny as ancestor of

3030-414: A universal, natural creative force that informs the physical world. She is addressed as "Alma Venus" ("Mother Venus") by Lucretius in the introductory lines of his vivid, poetic exposition of Epicurean physics and philosophy, De Rerum Natura . She seems to have been a favourite of Lucretius' patron, Memmius . Venus Physica Pompeiana was Pompeii's protective goddess, antedating Sulla's imposition of

3131-443: Is also cognate with Latin venia ('favour, permission') and vēnor ('to hunt') through to common PIE root *wenh₁- ('to strive for, wish for, desire, love'). Venus has been described as perhaps "the most original creation of the Roman pantheon", and "an ill-defined and assimilative" native goddess, combined "with a strange and exotic Aphrodite". Her cults may represent the religiously legitimate charm and seduction of

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3232-630: Is also a regal form of "Nature Mother" and a guarantor of success in love. Venus Urania ("Heavenly Venus"), used as the title of a book by Basilius von Ramdohr , a relief by Pompeo Marchesi , and a painting by Christian Griepenkerl . (cf. Aphrodite Urania ) Venus Verticordia ("Venus the Changer of Hearts"), celebrated at the Veneralia for her ability to transform untethered desire ( libido) into pudicitia , sexuality expressed within socially permitted bounds, hence marriage. Venus Victrix ("Venus

3333-584: Is evidence of his cult, shared with Venus at her Temple just outside the Colline Gate and elsewhere. He would also have featured in many private household cults. In private and public areas alike, statues of Venus and Mars attended by Cupid, or Venus, Cupid and minor erotes were sometimes donated by wealthy sponsors, to serve both religious and artistic purposes. Cupid's roles in literary myth are usually limited to actions on behalf of Venus; in Cupid and Psyche , one of

3434-443: Is possessed by the Æsir, the elves , mankind, and the Vanir. In Skírnismál , the beautiful jötunn Gerðr first encounters the god Freyr 's messenger Skírnir , and asks him if he is of the elves, of the Æsir, or of the "wise Vanir". Skírnir responds that he is not of any of the three groups. Later in the poem, Skírnir is successful in his threats against Gerðr (to have Gerðr accept Freyr's affections), and Gerðr offers Skírnir

3535-510: Is unclear where the offering is made, and others say this gift is to the Lares. In dice-games played with knucklebones , a popular pastime among Romans of all classes, the luckiest, best possible roll was known as " Venus ". Like other major Roman deities, Venus was given a number of epithets that referred to her different cult aspects, roles, and her functional similarities to other deities. Her "original powers seem to have been extended largely by

3636-507: The Prose Edda and Heimskringla , both written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson ; and in the poetry of skalds . The Vanir are only attested in these Old Norse sources. All sources describe the god Njörðr , and his children Freyr and Freyja as members of the Vanir. A euhemerized prose account in Heimskringla adds that Njörðr's sister —whose name is not provided—and Kvasir were Vanir. In addition, Heimskringla reports

3737-537: The Vinalia rustica festival. In 217 BC, in the early stages of the Second Punic War with Carthage , Rome suffered a disastrous defeat at the battle of Lake Trasimene . The Sibylline oracle suggested that Carthage might be defeated if the Venus of Eryx ( Venus Erycina ), patron goddess of Carthage's Sicilian allies, could be persuaded to change her allegiance. Rome laid siege to Eryx and promised its goddess

3838-497: The gens Julia , embellished an existing connection between Venus, whom Julius Caesar had adopted as his protectress, and the Trojan prince Aeneas , refugee from Troy's destruction and eventual ancestor of the Roman people. Virgil's Aeneas is guided to Latium by Venus in her heavenly form, the morning star, shining brightly before him in the daylight sky; much later, she lifts Caesar's soul to heaven. In Ovid 's Fasti Venus came to Rome because she "preferred to be worshipped in

3939-525: The Freedwoman "), probably arising through the semantic similarity and cultural links between libertina (as "a free woman") and lubentina (possibly meaning "pleasurable" or "passionate"). Further titles or variants acquired by Venus through the same process, or through orthographic variance, include Libentia, Lubentina, and Lubentini. Venus Libitina links Venus to a patron-goddess of funerals and undertakers , Libitina , who also became synonymous with death;

4040-600: The North Germanic peoples , proposing an early Germanic model of a ship in a "field of the dead" that may be represented both by Freyja's afterlife field Fólkvangr and by the Old English Neorxnawang (the mysterious first element of which may be linked to the name of Freyja's father, Njörðr). Richard North theorizes that glossing Latin vanitates ("vanities", "idols") for "gods" in Old English sources implies

4141-457: The Poetic Edda poem Skírnismál ; the coming together of the Vanir god Freyr and his love, Gerðr. Much of the discussion among scholars on the topic of the Vanir has historically been on the question of whether the Vanir are the reflection of a purported historic meeting between different peoples in the ancient past ( historicists ) or an extension of Proto-Indo-European mythology where such

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4242-554: The attitude anasyrmene , from the Greek verb anasyromai , "to pull up one's clothes" to reveal her male genitalia. The gesture traditionally held apotropaic or magical power. Venus Caelestis (Celestial or Heavenly Venus), used from the 2nd century AD for Venus as an aspect of a syncretised supreme goddess. Venus Caelestis is the earliest known Roman recipient of a taurobolium (a form of bull sacrifice), performed at her shrine in Pozzuoli on 5 October 134. This form of

4343-465: The "fair voyage"), also known as Venus Pontia (Venus of the Sea"), because she smooths the waves for mariners. She is probably based on the influential image of Aphrodite by Praxiteles , once housed in a temple by the sea but now lost. Most copies of its Venus image would have been supported by dolphins, and worn diadems and carved veils, inferring her birth from sea-foam, and a consequent identity as Queen of

4444-449: The 10th century before Iceland was Christianized . Another points to the presence of words found only in late skaldic poetry, which would indicate that it came from the 12th-century skaldic poetry revival. Vanir In Norse mythology , the Vanir ( / ˈ v ɑː n ɪər / ; Old Norse :, singular Vanr ) are a group of gods associated with fertility, wisdom, and the ability to see

4545-402: The 13th to 20th centuries". Simek states that he "believe[s] that these are not mistakes that we are dealing with here, but a deliberate invention on the part of Snorri". Simek's argument receive some level of support from Frog and Jonathan Roper (2011), who analyze the small corpus of poetic usages of Vanir . The authors suggest that this implies that vanir was a "suspended archaism" used as

4646-458: The Elder , having a Stoic's outlook, sees Cupid as a deity of greed and blind passion, morally inferior to Amor. The Roman playwright Plautus , however, has Venus, Cupid and Amor working together. In Roman cult inscriptions and theology, "Amor" is rare, and "Cupido" relatively common. No Roman temples seem dedicated to Cupid alone but the joint dedication formula Venus Cupidoque ("Venus and Cupid")

4747-516: The Fisher-woman") are almost exclusive to Pompeii. Both forms of Venus are represented within Pompeian homes of the well-off, with Venus Pompeiana more commonly found in formal reception spaces, typically depicted in full regalia , draped with a mantle, standing rigidly upright with her right arm across her chest. Images of Venus Pescatrice tend to be more playful, usually found in less formal and less public "non-reception" areas: here, she usually holds

4848-404: The Greek word for "dart", "needle", "arrow", whence "love's arrows" and love's bitter "cares and pangs". Ovid uses acidalia only in the latter sense. Venus Acidalia is likely a literary conceit, formed by Virgil from earlier usages in which acidalia had no evident connection to Venus. It was almost certainly not a cultic epithet. Venus Anadyomene (Venus "rising from the sea"), based on

4949-417: The Roman pantheon, Vulcan and Mars , are active and fiery. Venus absorbs and tempers the male essence, uniting the opposites of male and female in mutual affection. She is essentially assimilative and benign, and embraces several otherwise quite disparate functions. She can give military victory, sexual success, good fortune and prosperity. In one context, she is a goddess of prostitutes; in another, she turns

5050-591: The Roman people, Dido is said to invoke Anteros as "contrary to Cupid". She falls into hatred and despair, curses Rome, and when Aeneas leaves, commits suicide. Ovid 's Fasti, Book 4, invokes Venus not by name but as "Mother of the Twin Loves", the gemini amores . "Amor" is the Latin name preferred by Roman poets and literati for the personification of "kindly" love. Where Cupid (lust) can be imperious, cruel, prone to mischief or even war-like, Amor softly persuades. Cato

5151-455: The Romans, so as far as the Romans were concerned, this was the homecoming of an ancestral goddess to her people. Soon after, Rome's defeat of Carthage confirmed Venus's goodwill to Rome, her links to its mythical Trojan past, and her support of its political and military hegemony. The Capitoline cult to Venus seems to have been reserved to higher status Romans. A separate cult to Venus Erycina as

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5252-619: The Sea, and patron of sailors and navigation. Roman copies would have embellished baths and gymnasiums. Venus Frutis honoured by all the Latins with a federal cult at the temple named Frutinal in Lavinium. Inscriptions found at Lavinium attest the presence of federal cults, without giving precise details. Venus Felix ("Lucky Venus"), probably a traditional epithet, combining aspects of Venus and Fortuna , goddess of both good and bad fortune and personification of luck, whose iconography includes

5353-453: The Vanir formed a truce by spitting into a vat. When they left, the gods decided that it shouldn't be poured out, but rather kept as a symbol of their peace, and so from the contents they made a man; Kvasir. Kvasir is later murdered by dwarves , and from his blood the Mead of Poetry is made. In chapter 6, poetic names for Njörðr are provided, including "descendant of Vanir or a Van". As reference,

5454-410: The Vanir made Hœnir a chieftain. However, whenever Hœnir appeared at assemblies or meetings where the Vanir asked him his opinion on difficult issues, his response was "let others decide". The Vanir suspected that they had been cheated by the Æsir in the hostage exchange, and so grabbed hold of Mímir, cut off Mímir's head, and sent it to the Æsir. The same chapter describes that while Njörðr lived among

5555-589: The Vanir may be connected to small pieces of gold foil found in Scandinavia at some building sites from the Migration Period to the Viking Age and occasionally in graves. They have speculated whether the Vanir originally represented pre-Indo-European deities or Indo-European fertility gods , and have theorized a form of the gods as venerated by the pagan Anglo-Saxons . Numerous theories have been proposed for

5656-537: The Vanir originated as the deities of a distinct people. Some scholars have doubted that they were known outside Scandinavia; however, there is evidence that the god Freyr is the same god as the Germanic deity Ing (reconstructed as Proto-Germanic *Ingwaz ), and that, if so, he is attested as having been known among the Goths . Hilda Ellis Davidson theorizes that all of the wives of the gods may have originally been members of

5757-401: The Vanir the god Hœnir . The sending of Njörðr as a hostage resulted in a peace agreement between the Æsir and the Vanir. Chapter 35 provides information regarding the goddess Freyja , including that one of her names is " Dis of the Vanir". In the same chapter, High tells that the goddess Gná rides the horse Hófvarpnir , and that this horse has the ability to ride through the air and atop

5858-426: The Vanir with the elves . In a 2010 piece building on an earlier proposal by Lotte Motz , Rudolf Simek argues that vanir was originally nothing more than a general term for deities like æsir , and that its employment as a name for a distinct group of deities was an invention of Snorri, whom he identifies as the author of the Prose Edda . According to Simek, the Vanir are therefore "a figment of imagination from

5959-429: The Vanir's Gunnell concludes that The Vanir are featured in the poem " Om vanerne " by Oehlenschläger (1819). Some Germanic Neopagans refer to their beliefs as Vanatrú (meaning "those who honor the Vanir"). Venus (mythology) Venus ( / ˈ v iː n ə s / ) is a Roman goddess whose functions encompass love, beauty, desire, sex , fertility , prosperity , and victory. In Roman mythology , she

6060-399: The Vanir, his wife (unnamed) was his sister, and the couple had two children: Freyr and Freyja. However, "among the Æsir it was forbidden to marry so near a kin". By Odin's appointment, Njörðr and his son Freyr became priests over offerings of sacrifice , and they were recognized as gods among the Æsir. Freyja was priestess at the sacrifices, and "it was she who first taught the Æsir magic as

6161-467: The Vanir, noting that many of them appear to have originally been children of jötnar . Davidson additionally notes that "it is the Vanir and Odin who seem to receive the most hostile treatment in Christian stories about mythological personages". Joseph S. Hopkins and Haukur Þorgeirsson, building on suggestions by archaeologist Ole Crumlin-Pedersen and others, link the Vanir to ship burial customs among

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6262-559: The Victorious"), a Romanised aspect of the armed Aphrodite that Greeks had inherited from the East, where the goddess Ishtar "remained a goddess of war, and Venus could bring victory to a Sulla or a Caesar". Pompey vied with his patron Sulla and with Caesar for public recognition as her protégé. In 55 BC he dedicated a temple to her at the top of his theater in the Campus Martius . She had

6363-484: The city of her own offspring". In Virgil's poetic account of Octavian 's victory at the sea- battle of Actium , the future emperor is allied with Venus, Neptune and Minerva . Octavian's opponents, Antony , Cleopatra and the Egyptians, assisted by bizarre and unhelpful Egyptian deities such as "barking" Anubis , lose the battle. Cupid (lust or desire) and Amor (affectionate love) are taken to be different names for

6464-416: The divine by mortals, in contrast to the formal, contractual relations between most members of Rome's official pantheon and the state, and the unofficial, illicit manipulation of divine forces through magic. The ambivalence of her persuasive functions has been perceived in the relationship of the root *wenos- with its Latin derivative venenum ('poison'; from *wenes-no 'love drink' or 'addicting'), in

6565-439: The epithet and its attendant responsibilities represented a change of heart in the goddess herself. Vinalia urbana (April 23), a wine festival shared by Venus and Jupiter , king of the gods. It offered opportunity to supplicants to ask Venus' intercession with Jupiter, who was thought to be susceptible to her charms, and amenable to the effects of her wine. Venus was patron of " profane " wine, for everyday human use. Jupiter

6666-541: The etymology of Vanir . Scholar R. I. Page says that, while there is no shortage of etymologies for the word, it is tempting to link the word with Old Norse vinr ('friend') and Latin Venus ('goddess of physical love'). Vanir is sometimes anglicized to Wanes (singular Wane ). In the Poetic Edda , the Vanir, as a group, are specifically referenced in the poems Völuspá , Vafþrúðnismál , Skírnismál , Þrymskviða , Alvíssmál , and Sigrdrífumál . In Völuspá ,

6767-456: The existence of *uuani (a reconstructed cognate to Old Norse Vanir ) in Deiran dialect and hence that the gods that Edwin of Northumbria and the northern Angles worshiped in pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon England were likely to have been the * uuani . He comments that they likely "shared not only the name but also the orgiastic character of the [Old Icelandic] Vanir ". Alaric Hall has equated

6868-554: The fondness of the Romans for folk-etymology, and by the prevalence of the religious idea nomen-omen which sanctioned any identifications made in this way." Venus Acidalia , in Virgil 's Aeneid (1.715–22, as mater acidalia ). Servius speculates this "rare" and "strangely recondite epithet" as reference to a mooted "Fountain of Acidalia" ( fons acidalia ) where the Graces (Venus' daughters) were said to bathe; but he also connects it to

6969-487: The future. The Vanir are one of two groups of gods (the other being the Æsir ) and are the namesake of the location Vanaheimr ( Old Norse "Home of the Vanir"). After the Æsir–Vanir War , the Vanir became a subgroup of the Æsir. Subsequently, members of the Vanir are sometimes also referred to as members of the Æsir. The Vanir are attested in the Poetic Edda , compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources;

7070-410: The god Heimdallr possesses foreknowledge, "as the Vanir also can". Sigrdrífumál records that the Vanir are in possession of a "sacred mead ". In the poem, the valkyrie Sigrdrífa provides mystical lore about runes to the hero Sigurd . Sigrdrífa notes that runes were once carved on to various creatures, deities, and other figures, and then shaved off and mixed with a "sacred mead ". This mead

7171-566: The goddess, and the taurobolium, are associated with the "Syrian Goddess", understood as a late equivalent to Astarte , or the Roman Magna Mater , the latter being another supposedly Trojan "Mother of the Romans", as well as "Mother of the Gods". Venus Calva ("Venus the bald one"), a legendary form of Venus, attested only by post-Classical Roman writings which offer several traditions to explain this appearance and epithet. In one, it commemorates

7272-408: The hearts of men and women from sexual vice to virtue. Varro 's theology identifies Venus with water as an aspect of the female principle. To generate life, the watery matrix of the womb requires the virile warmth of fire. To sustain life, water and fire must be balanced; excess of either one, or their mutual antagonism, is unproductive or destructive. Prospective brides offered Venus a gift "before

7373-409: The heavens have the following names, according to Alvíss: Himinn heitir með mönnum, en hlýrnir með goðum, kalla vindófni vanir, uppheim jötnar, alfar fagraræfr, dvergar drjúpansal. 'Heaven' men call it, 'The Height' the gods, The Wanes 'The Weaver of Winds'; Giants 'The Up-World', Elves 'The Fair-Roof', The dwarfs 'The Dripping Hall'. Ultimately, Thor confesses he was asking

7474-756: The later classical tradition of the West , Venus became one of the most widely referenced deities of Greco-Roman mythology as the embodiment of love and sexuality. As such, she is usually depicted nude . The Latin theonym Venus and the common noun venus ('love, charm') stem from a Proto-Italic form reconstructed as *wenos- ('desire'), itself from Proto-Indo-European (PIE) *wenh₁-os ('desire'; cf. Messapic Venas , Old Indic vánas 'desire'). Derivatives include venustus ('attractive, charming'), venustās ('charm, grace'), venerius ('of Venus, erotic'), venerāre ('to adore, revere, honor, venerate, worship'), and venerātiō ('adoration'). Venus

7575-465: The literary concept of Venus is mantled in whole-cloth borrowings from the literary Greek mythology of her counterpart, Aphrodite, but with significant exceptions. In some Latin mythology, Cupid was the son of Venus and Mars , the god of war. At other times, or in parallel myths and theologies, Venus was understood to be the consort of Vulcan or as mother of the "second cupid", fathered by Mercury . Virgil , in compliment to his patron Augustus and

7676-461: The most pudica (sexually pure) in Rome by a committee of Roman matrons. At first, this statue was probably housed in the temple of Fortuna Virilis , perhaps as divine reinforcement against the perceived moral and religious failings of its cult. In 114 BC Venus Verticordia was given her own temple. She was meant to persuade Romans of both sexes and every class, whether married or unmarried, to cherish

7777-454: The most support among academics, although with caveats, including among Jens Peter Schjødt , Margaret Clunies Ross , and Thomas DuBois . Like the Vanr goddess Freyja, the Vanir as a group are not attested outside Scandinavia. Traditionally, following Völuspá and the Prose Edda , scholarship on the Vanir has focused on the Æsir–Vanir War, its possible basis in a war between peoples, and whether

7878-515: The outfall of the Cloaca Maxima , originally a stream, later covered over to function as Rome's main sewer. The rites conducted at the shrine were probably meant to purify the culvert's polluted waters and noxious airs . In some traditions, Titus Tatius was responsible for the introduction of lawful marriage to Rome, and Venus-Cloacina promoted, protected and purified sexual intercourse between married couples. Venus Erycina (" Erycine Venus"),

7979-768: The peculiar milieu of the Aventine and the Circus Maximus" – a strongly plebeian context for Venus's cult, in contrast to her aristocratic cultivation as a Stoic and Epicurian "all-goddess". Towards the end of the Roman Republic , some leading Romans laid personal claims to Venus' favour. The general and dictator Sulla adopted Felix ("Lucky") as a surname, acknowledging his debt to heaven-sent good fortune and his particular debt to Venus Felix , for his extraordinarily fortunate political and military career. His protégé Pompey competed for Venus' support, dedicating (in 55 BC)

8080-508: The poem, Alvíss supplies terms that various groups, including the Vanir, use to refer to various subjects. Alvíss attributes nine terms to the Vanir; one for Earth ("The Ways"), Heaven ("The Weaver of Winds"), clouds ("Kites of the Wind"), calm ("The Hush of the Winds"), the sea ("The Wave"), fire ("Wildfire"), wood ("The Wand"), seed ("growth"), and ale ("The Foaming"). The poem Þrymskviða states that

8181-404: The questions to gain some time for the sun to rise and turn the dwarf into stone. It is not known when Alvíssmál was created; analysis of its contents can point to multiple periods depending on which elements are focused upon. One theory is that the use of Thor and references to mythical beings can be assumed to reflect the culture's religious beliefs, so it would have been created no later than

8282-472: The ripening of the grapes; but the sacrificial victim, a female lamb ( agna ), may be evidence that it once belonged to Venus alone. A festival of Venus Genetrix (September 26) was held under state auspices from 46 BC at her Temple in the Forum of Caesar , in fulfillment of a vow by Julius Caesar , who claimed her personal favour as his divine patron, and ancestral goddess of the Julian clan . Caesar dedicated

8383-494: The rudder of a ship, found in some Pompeian examples of the regal Venus Physica . A form of Venus usually identified as Venus Felix was adopted by the dictator Sulla to legitimise his victories over his domestic and foreign opponents during Rome's late Republican civil and foreign wars; Rives finds it very unlikely that Sulla would have imposed this humiliating connection on unwilling or conquered domestic territories once allied to Samnium, such as Pompei. The emperor Hadrian built

8484-428: The same Roman love-god, the son of Venus, fathered by Mercury , Vulcan or Mars. Childlike or boyish winged figures who accompany Venus, whether singly, in pairs or more, have been variously identified as Amores, Cupids , Erotes or forms of Greek Eros . The most ancient of these is Eros, whom Hesiod categorises as a primordial deity , emerging from Chaos as a generative power with neither mother nor father. Eros

8585-405: The sea. High continues that "once some Vanir saw her path as she rode through the air" and that an unnamed one of these Vanir says, in verse (for which no source is provided): Gná responds: In chapter 57 of Skáldskaparmál , the god Bragi explains the origin of poetry. Bragi says the origin of poetry lies in the Æsir-Vanir War. During the peace conference held to end the war both the Æsir and

8686-422: The sense of "a charm, magic philtre ". Venus seems to have had no origin myth until her association with Greek Aphrodite. Venus-Aphrodite emerged, already in adult form, from the sea foam (Greek αφρός, aphros ) produced by the severed genitals of Caelus - Uranus . Roman theology presents Venus as the yielding, watery female principle, essential to the generation and balance of life. Her male counterparts in

8787-489: The springtime blossoming of trees and flowers. In the interpretatio romana of the Germanic pantheon during the early centuries AD, Venus became identified with the Germanic goddess Frijjo , giving rise to the loan translation " Friday " for dies Veneris . Veneralia (April 1) was held in honour of Venus Verticordia ("Venus the Changer of Hearts"), and Fortuna Virilis (Virile or strong Good Fortune )), whose cult

8888-633: The stories within The Golden Ass , by the Roman author Apuleius , the plot and its resolution are driven by Cupid's love for Psyche ("soul"), his filial disobedience, and his mother's envy. Images of Venus have been found in domestic murals, mosaics and household shrines ( lararia ). Petronius , in his Satyricon , places an image of Venus among the Lares (household gods) of the freedman Trimalchio 's lararium . The Venus types known as Venus Pompeiana ("Venus of Pompeii") and Venus Pescatrice ("Venus

8989-508: The temple during his extraordinarily lavish quadruple triumph. At the same time, he was pontifex maximus and Rome's senior magistrate; the festival is thought to mark the unprecedented promotion of a personal, family cult to one of the Roman state. Caesar's heir, Augustus, made much of these personal and family associations with Venus as an Imperial deity. The festival's rites are not known. As with most major gods and goddesses in Roman mythology ,

9090-607: The term must have originated in historical usage, and that "it is something of a misrepresentation of the evidence to suggest that Snorri is the main source for the vanir ". Tolley continues: Słupecki argues that the Vanir remained distinct from the Æsir – except for Freyja and Freyr, whom he follows the Prose Edda in seeing as having been born after Njörðr became a hostage among the Æsir, and thus regards as Æsir – and therefore that Ragnarök "[has] no importance for their world". According to Jens Peter Schjødt, Schjødt, in response to Simek's piece, says: Terry Gunnell proposes that

9191-454: The traditional sexual proprieties and morality known to please the gods and benefit the State. During her rites, her image was taken from her temple to the men's baths, where it was undressed and washed in warm water by her female attendants, then garlanded with myrtle. Women and men asked Venus Verticordia's help in affairs of the heart, sex, betrothal and marriage. For Ovid , Venus's acceptance of

9292-520: The virtuous offer by Roman matrons of their own hair to make bowstrings during a siege of Rome. In another, king Ancus Marcius ' wife and other Roman women lost their hair during an epidemic; in hope of its restoration, unafflicted women sacrificed their own hair to Venus. Venus Cloacina ("Venus the Purifier"); a fusion of Venus with the Etruscan water goddess Cloacina , who had an ancient shrine above

9393-507: The wedding"; the nature of the gift, and its timing, are unknown. The wedding ceremony itself, and the state of lawful marriage, belonged to Juno – whose mythology allows her only a single marriage, and no divorce from her habitually errant spouse, Jupiter – but Venus and Juno are also likely "bookends" for the ceremony; Venus prepares the bride for "conubial bliss" and expectations of fertility within lawful marriage. Some Roman sources say that girls who come of age offer their toys to Venus; it

9494-538: The widest possible spacing between the temple columns, producing a light and airy space, and he offers Venus's temple in Caesar's forum as an example of how not to do it; the densely spaced, thickset columns darken the interior, hide the temple doors and crowd the walkways, so that matrons who wish to honour the goddess must enter her temple in single file, rather than arm-in arm. In 135 AD the Emperor Hadrian inaugurated

9595-526: Was vowed to Venus Obsequens by Q. Fabius Gurges in the heat of a battle against the Samnites . It was dedicated in 295 BC, at a site near the Aventine Hill , and was supposedly funded by fines imposed on Roman women for sexual misdemeanours. Its rites and character were probably influenced by or based on Greek Aphrodite 's cults, which were already diffused in various forms throughout Italian Magna Graeca . Its dedication date connects Venus Obsequens to

9696-403: Was not raised among the Æsir. Vafþrúðnir responds that Njörðr was created in Vanaheimr ("home of the Vanir") by "wise powers" and details that during the Æsir–Vanir War, Njörðr was exchanged as a hostage. In addition, when the world ends ( Ragnarök ), Njörðr "will return to the wise Vanir". Alvíssmál consists of question and answer exchanges between the dwarf Alvíss and the god Thor . In

9797-410: Was patron of the strongest, purest, sacrificial grade wine, and controlled the weather on which the autumn grape-harvest would depend. At this festival, men and women alike drank the new vintage of ordinary, non-sacral wine (pressed at the previous year's vinalia rustica ) in honour of Venus, whose powers had provided humankind with this gift. Upper-class women gathered at Venus's Capitoline temple, where

9898-753: Was practiced among the Vanir". In chapter 15, the king Sveigðir is recorded as having married a woman named Vana in "Vanaland", located in Sweden . The two produced a child, who they named Vanlandi (Old Norse "Man from the Land of the Vanir". Small pieces of gold foil decorated with pictures of figures dating from the Migration Period into the early Viking Age (known as gullgubber ) have been discovered in various locations in Scandinavia , in one case almost 2,500. The foil pieces have been found largely at sites of buildings, only rarely in graves. The figures are sometimes single, occasionally an animal, sometimes

9999-414: Was probably by far the older of the two. Venus Verticordia was invented in 220 BC, in response to advice from a Sibylline oracle during Rome's Punic Wars , when a series of prodigies was taken to signify divine displeasure at sexual offenses among Romans of every category and class, including several men and three Vestal Virgins . The statue of Venus Verticordia was dedicated by a young woman, chosen as

10100-633: Was the patron deity of Thespiae , where he was embodied as an aniconic stone as late as the 2nd century AD. From at least the 5th century BC he also had the form of an adolescent or pre-adolescent male, at Elis (on the Peloponnese ) and elsewhere in Greece, acquiring wings, bow and arrows, and divine parents in the love-goddess Aphrodite and the war-god Ares. He had temples of his own, and shared others with Aphrodite. At Elis, and in Athens , Eros shared cult with

10201-401: Was the ancestor of the Roman people through her son, Aeneas , who survived the fall of Troy and fled to Italy. Julius Caesar claimed her as his ancestor. Venus was central to many religious festivals , and was revered in Roman religion under numerous cult titles. The Romans adapted the myths and iconography of her Greek counterpart Aphrodite for Roman art and Latin literature . In

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