Aphrodite Urania
Aphrodite Urania ( Greek Ἀφροδίτη Οὐρανία ), the heavenly Aphrodite, is a manifestation of the Greek goddess Aphrodite , which probably goes back to Levantine models. Pausanias describes their worship in Athens . She is the daughter of Uranus and Pontus .
Herodotus mentions a temple of Aphrodite Urania ( Derketo ) in Ascalon , which he regards as the oldest temple of this deity. Phoenicians from Askalon would then have founded the famous Aphrodite temples on Cyprus and on Kythera .
After Pausanias, the Assyrians were the first worshipers of Aphrodite Urania ( Ištar ?), After them the inhabitants of Paphos and the inhabitants of Ascalon in Palestine and the inhabitants of the island of Kythera, who took over the cult from the Phoenicians.
Strabo equates Aphrodite Urania of Askalon with Atargatis .
literature
- Christine Walde. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 12, Metzler, Stuttgart 2002, ISBN 3-476-01470-3 , Sp. 1024 – Urania 4.
- Mayer: Urania 1 . In: Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher (Hrsg.): Detailed lexicon of Greek and Roman mythology . Volume 6, Leipzig 1937, Col. 98-102 ( digitized version ).