Aphrodite

Forms

Aphrodītē f sg (genitive Aphrodītēs); first declension^[1] Ausonius has the form Aphrodita.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek Ἀφροδίτη (Aphrodítē), the name of the Greek goddess of love.^[1][3][4] The origin of the Greek name is unclear.^[3][4] Beekes notes that the old connection with ἀφρός (aphrós, “foam”) has been abandoned, and since the goddess seems to be of Eastern origin, he suggests that her name came from the East too, possibly from the Semitic name of Astarte, perhaps through another language.^[4] Macrobius already explained the name from the foam from which the goddess arose.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Pliny the Elder (23/24–79 AD)^[3] gives the Greek name of a statue of Aphrodite and calls a kind of amethyst Aphrodites blepharon, which he elsewhere translates as “Venus' eyelid”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The Romans identified the goddess with their Venus.^[2][5] Ausonius calls Aphrodite the companion of Mars, Censorinus denies that the month of April was named after her, deriving it from aperiō “to open”, and Martianus Capella also uses the name.^[2] A herbal ascribed to Apuleius reports “Aphrodite's bath” as the prophets' name for a plant, and inscriptions have the name, spelled also Aprodite and Afrodite, for women.^[2]

Timeline

• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder names a kind of amethyst Aphrodites blepharon.^[2][3]
• c. 310–394 AD – Ausonius makes Aphrodite the companion of Mars.^[2][3]
• 1st half of the 5th century AD – Macrobius derives her name from the foam from which she arose.^[2][3]
• 5th century AD – Martianus Capella uses the name.^[2][3]

Meanings

Proper noun

1. (Greek mythology) Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love, identified with Venus.^[5][2][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
4. ^ a b c Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press