Did you know that Aphrodite (the mother of Cupid) and the demon Lucifer are both actually derived from the same mythic figure?
Aphrodite is unusual among the Greek pantheon for not having any blood relation to the other Olympians or Titans, because she actually originated as the Sumerian deity Innan/Ishtar (a major antagonist in the Epic of Gilgamesh).
Ishtar, associated with the planet Venus, was also the first mythic depiction of the “morning star” as a being of light falling from the heavens into the underworld. This was later applied to male deities, and then like many other popular deities from the region, associated with a fallen angel in early Christian myth.
The features Ishtar shares with both figures, being beautiful as well as dangerously unreliable and jealous, feel like a pretty good representation of the personification of love, at least to me.
Did you know that Aphrodite (the mother of Cupid) and the demon Lucifer are both actually derived from the same mythic figure?
Aphrodite is unusual among the Greek pantheon for not having any blood relation to the other Olympians or Titans, because she actually originated as the Sumerian deity Innan/Ishtar (a major antagonist in the Epic of Gilgamesh).
Ishtar, associated with the planet Venus, was also the first mythic depiction of the “morning star” as a being of light falling from the heavens into the underworld. This was later applied to male deities, and then like many other popular deities from the region, associated with a fallen angel in early Christian myth.
The features Ishtar shares with both figures, being beautiful as well as dangerously unreliable and jealous, feel like a pretty good representation of the personification of love, at least to me.