Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 139-163

 hAp 139-163

[Aphrodite speaking: "Marry me and tell my parents.] They will send gold and clothing. Do it and offer a charming wedding feast."

Desire took Anchises, and he said, "If you are a mortal woman, and Otreus is your famous father, as you say, and if you came here by the will of Hermes, and if you will be called my wife all my days -- if all that, then no god or mortal will prevent me from mingling in love right now. Not even if Apollo shoots painful arrows from his bow. I'd rather climb your bed and enter Hades -- you look just like a goddess."

He took her hand. And smiling Aphrodite turned her head away and looked down, and crept to the bed covered with soft blankets. On top were skins of lions and bears that Anchises himself had killed. He took off her adornment, her bracelets and necklaces.

  • Anchises is reasonably worried about the consequences of a mortal man sleeping with a goddess. Epic finds this relationship quite problematic -- cf. Od. 5.118-129, where Calypso provides a catalogue of the mortal men that the gods have killed for sleeping with a goddess.
  • Lionskins and bearskins -- more in this hymn about subduing nature and the manly qualities of a man who can subdue nature. I continue to think the treatment of nature in this hymn is not very Homeric -- e.g. there's no bear skins in Homer, lion skins 2x in Il. 10 (i.e. fake Homer). Eumaeus' bed (Od. 14.519) has goat and sheep skins but that's a different situation (domesticated animals).
  • 5.140: σὺ δὲ πολλὰ καὶ ἀγλαὰ δέχθαι ἄποινα. The use of ἄποινα here to mean 'dowry' is a little difficult. The line resembles Il. 1.23 αἰδεῖσθαί θ᾽ ἱερῆα καὶ ἀγλαὰ δέχθαι ἄποινα: maybe mis- / strained use of a formula.

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