Eros in the context of "433 Eros"

The Symposium (Ancient Greek: Συμπόσιον, Symposion) is a Socratic dialogue by Plato, dated c. 385 – 370 BC. It depicts a friendly contest of extemporaneous speeches given by a group of notable Athenian men attending a banquet. The men include the philosopher Socrates, the general and statesman Alcibiades, and the comic playwright Aristophanes. The panegyrics are to be given in praise of Eros, the god of love and sex.

In the Symposium, Eros is recognized both as erotic lover and as a phenomenon capable of inspiring courage, valor, great deeds and works, and vanquishing man's natural fear of death. It is seen as transcending its earthly origins and attaining spiritual heights. The extraordinary elevation of the concept of love raises a question of whether some of the most extreme extents of meaning might be intended as humor or farce. Eros is almost always translated as "love," and the English word has its own varieties and ambiguities that provide additional challenges to the effort to understand the Eros of ancient Athens.

Aphrodite Pandemos (Ancient Greek: Πάνδημος, romanized: Pándēmos; "common to all the people") occurs as an epithet of the Greek goddess Aphrodite. This epithet can be interpreted in different ways. In Plato's Symposium, Pausanias of Athens describes Aphrodite Pandemos as the goddess of sensual pleasures, in opposition to Aphrodite Urania, or "the heavenly Aphrodite". At Elis, she was represented as riding on a ram by Scopas. Another interpretation is that of Aphrodite uniting all the inhabitants of a country into one social or political body. In this respect she was worshipped at Athens along with Peitho (persuasion), and her worship was said to have been instituted by Theseus at the time when he united the scattered townships into one great body of citizens. According to some authorities, it was Solon who erected the sanctuary of Aphrodite Pandemos, either because her image stood in the agora, or because the hetairai had to pay the costs of its erection. The worship of Aphrodite Pandemos also occurs at Megalopolis in Arcadia, and at Thebes. A festival in honour of her is mentioned by Athenaeus. The sacrifices offered to her consisted of white goats. Pandemos occurs also as a surname of Eros. According to Harpocration, who quotes Apollodorus, Aphrodite Pandemos has very old origins, "the title Pandemos was given to the goddess established in the neighborhood of the Old Agora because all the Demos (people) gathered there of old in their assemblies which they called agorai." To honour Aphrodite's and Peitho's role in the unification of Attica, the Aphrodisia festival was organized annually on the fourth of the month of Hekatombaion (the fourth day of each month was the sacred day of Aphrodite). The Synoikia that honoured Athena, the protectress of Theseus and main patron of Athens, also took place in the month of Hekatombaion.

Christine Downing comments that, "Pausanias's description of the love associated with Aphrodite Pandemos as dedicated only to sensual pleasure and therefore directed indifferently to women and men, and that associated with the Ouranian Aphrodite as "altogether male" and dedicated to the education of the soul of the beloved is actually an innovation—for Aphrodite Ourania was served in Corinth by prostitutes and Aphrodite Pandemos was the goddess as worshipped by the whole community."

The primordial deities of Greek mythology are the first generation of gods and goddesses. These deities represented the fundamental forces and physical foundations of the world and were generally not actively worshipped, as they, for the most part, were not given human characteristics; they were instead personifications of places or abstract concepts.

Hesiod, in his Theogony, considers the first beings (after Chaos) to be Erebus, Gaia, Tartarus, Eros and Nyx. Gaia and Uranus, whose severed genitals created the goddess Aphrodite from sea foam, in turn gave birth to the Titans, and the Cyclopes. The Titans Cronus and Rhea then gave birth to the generation of the Olympians: Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, Hestia, Hera and Demeter. They overthrew the Titans, with the reign of Zeus marking the end of the period of warfare and usurpation among the gods.

In Greek mythology, Danaë (/ˈdæneɪ.i/, /ˈdæni.iː/; Ancient Greek: Δανάη, romanized: Danáē; Ancient Greek: [da.ná.ɛː], Modern: [ðaˈna.i]) was an Argive princess and mother of the hero Perseus by Zeus. She was credited with founding the city of Ardea in Latium during the Bronze Age.

Apulian vase painting was a regional style of South Italian vase painting from ancient Apulia in southeast Italy. It comprises geometric pottery and red-figure pottery.

The legitimate Iron Age sequel to the Neolithic and Bronze Age culture of Matera and Molfetta has not yet been discovered and the pre-history of Daunia, Peucetia and Messapia begins to take shape as a coherent whole only with the 7th century BCE. Even then our knowledge is almost confined to the pottery, but it offers a rich field for study.

In Greek mythology, Erato (/ˈɛrətoʊ/; Ancient Greek: Ἐρατώ) is one of the Muses, associated with erotic lyric poetry. The name would mean "desired" or "lovely", if derived from the same root as Eros, as Apollonius of Rhodes playfully suggested in the invocation to Erato that begins Book III of his Argonautica.

Cupid and Psyche is a story originally from Metamorphoses (also called The Golden Ass), written in the 2nd century AD by Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis (or Platonicus). The tale concerns the overcoming of obstacles to the love between Psyche (/ˈsaɪkiː/; Ancient Greek: Ψυχή, lit. 'Soul' or 'Breath of Life', Ancient Greek pronunciation: [psyːkʰɛ̌ː]) and Cupid (Latin: Cupido, lit. 'Desire', Latin pronunciation: [kʊˈpiːd̪oː]) or Amor (lit. 'Love', Greek Eros, Ἔρως), and their ultimate union in a sacred marriage. Although the only extended narrative from antiquity is that of Apuleius from the 2nd century AD, Eros and Psyche appear in Greek art as early as the 4th century BC. The story's Neoplatonic elements and allusions to mystery religions accommodate multiple interpretations, and it has been analyzed as an allegory and in light of folktale, Märchen or fairy tale, and myth.

The story of Cupid and Psyche was known to Boccaccio in c. 1370. The first printed version dates to 1469. Ever since, the reception of Cupid and Psyche in the classical tradition has been extensive. The story has been retold in poetry, drama, and opera, and depicted widely in painting, sculpture, and even wallpaper.