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 The Planet
Venus
 Until the 1960s, Venus was often considered a "twin sister" to the Earth because Venus is the nearest planet to us, and because
superficially the two planets seem to share many characteristics (image source).
Earlier Views of VenusIn earlier times, there was considerable speculation
concerning the possibility of life on Venus, sometimes with rather elaborate characteristics. In 1686 a French "man of letters",
Bernard de Fontenelle, wrote that
I can tell from here . . . what the inhabitants of Venus are like; they resemble the Moors
of Granada; a small black people, burned by the sun, full of wit and fire, always in love, writing verse, fond of music, arranging
festivals, dances, and tournaments every day. (Quoted in National Geographic, June, 1975) Now apart from the fact that this description is rather unremarkable because it sounds like everyday student
life around a great University like ours, it turns out that monsieur de Fontenelle was quite incorrect about Venus and its
conjectured inhabitants.
Modern views of VenusIn the last 30 years we have learned a great
deal about our "sister" planet, and we now know that almost nothing on Venus is like that on the Earth. Much of the previous
misconception can be traced to the difficulty of observing Venus because it is always covered with a thick cloud layer. In
the past 3 decades astronomers have learned how to peer through that cloud layer and unlock many of the secrets of this nearby
but previously not well known planet.
SEE LINK VENUS
VENUS
SOPHIA OF WISDOM III - PICS - VENUS
Venus was a major Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty and fertility, the
Venus was a major Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty and fertility, the equivalent of the Greek goddess Aphrodite.
Venus was the consort of Vulcan. She was considered the ancestor of the Roman people by way of its legendary founder, Aeneas, and played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths.
Venus was the consort of Vulcan. She was considered the ancestor of the Roman people by way of its legendary founder, Aeneas, and played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths.
Venus in mythology
-
For more details on this topic, see Aphrodite.
Like most other gods and goddesses in Roman mythology, that of Venus consists of whole-cloth borrowings from the Greek mythology of her equivalent counterpart Aphrodite.
Her cult began in Ardea and Lavinium, Latium. On August 15, 293 BC, her oldest-known temple was dedicated, and August 18 became a festival called the Vinalia Rustica. On April 25, 215 BC, a temple to Venus was dedicated outside the Colline gate on the Capitol, to commemorate the Roman defeat at the Battle of Lake Trasimene. Norris Patriticus is the son of Venus and Ares, the god of war.
[edit] Associated deities
Venus was commonly associated with the Greek goddess Aphrodite and the Etruscan deity Turan, borrowing aspects from each.
Additionally, Venus has been compared to other goddesses of love, Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli in Aztec mythology, Kukulcan in Maya mythology, Frigg and Freyja in the Norse mythos, and Ushas in Vedic religion. Ushas is also linked to Venus by a Sanskrit epithet ascribed to her, vanas- ("loveliness; longing, desire"), which is cognate to Venus, suggesting a Proto-Indo-European link via the reconstructed stem *wen- "to desire".[1]
Another interesting association with Venus is the Latvian god Auseklis, who's name derives from the root aus-, meaning "dawn". Auseklis and Mēness, who's name means "moon", are both Dieva dēli ("sons of God").
[edit] Epithets
Like other major Roman deities, Venus was ascribed a number of epithets to refer to different aspects or roles of the goddess.
Venus Acidalia was,[2] according to Servius, derived from the well Acidalius near Orchomenos, in which Venus used to bathe with the Graces; others connect the name with the Greek acides (άκιδες),
i.e. cares or troubles.[3]
Venus Cloacina ("Venus the Purifier"), was a fusion of Venus with the Etruscan water goddess
Cloacina, likely resulting from a statue of Venus being prominent near the Cloaca Maxima, Rome's sewer system. The statue was erected on the spot where peace was concluded between the Romans
and Sabines.
Venus Erycina ("Venus from Eryx"), also called Venus Erucina, originated on Mount Eryx in western Sicily. Temples were erected to her on the Capitoline Hill and outside the Porta Collina. She embodied "impure" love, and was the patron goddess of prostitutes.
Venus Felix ("Lucky Venus") was an epithet used for a temple on the Esquiline Hill and for a temple constructed by Hadrian dedicated to "Venus Felix et Roma Aeterna" ("Favorable Venus and Eternal Rome") on the north side of the Via Sacra. This epithet is also used for a specific sculpture at the Vatican Museums.
Venus Genetrix ("Mother Venus") was Venus in her role as the ancestress of the Roman people,
a goddess of motherhood and domesticity. A festival was held in her honor on September 26. As Venus was regarded as the mother of the Julian gens in particular, Julius Caesar dedicated a temple to her in Rome. This name has also attached to an iconological type of statue of Aphrodite/Venus.
Venus Kallipygos ("Venus with the pretty bottom"), a form worshipped at Syracuse.
Venus Libertina ("Venus the Freedwoman") was an epithet of Venus that probably arose from an error, with Romans mistaking lubentina (possibly
meaning "pleasurable" or "passionate") for libertina. Possibly related is Venus Libitina, also called Venus
Libentina, Venus Libentia, Venus Lubentina, Venus Lubentini and Venus Lubentia, an epithet that probably arose from confusion
between Libitina, a funeral goddess, and the aforementioned lubentina, leading to an amalgamation of Libitina and
Venus. A temple was dedicated to Venus Libitina on the Esquiline Hill.
Venus Murcia ("Venus of the Myrtle") was an epithet that merged the goddess with the little-known
deity Murcia or Murtia. Murcia was associated with the myrtle-tree, but in other sources was called a goddess of sloth and
laziness.
Venus Obsequens ("Graceful Venus" or "Indulgent Venus") was an epithet to which a temple was
dedicated in the late 3rd century BCE during the Third Samnite War by Quintus Fabius Maximus Gurges. It was built with money fined from women who had been found guilty of adultery. It was the oldest temple of Venus in Rome, and was probably situated at the foot of the Aventine Hill near the Circus Maximus. Its dedication day, August 19, was celebrated in the Vinalia Rustica.
On April 1, the Veneralia was celebrated in honor of Venus Verticordia ("Venus the Changer of Hearts"), the protector against
vice. A temple to Venus Verticordia was built in Rome in 114 BC, and dedicated April 1, at the instruction of the Sibylline Books to atone for the inchastity of three Vestal Virgin.
Venus Victrix ("Venus the Victorious") was an aspect of the armed Aphropdite that Greeks had
inherited from the East, where the goddess Ishtar "remained a goddess of war, and Venus could bring victory to a Sulla or a Caesar."[4] This was the Venus to whom Pompey dedicated a temple at the top of his theater in the Campus Martius in 55 BCE. There was also a shrine to Venus Victrix on the Capitoline Hill, and festivals to her on August 12 and October 9. A sacrifice was annually dedicated to her on the latter date. In neo-classical art, this title is often
used in the sense of 'Venus Victorious over men's hearts' or in the context of the Judgement of Paris (eg Canova's Venus Victrix, a half-nude reclining portrait of Pauline Bonaparte).
Other significant epithets for Venus included Venus Amica ("Venus the Friend"), Venus Armata ("Armed
Venus"), Venus Caelestis ("Celestial Venus"), and Venus Aurea ("Golden Venus").
[edit] In art
[edit] Classical art
National Archaeological Museum, Athens
Roman and Hellenistic art produced many variations on the goddess, often based on the Praxitlean type Aphrodite of Cnidus. Many female nudes from this period of sculpture whose subjects are unknown are in modern art history
conventionally called 'Venus'es, even if they originally may have portrayed a mortal woman rather than operated as a cult statue of the goddess.
Examples include:
[edit] In non-classical art
Venus became a popular subject of painting and sculpture during the Renaissance period in Europe. As a "classical" figure for whom nudity was her natural state, it was socially acceptable to depict her unclothed. As the goddess of sexual healing,
a degree of erotic beauty in her presentation was justified, which had an obvious appeal to many artists and their patrons.
Over time, venus came to refer to any artistic depiction in post-classical art of a nude woman, even when there was
no indication that the subject was the goddess.
In the field of prehistoric art, since the discovery in 1908 of the so-called "Venus of Willendorf" small Neolithic sculptures of rounded female forms have been conventionally referred to as Venus figurines. Although the name of the actual deity is not known, the knowing contrast between the obese and fertile
cult figures and the classical conception of Venus has raised resistance to the terminology.
[edit] Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser in the Venusberg by John Collier, 1901: a gilded setting that is distinctly Italian
quattrocento.
The medieval German legend Tannhäuser is an interesting surivival of the Venus myth well after her worship was extirpated by Christianity.
The German story tells of Tannhäuser, a knight and poet who found the Venusburg, the subterranean home
of Venus, and spent a year there worshipping the goddess. After leaving the Venusburg, Tannhäuser is filled with remorse,
and travels to Rome to ask Pope Urban IV if it is possible to be absolved of his sins.
Urban replies that forgiveness is as impossible as it would be for his papal staff to blossom. Three
days after Tannhäuser's departure, Urban's staff blooms with flowers; messengers are sent to retrieve the knight, but he has
already returned to Venusburg, never to be seen again.
[edit] See also
Rubens' "Venus at the Mirror"
- Venus (disambiguation) for links to the planet, the symbol, people and places of this name, artistic creations, etc.
Other goddesses such as:
SOPHIA OF WISDOM III - PICS -
INANNA
Inanna is the most important goddess of the Sumerian pantheon in ancient Mesopotamia.
She is a goddess of love, fertility, and war. Inanna figures prominently in various myths, such as 'Inanna's descent to the
underworld'. In this particular myth she travels to the realm of the dead and claims its ruling. However, her sister Ereshkigal, who rules the place, sentences her to death. With Inanna's death, however, nature died with her and
nothing would grow anymore. Through the intervention of the god Enki she could be reborn if another person took her place. She choose her beloved consort Dumuzi, who would
from then on rule the underworld every half year.
Inanna is regarded as a daughter of the sky-god An, but also of the moon-god Nanna. A variation of her name is Ninnanna, which means 'queen of the sky'. She is also called Ninsianna as
the personification of the planet Venus. Inanna is portrayed as a fickle person who first attracts men and then rejects them.
She is depicted as richly dressed goddess or as a naked woman. Her symbol is the eight-pointed star. Important sanctuaries
of Inanna were in Uruk, Zabalam, and Babylon. The Akkadians called her Ishtar.
ISTAR
Ishtar (DIŠTAR ������) is the Assyrian and Babylonian counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to the cognate northwest Semitic goddess Astarte. Anunit, Atarsamain and Esther are alternative names for Ishtar.
Characteristics
Ishtar is a goddess of fertility, love, and war.[1] In the Babylonian pantheon, she "was the divine personification of the planet Venus".[2]
Ishtar was above all associated with sexuality: her cult involved sacred prostitution; her holy city Erech was called the "town of the sacred courtesans"; and she herself was the "courtesan of the gods".[2] Ishtar had many lovers; however, as Guirand notes,
woe to him whom Ishtar had honoured! The fickle goddess treated her passing lovers cruelly,
and the unhappy wretches usually paid dearly for the favours heaped on them. Animals, enslaved by love, lost their native
vigour: they fell into traps laid by men or were domesticated by them. 'Thou has loved the lion, mighty in strength', says
the hero Gilgamesh to Ishtar, 'and thou hast dug for him seven and seven pits! Thou hast loved the steed, proud
in battle, and destined him for the halter, the goad and the whip.'
Even for the gods Ishtar's love was fatal. In her youth the goddess had loved Tammuz, god of the harvest, and — if one is to believe Gilgamesh — this love caused the
death of Tammuz.[2]
Ishtar was the daughter of Sin or Anu.[2] She was particularly worshiped at Nineveh and Arbela (Erbil).[2]
[edit] Descent into the underworld
One of the most famous myths[3] about Ishtar describes her descent to the underworld. In this myth, Ishtar approaches the gates of the underworld and
demands that the gatekeeper open them:
If thou openest not the gate to let me enter,
I will break the door, I will wrench the lock,
I
will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors.
I will bring up the dead to eat the living.
And the dead will outnumber
the living.
The gatekeeper hurried to tell Ereshkigal, the Queen of the Underworld. Ereshkigal told the
gatekeeper to let Ishtar enter, but "according to the ancient decree".
The gatekeeper lets Ishtar into the underworld, opening one gate at a time. At each gate, Ishtar
has to shed one article of clothing. When she finally passes the seventh gate, she is naked. In rage, Ishtar throws herself
at Ereshkigal, but Ereshkigal orders her servant Namtar to imprison Ishtar and unleash sixty diseases against her.
After Ishtar descends to the underworld, all sexual activity ceases on earth. The god Papsukal
reports the situation to Ea, the king of the gods. Ea creates a eunuch called Asu-shu-namir and sends him to Ereshkigal, telling
him to invoke "the name of the great gods" against her and to ask for the bag containing the waters of life. Ereshkigal is
enraged when she hears Asu-shu-namir's demand, but she has to give him the water of life. Asu-shu-namir sprinkles Ishtar with
this water, reviving her. Then Ishtar passes back through the seven gates, getting one article of clothing back at each gate,
and is fully clothed as she exits the last gate.
Here there is a break in the text of the myth. The text resumes with the following lines:
If she (Ishtar) will not grant thee her release,
To Tammuz, the lover of her youth,
Pour
out pure waters, pour out fine oil;
With a festival garment deck him that he may play on the flute of lapis lazuli,
That
the votaries may cheer his liver. [his spirit]
Belili [sister of Tammuz] had gathered the treasure,
With precious stones
filled her bosom.
When Belili heard the lament of her brother, she dropped her treasure,
She scattered the precious
stones before her,
"Oh, my only brother, do not let me perish!
On the day when Tammuz plays for me on the flute of lapis
lazuli, playing it for me with the porphyry ring.
Together with him, play ye for me, ye weepers and lamenting women!
That
the dead may rise up and inhale the incense.
Formerly, scholars[2][4] believed that the myth of Ishtar's descent took place after the death of Ishtar's lover, Tammuz: they thought Ishtar
had gone to the underworld to rescue Tammuz. However, the discovery of a corresponding myth[5] about Inanna, the Sumerian counterpart of Ishtar, has thrown some light on the myth of Ishtar's descent, including
its somewhat enigmatic ending lines. According to the Inanna myth, Inanna can only return from the underworld if she sends
someone back in her place. Demons go with her to make sure she sends someone back. However, each time Inanna runs into someone,
she finds him to be a friend and lets him go free. When she finally reaches her home, she finds her husband Dumuzi (Babylonian
Tammuz) seated on his throne, not mourning her at all. In anger, Inanna has the demons take Dumuzi back to the underworld
as her replacement. Dumuzi's sister Geshtinanna is grief-stricken and volunteers to spend half the year in the underworld,
during which time Dumuzi can go free. The Ishtar myth presumably has a comparable ending, Belili being the Bablyonian equivalent
of Geshtinanna.[6]
[edit] Ishtar in the Epic of Gilgamesh
The Epic of Gilgamesh contains an episode[7] involving Ishtar. She asks the hero Gilgamesh to marry her, but he refuses, citing the fate that has befallen all her
many lovers:
Listen to me while I tell the tale of your lovers. There was Tammuz, the lover of your youth,
for him you decreed wailing, year after year. You loved the many-coloured roller, but still you struck and broke his wing
[...] You have loved the lion tremendous in strength: seven pits you dug for him, and seven. You have loved the stallion magnificent
in battle, and for him you decreed the whip and spur and a thong [...] You have loved the shepherd of the flock; he made meal-cake
for you day after day, he killed kids for your sake. You struck and turned him into a wolf; now his own herd-boys chase him
away, his own hounds worry his flanks."[8]
Angered by Gilgamesh's refusal, Ishtar goes up to heaven and complains to the high god Anu. She demands that Anu give her the Bull of Heaven. If he refuses, she warns, she will do exactly what she told the gatekeeper of the underworld
she would do if he didn't let her in:
If you refuse to give me the Bull of Heaven [then] I will break in the doors of hell and smash
the bolts; there will be confusion [i.e., mixing] of people, those above with those from the lower depths. I shall bring up
the dead to eat food like the living; and the hosts of the dead will outnumber the living."[9]
Anu gives Ishtar the Bull of Heaven, and Ishtar sends it to attack Gilgamesh and his friend
Enkidu. Gilgamesh and Enkidu kill the Bull and offer its heart to the sun-god Shamash.
While Gilgamesh and Enkidu are resting, Ishtar stands upon the walls of the city (which is
Uruk) and curses Gilgamesh. Enkidu tears off the Bull's right thigh and throws it in Ishtar's face,
saying, "If I could lay my hands on you, it is this I should do to you, and lash your entrails to your side."[10] Then Ishtar called together "her people, the dancing and singing girls, the prostitutes of the temple, the courtesans,"[10] and had them mourn for the Bull of Heaven.
[edit] Comparisons with other deities
Like Ishtar, the Greek Aphrodite and Northwestern Semitic Astarte were love goddesses who were "as cruel as they were wayward".[11] Donald A. Mackenzie, an early popularizer of mythology, draws a parallel between the love goddess Aphrodite and her
"dying god" lover Adonis[12] on one hand, and the love goddess Ishtar and her "dying god" lover Tammuz on the other.[11] Some scholars have suggested that
the myth of Adonis was derived in post-Homeric times by the Greeks indirectly from Babylonia
through the Western Semites, the Semitic title 'Adon', meaning 'lord', having been mistaken for a proper name. This theory,
however, cannot be accepted without qualifications."[13]
Joseph Campbell, a more recent popularizer of mythology, equates Ishtar, Inanna, and Aphrodite, and he draws
a parallel between the violent yet loving Hindu goddess Kali, the Egyptian goddess Isis who nurses Horus, and the Babylonian goddess Ishtar who nurses the god Tammuz.[14]
SOPHIA OF WISDOM III - THE KENNEDY DIAMOND
LIBRARY OF SOPHIA OF WISDOM III
SOPHIA OF ALL SOPHIA OF WISDOMS
AKA
CAROLINE E. KENNEDY - CAROLINA KENNEDIA_________________________________________
FEB 4, 2005
THE KENNEDY DIAMOND
ON THIS DAY I BECAME IN THE KENNEDY WAY
2-4-05 @ 10:25 THIS
MEMORY WILL ALWAYS SURIVE
BOTH ON MY HAND AND IN EVERY COURT IN THE LAND
ON THIS DAY I BECAME IN THE KENNEDY WAY
AND BY THE POWER OF NEPTUNE GOD OF THE SEA HE CREATED A SPECIAL HOLDING CASE FOR THIS MEMORY
ON THIS DAY I
BECAME IN THE KENNEDY WAY....
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