Venus Mythology

From Inanna to Aphrodite

Venus is the brightest planet in the sky; that the morning star rising before the Sun and the evening star setting after it are one body was discovered in Babylon. The Sumerians called her Inanna: goddess of love and of war. The Greeks placed Aphrodite here, the Romans Venus.

The map below gathers the branches of Venus' symbolism: goddesses, archetypes, traditions, tales. Tap a branch.

16 branches7 cultures3 myths7 number (Agrippa)

Key facts

Symbolism map: desire, beauty, choice and pleasure

The glyph at the centre, the branches of Venus' symbolism around it: gods (gold), archetypes (blue), traditions (green) and narratives (red). Tap a branch and its explanation opens on the right.

Aphrodite and ErosGreek

In Hesiod born from the foam of Uranus' severed member fallen into the sea, in Homer the daughter of Zeus and Dione. Wife of Hephaestus, lover of Ares; mother of Eros, Deimos and Phobos. Beauty, adornment, erotic love, vanity and self-love are her domain. Aphrodite in the Greek family tree →

Inanna, Ishtar, HathorMesopotamia and Egypt

Sumer's Inanna and Akkad's Ishtar carry love and war in one body; the planet Venus is her star. Egypt's Hathor is the goddess of music, drunkenness and love, but when angered she becomes Sekhmet. Lust and battle together. Inanna in the Mesopotamian family tree →

FreyjaNorse

Goddess of the Vanir; love, beauty, seidr magic and half of those slain in battle are hers. She sleeps with four dwarves for the necklace Brísingamen; she weeps tears of gold for her lost husband Od. Friday is the day of Frigg/Freyja, the day of Venus. Freyja in the Norse family tree →

ShukraHindu

In Vedic astrology Venus is male: Shukra, the wise teacher of the asuras, keeper of the mantra that raises the dead. The graha of pleasure, art, marriage and wealth; Friday (Shukravara) is his day.

PsycheApuleius

The beauty of the mortal Psyche makes Venus jealous; Eros falls in love with her, loves her in the dark and flees at the light of the lamp. Psyche carries out Venus' four impossible tasks and becomes immortal. The soul (psyche) takes a body; jealousy and the trials of love. Psyche in the family tree →

CirceOdyssey

Sorceress daughter of Helios; she turns Odysseus' men into swine and keeps Odysseus for a year. Sexual enchantment, seduction, the power of desire to make beasts of us: the dark face of Venus. Circe in the family tree →

The appleParis, Eve, Idun

Eris' golden apple inscribed 'to the fairest' sets off the judgement of Paris and the Trojan War; Eve's apple brings knowledge and exile, Idun's apples the youth of the gods. The apple is choice and consequence: Venus' judgement of value.

The rose and the talesBriar Rose, Beauty and the Beast

Grimm's Briar Rose sleeps a hundred years behind the thorns; in Beauty and the Beast a plucked rose leads into the monster's palace. The rose is Venus' flower: beauty comes with thorns, love with a price. Mother-daughter bonds and awakening lie beneath the tales.

Troubadours and courtly loveFin'amor

The Provençal troubadours of the twelfth century invented love devoted to the unattainable lady (fin'amor): the beloved becomes a mirror, the reflection of the soul, the anima. Love moves from desire to idealisation; Venus' Libra face.

The pleasure principleIndividual relationship

Venus tells what we find beautiful, what we enjoy, whom we are drawn to. Freud's pleasure principle is Venus' realm in astrology: pleasure, taste, comfort, the wish to be together.

Choice and valuesThe Lovers (Tarot VI)

In the tarot the Lovers card is about choice, not union: in the old designs a young man stands between two women while Eros aims his arrow. Venus chooses what we value; a relationship is a preference.

Hetaira and temple womanCourtesan, hierodule

The temple women of Ishtar in Babylon, the educated hetairai of Greece, the courtesans of the Renaissance: the woman who makes love and beauty her profession. Venus at the edge of society; the trade and the art of desire.

Mirrors and animaSoul, treasure

Venus' glyph is a hand mirror. The mirror is seeing oneself and finding oneself in another; Jung's anima is the feminine image within the man, the soul reflected in the beloved. The treasure, the value that must be won.

NetzachKabbalah, the seventh sephira

On the Tree of Life Netzach (Victory) is the sphere of feeling, art and nature; it corresponds to Venus, and Mercury's Hod stands opposite. Beauty, order and design are born here.

Copper and CyprusCuprum, Kypris

The Latin name of copper, cuprum, comes from Cyprus (Cyprium); Aphrodite is Kypris because she came ashore on Cyprus. Venus' metal is copper, her mirror polished copper. In the body the kidneys, throat and reproductive organs.

Morning and evening starPhosphorus and Hesperus

The Greeks called the morning star Phosphorus and the evening star Hesperus; the Babylonians knew both were Ishtar. In classical astrology Venus rising before the Sun (morning star) is held more combative, setting after it (evening star) gentler.

Meaning of the glyph: ♀

The glyph of Venus is a cross beneath a circle: spirit (circle) above matter (cross). The traditional reading takes this as 'spirit ruling matter', love ennobling the body. Its more concrete origin is Aphrodite's hand mirror; since the Renaissance the same sign has also marked the female sex and copper.

○ CircleSpirit, wholeness; the face of the mirror, seeing oneself.
+ CrossMatter, the four elements; the mirror's handle, holding on to the body.
WholeSpirit standing on matter: value embodied as beauty.

Venus across cultures

The Venus figure carries war as much as love: Inanna goes to battle, Freyja takes half the slain, Hathor turns into Sekhmet. The Greek Aphrodite splits these two faces and keeps Ares outside as a lover.

Sumer and Akkad

Inanna / Ishtar

Love, war and the planet Venus; she descends to the underworld, is stripped at seven gates, sends Dumuzi in her place. Gilgamesh refuses her and the Bull of Heaven comes.

In the family tree
Egyptian

Hathor

Cow-horned goddess of love, music, dance and drunkenness; the Eye of Ra. Sekhmet when enraged, Hathor when soothed.

In the family tree
Greek

Aphrodite

Foam-born; lady of Cyprus and Cythera, mother of Eros, lover of Ares. She promises Helen to Paris.

In the family tree
Roman

Venus

Italic goddess of gardens and fertility, later identified with Aphrodite; as mother of Aeneas the ancestress of Rome and the Julian line (Venus Genetrix).

Norse

Freyja

Vanir goddess; love, beauty, seidr, the battle-dead. Her chariot drawn by cats, the necklace Brísingamen.

In the family tree
Hindu

Shukra

Male Venus; teacher of the asuras, keeper of the reviving mantra. Pleasure, marriage, art; white, diamond.

Phoenician and Canaanite

Astarte

The western form of Ishtar; the source that flowed to Aphrodite by way of Cyprus. In Egypt counted a daughter of Ra and wife of Seth.

In the family tree

Three myths

Inanna's descent to the underworld

Inanna 'from the great above set her mind on the great below' and descends to the realm of her sister Ereshkigal. At each of the seven gates an ornament is taken: her crown, her necklace, her breast-ornament, her ring, her measuring rod, her robe. Naked and powerless, she is struck by the eye of death and her corpse is hung on a hook. Her minister Ninshubur goes from god to god; the two beings Enki creates revive her, but the underworld demands a price. Inanna sends her husband Dumuzi, who did not mourn her, in her place. Venus' disappearance from the sky and her rebirth are this myth's calendar.

Born of the foam

Cronus castrates his father Uranus with a sickle and throws the severed member into the sea. White foam (aphros) gathers round the seed and a girl grows within it; she comes ashore first at Cythera, then at Cyprus, and grass springs up where she treads. Eros and Himeros (desire) greet her. In Hesiod's account Venus is older than Zeus: desire precedes order.

The net and the laughing gods

Aphrodite is married to lame Hephaestus but loves Ares. All-seeing Helios tells Hephaestus of the affair; the smith forges an invisible, unbreakable net and hangs it over the bed. The lovers are caught and Hephaestus summons all the gods; the gods laugh until they ache, and Hermes says he would gladly lie beside Aphrodite even under three such nets. Poseidon stands surety, Aphrodite goes to Cyprus, Ares to Thrace. Desire is met with laughter, not shame.

Venus in classical astrology

Signs ruledTaurus (night house) and Libra (day house)
ExaltationPisces 27°
DetrimentScorpio and Aries
FallVirgo 27°
SectNocturnal planet; the lesser benefic
Joy5th house
NatureCold and moist (temperate); in Ptolemy close to warm
Day and hourFriday; the hours of Venus
MetalCopper
SpeedAbout 1°12' a day; never more than 47° from the Sun; five conjunctions in eight years draw a pentagram

In classical interpretation Venus signifies love, marriage, beauty, art and pleasure; in Taurus it tells of possession, in Libra of relationship. See the family of Aphrodite and the birth chart calculator.

Table of correspondences

Day, metal, tarot and Kabbalah correspondences follow Agrippa, Lilly and the Golden Dawn; not one system but layers laid over centuries.

DayFriday (Veneris dies; Frigg's/Freyja's day)
MetalCopper
Number (Agrippa)7
TarotIII The Empress
KabbalahNetzach (Victory), the seventh sephira
AlchemyCopper; the principle of union (coniunctio)
Body (Lilly)Kidneys, throat, reproductive organs, skin
Colour (Lilly)White, light green, sky blue
Angel (grimoire tradition)Anael (Haniel)
Plants (tradition)Rose, myrtle, apple, violet

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Frequently Asked Questions

Which goddess is Venus named after?

The Roman goddess of love and gardens, Venus; the Greek Aphrodite, Babylonian Ishtar, Sumerian Inanna, Egyptian Hathor and Norse Freyja are goddesses of the same planet. In Hindu astrology Venus is male: Shukra.

Why is Venus a goddess of both love and war?

In her oldest form, Inanna/Ishtar, love and war are not separated: desire, conquest and destruction are faces of one power. Greek tradition divides this duality between Aphrodite and Ares and places a love affair between them; Freyja still takes half of the slain for herself.

What does the Venus glyph show?

A cross beneath a circle: spirit standing on matter. Its concrete origin is Aphrodite's hand mirror; the same sign marks copper and the female sex.

Are the morning star and the evening star different planets?

They are the same planet; it is the morning star when it rises before the Sun and the evening star when it sets after it. The Babylonians knew both were Ishtar; the Greeks distinguished Phosphorus and Hesperus. In classical astrology the morning-star Venus is held more assertive, the evening-star Venus more conciliatory.

What does Venus signify in classical astrology?

Love, marriage, beauty, art, pleasure, women and values; in the body the kidneys and reproductive organs. It rules Taurus and Libra, is exalted in Pisces, falls in Virgo and has its joy in the 5th house; it is the lesser benefic of the night sect.

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