Dedication of an altar to Aphrodite
created: Transcription (Reynolds).
source date: Probably second century CE
language: ar; en; fr; de; grc; grc-Latn; el; he
availability: Creative Commons licence Attribution UK 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/uk/) All reuse or distribution of this work must contain somewhere a link back to the URL http://inslib.kcl.ac.uk/

Bibliography

[...], 156.4, fig 118 (drawing only, from T. XXI, 7-10), whence [...], 1964.570; [...], 4 whence [...] 57.2021, [...], 2008.604

Ἀφροδείτᾳ

ἀρχεγόνῳ

Translation

For Aphrodite, source of life

Commentary

All the altars in this set that can be legible contain unusual elements. There is a discussion by Pugliese-Carratelli (1963).

b: The epithet is applied to Asklepios in IG II,2, 4494 (at PHI 6785), but we have not found it elsewhere of Aphrodite. She is perhaps analogous here to Venus Genetrix; or the term may imply a more philosophical approach See also Damoxenus 2.8, at Athenaeus 60.16 (available inPerseus) ἡ φύσις πάσης τέχνης ἀρχέγονον ἐστι; so Diodorus Siculus, 1.88.1 (at Perseus) τὸ γεννητικὸν μόριον of Priapus which is to be honoured ὡς ἄν ὑπάρχον ἀρχέγονον τῆς τῶν Ζῴων φύσεως (Com., ND 8, Ὠκεανὸς ἀρχέγονος πάντων, ND 17, τὸ ἀρχέγονον ὑγρόν). See also Aphrodite as παγγενέτειρα in Orphic Hymn 55. Another possibility is that ἀρχέγονος = πρωτόγονος, 'first-born'.