The words «Cyprus» and «Paphos» bring immediately to mind the temple of Aphrodite. Old Paphos (Palaepaphos), was home to the temple of Aphrodite in Antiquity, the one that outranked all others including Delos, Thebes (Boiotia), Athens or Corinth. Aphrodisios was the name of the first month of the year in the Paphian calendar - which politely began on Augustus’s birthday (23 September). According to Tacitus (1), young Titus, the son of the Emperor Vespasian,

visited the temple on his way to see Berenice again for the sole purpose of consulting the goddess of love. A statue of Titus eventually graced one of the city’s streets. Consulting the goddess: her priests evidently practised divination. That meant offering a sacrifice - some male animal, most probably a young goat kid whose entrails were said to provide the best readings. The priests read the signs, the visitors prayed. Aphrodite’s statue was always extremely archaic and like no other anywhere in the world: a circular stone mass that rose up in a cone shape, wider at the base than at the summit. (2)

The temple complex consisted of at least two sacred buildings. One was situated on the beach where, according to one version, the goddess was born from the foam of the sea. The other was more inland, (ca. 2.4 km distant) on the banks of the stream called Bocarus, in a wood of laurels. Ajacent sacred gardens were cultivated by the priests of Aphrodite. Anyone, even criminals, who entered the temple, including the Via Sacra, the paved marble walkway leading to the holy complex, could claim sanctuary for as long as s/he remained there.

Pausanias records (3) that Agapenor, who commanded the Arcadians in the Trojan War, was pushed to Paphos by a storm and that he founded the temple of Aphrodite. Then he built New Paphos (Neapaphos) near Old Paphos, the religious centre of the island, thus separating commercial entreprise and religion. Neapaphos prospered quickly, for apart from Aphrodite’s temple, natural wealth and beauty abounded in the island.

Last but not least, the flowers. A single day in Cyprus in the spring sufficed to make one understand why the Hellenes swore that nowhere else in the Mediterranean was the air so full of sweet scents. Amongst all the flowers, the rose reigned supreme. A Festival of Roses called Rhodismos was celebrated in late spring or early summer. The rose connoted the idea of rebirth and at funerals symbolised participation after death in royal/divine life. (5) It was thanks to Cypriot roses, gems and perfumes that Cleopatra, the last Queen of Egypt, so dazzled Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonius that they nearly lost interest in politics, and that, in a sense, Octavian won at Actium and thus became master of the whole world.

1. Tacitus, Historiae II,3.
2. In what might be an instance of Roman tongue-in-cheek, the senator claims to ignore the symbolism behind the stone. Ibid. Apollonius of Tyana, for one, caught on at once - Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. III,58.
3. Pausanias, Epiegesis 8.5.1
4. Pliny the Elder, Hist. Nat., XXXVII.17.
5. Born from the blood of Adonis, the rose (others say the anemone) was said to have been brought to the island from the Syrian coast by the unconsolable Aphrodite.

Sources
Kokkinia, Christina: “Rosen für die Toten im griechischen Raum und eine neue Rhodismos-Inschrift aus Bithynien”, Museum Helveticum 56 (1999), pp. 204-221.
Mitford, Terence B.: “Roman Cyprus” in Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt (ANRW) II.7.2, pp. 1285-1384.
Walter, G: Preface to Casson, Stanley: Chypre dans l’Antiquité, Paris, 1939, pp. 9-12.

Some post-modern interpretations of the cult of Aphrodite.

Photo credits
Roman glass cameo, male head in profile, set within original gold ring. Ist - IInd century AD. Image source.
Other images are the author's.

Mauricius Fabius