By Joel Christensen
Each Valentine’s Day, when I see images of the chubby winged god Cupid taking aim with his bow and arrow at his unsuspecting victims, I take refuge in my training as a scholar of early Greek poetry and myth to muse on the strangeness of this image and the nature of love.
In Roman culture, Cupid was the child of the goddess Venus, popularly known today as the goddess of love, and Mars, the god of war. But for ancient audiences, as myths and texts show, she was really the patron deity of “sexual intercourse” and “procreation.” The name Cupid, which comes from the Latin verb cupere, means desire, love or lust. But in the odd combination of a baby’s body with lethal weapons, along with parents associated with both love and war, Cupid is a figure of contradictions – a symbol of conflict and desire.
This history isn’t often reflected in the modern-day Valentine celebrations. The Feast of Saint Valentine started out as a celebration of St. Valentine of Rome. As Candida Moss, a scholar of theology and late antiquity, explains, the courtly romance of holiday advertisements may have more to do with the Middle Ages than with ancient Rome.
The winged cupid was a favourite of artists and authors in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, but he was more than just a symbol of love to them.
Born of sex and war
The Romans’ Cupid was the equivalent of the Greek god Eros, the origin of the word “erotic.” In ancient Greece, Eros is often seen as the son of Ares, the god of war, and Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty, as well as sex and desire.
Playing with Cupid
Today it might be commonplace to say that you are what you love, but for ancient philosophers, you are both what and how you love. This is illustrated in one of the most memorable Roman accounts of Cupid that combines elements lust along with philosophical reflections.
There’s more than a bit of play to our modern Cupid. But this little archer comes from a long tradition of wrestling with a force that exerts so much influence over mortal minds. Tracing his path through Greek and Roman myth shows the vital importance of understanding the pleasures and dangers of desire.