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  • Goddess of Love and mother of Venus.
  • A benefactor of the Trojans.
  • She helps Aeneas whenever Juno tries to hurt him, causing conflict amongst the gods.
  • She is also referred to as Cytherea after Cythera, her home and where her shrine is.
  • After Juno sends a storm to harm Aeneas' ship, Venus rushes to Mount Olympus to beg Jupiter to end their suffering. Jupiter assures her that Aeneas will eventually find his promised home in Italy and that two of Aeneas’s descendants, Romulus and Remus, will found the mightiest empire in the world. Jupiter then sends a god down to the people of Carthage to make sure they behave hospitably to the Trojans.
  • Aeneas remains unaware of the divine machinations that steer his course. While he is in the woods, Venus appears to him in disguise and relates how Dido came to be queen of Carthage. She also contrives that Dido should marry him.
  • Venus advises Aeneas to go into the city and talk to the queen, who will welcome him. Aeneas and his friend Achates approach Carthage, shrouded in a cloud that Venus conjures to prevent them from being seen.
  • Venus worries that Juno will incite the Phoenicians against her son. She sends down another of her sons, Cupid, the god of love, who takes the form of Aeneas’s son, Ascanius. In this disguise, Cupid inflames the queen’s heart with passion for Aeneas. With love in her eyes, Dido begs Aeneas to tell the story of his adventures during the war and the seven years since he left Troy.
  • This book establishes Venus as Aeneas' immortal mother and makes it clear that he has the luxury of divine protection. It also establishes the meta-narrative of the gods and goddesses at war with each other which will run through the whole story.

Aeneas is re-telling the fall of Troy. He says that at one point he saw Helen, the cause of the war and is over come by the desire to kill her but Venus appears and explains that blame for the war belongs with the gods, not Helen. Venus advises Aeneas to flee Troy at once, since his fate is elsewhere.

Venus’s persuasion of Aeneas to not kill Helen relies on the ultimate inability of mortals to influence their destinies. Venus tells him to hold neither Helen nor Paris responsible for Troy’s downfall: he must realize that “the harsh will of the gods” caused Troy’s destruction. Venus’s words reveal that although Aeneas and the Trojans lose a battle with the Greeks that they might have won, in the end they have no choice but to submit to the unfavorable will of the gods. But the gods’ will is also what enables some of the Trojans to escape from Troy. Again, fate must always be fulfilled: Aeneas is destined to survive.

Juno sees Dido’s love for Aeneas as a way to keep Aeneas from going to Italy. Pretending to make a peace offering, Juno suggests to Venus that they find a way to get Dido and Aeneas alone together. If they marry, Juno suggests, the Trojans and the Tyrians would be at peace, and she and Venus would end their feud. Venus knows Juno is just trying to keep the Trojans from Italy but allows Juno to go ahead anyway.

Book 1- Storm and Banquet

Background General Info

Book 12

After Aeneas is wounded in the leg by an arrow, Venus sends down a healing balm which helps him dislodge the arrow

The Significance of Venus in The Aeneid

Book 10

Book 2 - The Fall of Troy

Venus blames Juno for the continued suffering of Aeneas and the Trojans. Juno angrily responds that she did not force Aeneas to go to Italy. Annoyed at their bickering, Jupiter decrees that henceforth he will not help either side, so that the merits and efforts of men will decide their ends. Jupiter grants Juno’s request only because Venus herself is already protecting Aeneas

Book 4 - Dido

Book 5 - Funeral Games

Book 8 - Aeneas in Rome

Venus, fearing more tricks from Juno, worries about the group’s safety at sea when they leave Eryx for Latium. She pleads with Neptune to let Aeneas reach Italy without harm. Neptune agrees to allow them safe passage across the waters, demanding, however, that one of the crew perish on the voyage, as a sort of sacrifice for the others. On the voyage, Palinurus, the lead captain of Aeneas’s fleet, falls asleep at the helm and falls into the sea

The goddesses Juno and Venus continue their quarrel by meddling further in the journey of the weary Trojans. The gods, not the hero, drive the plot—Aeneas has been reduced to a responsive role. A low point in terms of morale occurs when, to stop the burning of his fleet, Aeneas begs Jupiter to help him or end his life.

  • Aeneas meets Evander. Venus frets over Aeneas’s upcoming war. She speaks to her husband, Vulcan, the god of fire and forging, and persuades him to make Aeneas new weapons and armor that will give him an added advantage. Vulcan commands his workers—Cyclopes inside the great volcano Etna—to begin forging the items.
  • At the camp that night, Venus suddenly appears to Aeneas and presents him with the arms that Vulcan has completed: helmet, corselet, sword, spear, and shield, all of them beautifully crafted and stronger than metal forged by humans. The face of the shield is particularly notable, for on it Vulcan has depicted the story of the Roman glory that awaits Italy. Aeneas sees Romulus being nursed by the she-wolf, the defeat of the Gauls, Caesar Augustus as he defeats Antony and Cleopatra at the battle of Actium, and much else.

  • After many books in which we see Aeneas being alternately tormented at the hands of Juno and rescued by Venus and her allies, the fates begin to balance out. A veritable coalition of immortals now fortifies Aeneas for the coming campaign: he receives help from the gods Tiberinus, Venus, and Vulcan.
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