Aphrodite's Relationship With Fate In The Iliad

In Book 20 of The Iliad, Aphrodite’s relationship with fate is reversed after the proclamation of Poseidon. Poseidon foretells of Aeneas’ fate when he says, “He is destined to survive. Yes, so the generation of Dardanes will not perish” (Homer 513). Up to this point in The Iliad, Aphrodite’s actions are at odds with fate. This proclamation sets up a new role for Aphrodite, as her actions will now be the driving agent of fate for her son. The Roman poet Virgil turned this proclamation into the story of Aeneas Journey from defeat at Troy to the founding of the Roman civilization in The Aeneid. In this epic, Aphrodite takes on the Roman name Venus. Venus becomes the essential character reminding her son of his fate to found Rome. In Homer’s Iliad, those who the goddess of love cares about have been left to their own free will until they are about to die when she has intervened. …show more content…
Virgil seamlessly takes the same shortcomings of Aphrodite’s relentless devotion to those dear to her in The Iliad and transforms them to exemplary qualities guiding The Aeneid. Author W.D Anderson in his article Venus and Aeneas: The Difficulties of Filial Pietas says of Virgil’s representation of Venus, “Venus is a devoted mother, yet he allows her to show traces of the old, capricious Aphrodite, so that her very complexity, thus acknowledged, makes her seem at the same time more intriguing and, to one reader at least, more credible.” Anderson makes an important point in this article in that Aphrodite’s self-absorbed nature in The Iliad becomes a problem with her whimsical actions to defy fate. Venus character is no different than Aphrodite, but her actions seem more credible because of the fate she must uphold for her son to found