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Marble statue group of the goddess Aphrodite and Eros The British Museum © The Trustees of the British Museum -
Lamp Elpidephoros The British Museum © The Trustees of the British Museum -
Amphora with Aphrodite James Green The British Museum © The Trustees of the British Museum -
The Sanctuary of Aphrodite and Eros Davide Mauro © Davide Mauro / Wikimedia Commons, CC-BY-SA-4.0 -
Red-figured krater with depiction of Eros and Aphrodite The Phiale Painter The British Museum © The Trustees of the British Museum -
Terracotta squat lekythos with Aphrodite and Eros flanking an incense burner. The Metropolitan Museum of Art © 2000–2023 The Metropolitan Museum of Art / Public domain -
Aphrodite and Eros Musée du Louvre © 2006 Musée du Louvre / Daniel Lebée / Carine Deambrosis
On the slopes of the Acropolis, many sanctuaries were established to house ancient cults. The sanctuary of Aphrodite and Eros, also known as the sanctuary of Aphrodite Ourania, is located on a plateau on the northern slope of the Acropolis hill. It is an open-air sanctuary with entrance from the east through a sloping access and carved rock-cut steps.
On the rock, twenty-two niches have been carved for the dedication of votive offerings and there are two inscriptions that led to the identification of the space as a sanctuary dedicated to Aphrodite and Eros. The inscriptions date back to the classical period, and it appears that the differently shaped and sized niches were carved until the late Roman period. The excavation of the site yielded a plethora of findings: marble sculptures and reliefs depicting human body parts, replicas of genitalia, clay vessels, and figurines.
Two relief plaques depicting a procession of Erotes, which were found embedded in buildings around the sanctuary, and another fragment found within the sanctuary are believed to belong to the decoration of its peribolos. An impressive find associated with the sanctuary, currently exhibited in the Acropolis Museum, is a treasure box, made of two massive blocks fitted one on top of the other and secured with two locks. Inscribed on it is an inscription stating that it is a thesauros (box for collecting monetary offerings) for premarital offerings to Aphrodite Ourania. In this box, newlyweds would deposit a specific amount of money so that Aphrodite, the protector of marriage, would ensure them a ‘happily ever after’ together.
The cult of the two deities in the sanctuary experienced a great flourishing during the Hellenistic period, and its use likely continued until the 4th century CE. Some scholars consider it possible that an early Christian chapel was founded at the site of the sanctuary in later times.
