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Apaturia (mythology)

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Apaturia (Ancient Greek: Ἀπατουρία) was an epithet given to more than one goddess in Greek mythology. The name meant "the deceitful".

Athena

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The name Apaturia was given to the goddess Athena by Aethra, the mother of Theseus, who received a dream from Athena urging her to travel to the island of Sphairia to pour a libation for a charioteer of Pelops. After Aethra awoke she traveled to the island and was there raped by the god Poseidon.[1]

Aethra later established there a temple to this aspect of the goddess, and started a custom where brides would offer up their maidenhood belts before marriage to Athena Apaturia.[2][3][4] Athena Apaturia continued to be worshipped by the Troezenians in this manner.[5]

Aphrodite

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Apaturia was an epithet of the goddess Aphrodite at Phanagoria and other places in the Taurian Chersonesus, where it originated, according to tradition, in this way: Aphrodite was attacked by giants, and called Heracles to her assistance. He concealed himself with her in a cavern, and as the giants approached her one by one, she surrendered them to Heracles to kill them.[6][7]

Notes

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  1. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece 2.33.1
  2. ^ Rigoglioso, Marguerite (2009). The Cult of Divine Birth in Ancient Greece. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 76. ISBN 9780230620919. Retrieved 2016-02-19.
  3. ^ Håland, Evy Johanne (2014). Rituals of Death and Dying in Modern and Ancient Greece: Writing History from a Female Perspective. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. pp. 139, 436. ISBN 9781443868594. Retrieved 2016-02-19.
  4. ^ Monaghan, Patricia, ed. (2014). "Aethra". Encyclopedia of Goddesses and Heroines. New World Library. p. 222. ISBN 9781608682188. Retrieved 2016-02-19.
  5. ^ Hammond, N.G.L., ed. (1924). The Cambridge Ancient History. Vol. 3. Cambridge University Press. p. 716. ISBN 9780521224963. Retrieved 2016-02-19.
  6. ^ Strabo, Geographica xi. p.495
  7. ^ Stephanus of Byzantium, Ethnica, s.v Ἀπάτουρον

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domainSchmitz, Leonhard (1870). "Apaturia". In Smith, William (ed.). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Vol. 1. p. 220.