A rippling prelude –
now the bard struck up an irresistible song:
The Love of Ares and Aphrodite Crowned with Flowers…
how the two had first made love in Hephaestus’ mansion,
all in secret. Ares had showered her with gifts
and showered Hephaestus’ marriage bed with shame
but a messenger ran to tell the god of fire –
Helios, lord of the sun, who’d spied the couple
lost in each other’s arms and making love.
– Homer
The Odyssey, Book 8, lines 300-308. Demodocus plays a song about a betrayed husband Hephaestus, and the adulterous love affair between his wife Aphrodite with Ares. Hephaestus is god of fire and smiths, Aphrodite goddess of sexual love and Ares god of war. The bard’s tale will end with Hephaestus trapping the lovers in his marriage bed, bound in chains forged by the divine smith. There are certain parallels between the story and the situation of Penelope and the suitors. But there is one distinct difference: Aphrodite is the archetypal unfaithful wife, while Penelope is exemplary of wifely fidelity. They are two different examples of female power.