Psyche is the goddess of the human soul. She was born the prettiest, loveliest, fairest, finest and most extremely beautiful mortal in the world to a unnamed Greek King and Queen and was loved by many, including Eros, the God of Romantic Love, who eventually became her husband. She was turned into an immortal goddess by Zeus according to Greek Mythology.
Genealogy and Family[]
Psyche was born into an unnamed Greek royal family, she had two older sisters named Aglaura and Cidippe. With her husband, Eros she had a daughter named Hedone.
Role and Significance[]
The Greek goddess of the human soul, she represents the inner-mind. Historically speaking, Psyche was not a worshipped deity and did not obtain any cults in ancient Greece.
Greek Name[]
Psyche's Greek name is Ψυχη it means "soul".
Myth[]
In the Tale of Eros and Psyche by Apuleius, Psyche was a supremely beautiful girl born to an unnamed Greek King and Queen. So beautiful in fact that people considered her the successor of the Goddess of Beauty, Aphrodite herself, even admiring and worshipping her in Aphrodite's place.
Noticing a lack of visitors to her temple, because of the new obsession with Psyche, an angry and jealous Aphrodite commanded her son, Eros, to make Psyche fall in love with the most hideous monster in revenge, and so Eros visited the princess' bedroom at night whilst she was sleeping and planned to complete his mother's command's but Psyche was accidentally saved from this harsh fate, as Eros' arrow missed Psyche and shot into him instead, causing him to fall in love with (the first person he saw after the arrow plunged into him) Psyche.Eros then removed the romantic love of all the human men towards Psyche, which left her without any suitors. This made Psyche's concerned parents visit the Oracle at Delphi to find out why unlike their two older daughters, nobody wanted to marry their youngest child, Psyche. And after a lengthy and tiring prayer, the couple were told that Psyche was destined to marry a monster and were instructed to leave their daughter at the edge of a mountain. But the soothsayer's words were not literal and the monster he referred to was actually Eros. However due to the Oracular Apollo's rivalry and strife with Eros, he referred to him as a monster to his Soothsayer at the Oracle.
After Psyche is left at the edge of a mountain by her parents who bided her farewell she is left alone, where she is lifted and sent to her new marital home by Zephyrus, the god of the west wind, where she reaches a beautiful palace with plenty of amenities and comfort. Her mysterious husband, Eros, the god of love, visits Psyche every night, whilst it is dark, so she is unable to see him and Eros warns Psyche that she can never look at him, lest she be shocked.
One day Psyche's older sisters visit her in her new estate, and they talk. Psyche tells the two that as her husband only visits her at the darkness of night, she has never seen his face. Her sisters then warn Psyche and advise her, after the couple go to bed, to hide a lamp under her bed so she could see her husband's identity whilst he was asleep. Psyche carries out this advice but the melted wax in her candle, accidentally drops and lands on an unconscious Eros, awakening him in pain from his sleep.
Angry and feeling betrayed by Psyche for revealing his identity, Eros leaves her. Psyche tries to catch up with him, but he escapes too far with his wings. She then decides to track down Eros the next day and hopefully reunite with him, realising how much she loves him. Along the way, she comes across Pan, the god of the wild and shepherds and honours him, and also visits temples of Hera and Demeter, rearranging sacrifices to them, in hopes they could help her, to find both goddesses tell her they cannot help her when another goddess (Aphrodite) is against her.
Psyche then reaches Aphrodite's temple, where she asks her for a chance to reunite with Eros, but Aphrodite, has her whipped by her servants, Worry and Sadness and mocks her for her pregnancy. Aphrodite determined to keep her son and Psyche separate, sets Psyche four very difficult-almost impossible tasks, that she has to pass to reunite with Eros. Including sorting out a huge pile of grains into different piles, where Eros commanded ants to help her organise this, collecting the wool of golden sheep, where she was advised by a river god to collect the sheep's leftover wool from the bushes instead of touching the aggressive flock and filling up a container of water from a dragon infested place, where Zeus sent his eagle to fill the container for her. Psyche passed the first three tasks thanks to the help of other gods, but in the last task, she fell to death from opening Persephone's box of beauty, hoping for just a small amount of the substance intended for Aphrodite, but she is found and saved by Eros, who revived her and forgave her, after the two reunite, Zeus allows them to get married in Mount Olympus, where Psyche becomes the Goddess of the Human Soul. A few months later, Psyche gives birth to their daughter, Hedone.
Appearance[]
Psyche is depicted as a supremely and immensely beautiful, lovely, youthful, stunning, elegant, alluring and exquisite and drop dead gorgeous woman, with very fair and flawless skin and long flowing, wavy golden blonde hair, when turned into a goddess she appears with Butterfly wings on her back.
Personality[]
Psyche is cautious, brave, empathetic, sincere, emotional and loyal. She regretted betraying Eros and burning him, feeling genuine remorse for her actions and during their time together in secret fell in love with him so much so that she risked her life to reunite with Eros and completed numerous tasks set by Aphrodite in the hopes she could see him again. During the one of the tasks, she also tried to commit suicide feeling unable to complete it and in a heartbroken state of possibly never seeing her love again, but some of the Gods such as Zeus and a river god, realised her genuine feelings and felt so sorry for her that they helped her through her hardships. She was euphoric when she finally got to unite with Eros and marry him for real.
Relationships[]
Parents- Psyche seemed to have a loving relationship with her parents and them vice versa. Both Psyche's parents were concerned when she got no suitors and even went to the Oracle at Delphi, to find out why, they poured their hearts into the consultation with the soothsayer, which is where they learned that their daughter was to be married to a "monster", they were also instructed to leave Psyche at the edge of a mountain to be collected by her groom, to which they were shocked and saddened to hear. Even though it was bitter and harsh for them, Psyche's parents carried out their commands with Psyche following course too. After leaving Psyche to await her fate at the mountain's edge, they gave her a heartfelt farewell and would go on to grieve for their daughter's life.
Sisters- Psyche's two older sisters Aglaura and Cidippe, had a lot of resentment and jealousy towards Psyche due to her widespread fame and the admiration of her beauty. When both of the sisters had chosen their groom from their many suitors, they boasted to Psyche about their matches, as if to belittle her for being the only daughter of their parents left without any suitors, despite her popularity. Psyche's sisters were furthermore very plotting and deceitful towards their little sister who trusted them and under the guise of kind and caring sisters, advised Psyche (after meeting up with her at her new marital home) to light up a lamp to see and discover her husband's true identity once and for all at night, even though Psyche's husband, ( Eros) had explicitly told her to never look at his face in the light or find out his identity. And after Psyche saw his face and discovered his identity by shining a lit lamp whilst he was sleeping, Eros feeling betrayed (as well as burnt from the hot wax that dropped from Psyche's candle) flew away in anger and left her. Psyche, the next day in a grieving state, met up with these sisters and told them what had happened after she uncovered Eros' identity, in hopes of them comforting her but instead of sympathising with Psyche and helping her, they threw themselves off a mountain, offering themselves as brides to Eros, expecting to be caught and saved by Zephyrus God of the West Wind, but when he didn't, the two fell down to their gruesome deaths.
Eros- Eros is Psyche's husband. Eros and Psyche are a very loving and loyal couple to one another and were not recorded to have any extramarital affairs according to the accounts
Aphrodite- Aphrodite eventually becomes Psyche's mother in law through her marriage to Eros. Aphrodite disdained Psyche when she witnessed mortals giving Psyche her title and honours with Aphrodite even sending out her son, Eros, to make Psyche fall in love with the most hideous monster out of revenge, despite Psyche not being the person at fault. Unfortunately for her, Aphrodite's plan would fail and Eros would fall in love with the mortal princess and live with her in secret until Psyche uncovered his identity and accidentally burned him, leaving Eros to flee her heartbroken, this caused Aphrodite to have even more hatred for Psyche. When Psyche made it to Aphrodite's temple, hoping to reunite with Eros whom she had developed genuine feelings for, Aphrodite tortured her and forced her to undertake several nearly impossible to complete tasks. Aphrodite was frustrated when she found Psyche completed these. In spite of her being initially against the union, she would let Eros and Psyche marry as Zeus wanted and she attended their wedding, where she danced. Since this Aphrodite has put her qualms towards Psyche in the past and presumably the two get along as family members.
Skills and Abilities[]
As a mortal, Psyche was quite normal for a human, she was intelligent and likely well-educated given her royal lineage. She also had an ethereal beauty rivalling that of a goddess which she has maintained. As a goddess, Psyche gained immortality and eternal youth as well as perfect health, she can no longer suffer with diseases and disorders and does not need to sleep, no longer feeling tired. Thanks to her butterfly wings, a wedding gift from Zeus she can also fly. She also has divine powers and responsibilities tied to the human soul.
Symbols[]
Psyche's symbol is the butterfly.
Titles and Epithets[]
No epithets or titles for the goddess were recorded.
Trivia[]
Many cultures relate butterflies to the human soul. In ancient Greek the word for butterfly is "psyche" which means "soul"
Psyche's name is still used as a word for the human soul, mind or spirit and was also given to the modern word- Psychology, which refers to the scientific study of the human mind.
Gallery[]
Psyche has been depicted in art singularly but also alongside Eros in both paintings and sculptures:
You can find more images of Psyche in Psyche/gallery