September 22, 2011
Cupid and Psyche’s Love Story
When we talk about Cupid, the first thing that comes into our mind is love. We all regard him as the cute little child who matches persons to be lovers or who separates persons from being together. Persons shot with his gold-tipped arrows are matched to be in love with each other while his lead-tipped arrows had the opposite effect. On Valentine’s day, we see his images everywhere. He is shown as a chubby little boy with white wings. He is holding a bow and an arrow ready to shot everyone he likes.
Before the mid-300’s B.C., Cupid was described as a handsome and athletic young man. His early image was said to be..
In Ancient Mythology, Cupid was the son of Venus – the goddess of love and beauty. He was
called “Amor” and known to be the god of love. Everyone admired her mother until Psyche (Sy Kee) came. She was a beautiful princess (a mortal) and people turned to worshipping her instead of Venus. Because of this, Venus was jealous and sent her son, Cupid, to punish Psyche. However, he fell in love with her and brought her to his fairyland palace of gold and gems. Cupid forbade Psyche to see what he looked like and visited her only at night. He told her that if she ever saw him in the light, he must leave her forever. But Psyche, urged by her wicked sisters, lighted a lamp while Cupid was asleep. This woke Cupid and he left Psyche.
In her grief, Psyche went to different places looking for Cupid. She searched everywhere until she reached the place of Venus. The goddess of love and beauty made her a slave and gave her nearly impossible tasks. She was able to accomplish the first three tasks and failed on the fourth task. She was asked by Venus to visit the queen of the underworld where she was trapped. Cupid knew of this and saved her. With the help of Jupiter, the king of gods, Venus forgave Cupid. Then, Cupid made Psyche his wife and a goddess.
There were different versions of the story and the one I shared above was my personal favorite. I always love happy endings!
A symbolic interpretation of the story between Cupid and Psyche has been made. According to the interpretation, Psyche (which means soul in Greek) represents the human soul’s encounter with love and passion (Cupid) and its struggle to achieve immortality.
I have grown an interest in Ancient Mythologies and stories about gods and goddesses. That is why I find myself stuck in Greek and Roman Mythology books these days. I would love to accept any books from you! 🙂
I would like to apologize to KM for deleting her first comment:
"i'm not very well versed with ancient mythologies and a lot of times i tend to confuse a god/goddess with another or interchange Roman and Greek. i don't think i've ever really read a book of mythology, although i've read some short stories and watched a lot of movies. it helps that my husband is into it, so whenever i'd come across some character i don't have an idea who is, he'd enlighten me.
anyway, thanks a lot for sharing this. good read :)"
I deleted my Disqus widget because some readers are not able to send any comments on my posts! Thank you!
thanks for sharing..about cupid and psyche..
Kuya Arvin! Salamat sa pagbabasa. Kakabasa ko lang sa new poem mo. 🙂