The Aphrodite of Aphrodisias

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Aphrodisias originated as a small village around the sanctuary of a local Carian goddess. By the second century BC, the goddess had become identified with the Greek Aphrodite, and the village had been restructured as a small city. The distinctive Image of the Aphrodite of Aphrodisias appears in a series and versions from Aphrodisias itself as well as from other sites around the Mediterranean. The iconography of this image reflects the local, Anatolian origins of the goddess while giving her a new, universal significance in the Graeco-Roman world. The present volume is a study of this goddess and her image, collecting all known examples from Aphrodisias and abroad, many of which are previously unpublished and or unidentified. Emphasis is placed on the iconography of the goddess and her importance for the development of Aphrodisias as a polis in the late Hellenistic and early Roman eras.