Charis (mythology)

Charis (/ˈkærɪs/; Ancient Greek: Χάρις "grace, beauty, and life") is a goddess in Greek mythology. Her name is the singular form of the group called the Charites (Ancient Greek: Χάριτες)—or Gratiae (Graces) in Roman mythology—who are goddesses of charm, beauty, nature, human creativity and fertility. While the term Charis can refer to a member of this group generically, the name Charis is also used for specific goddesses in surviving sources.

Charis (center), with Thetis and Hephaestus (labelled as Vulcan), in a 1795 engraving after a 1793 drawing by John Flaxman.

Mythology

In Homer's Iliad, Charis is the wife of Hephaestus. She lives with Hephaestus in a bronze-wrought home on Mount Olympus, into which she welcomes Thetis so that the latter may ask for Hephaestus to forge armor for her son Achilles.^[1] The Dionysiaca also refers to the wife of Hephaestus as Charis.^[2] However, Hesiod names the member of the Charites who is married to Hephaestus as Aglaea,^[3] and some scholars conclude that these references refer to the same goddess under different names.^[4] However, Aglaea appears in the Dionysiaca, and although she is referred to generically as "the Charis" when carrying out orders from Aphrodite, she also explicitly refers to Charis as a separate (and less loyal) attendant of Aphrodite when speaking to Eros.^[5]

The Dionysiaca refers to Charis several other times, including twice alongside the goddesses Aphrodite (called by the epithets Cythereia and Paphian), Leto, Artemis, Athena, Hebe and Hera.^[6] Harmonia, daughter of Aphrodite and Ares, is compared to Charis and referred to by that name by the Libyan army,^[2] although later Charis accompanies Aphrodite when visiting Harmonia.^[7]

References

• Ancient Greece portal
• Myths portal

1. Homer, Iliad 18.382–385
2. Nonnus, Dionysiaca 29.317
3. Hesiod, Theogony 945.
4. Bell, s.v. Aglaia (1), p. 15.
5. Nonnus, Dionysiaca 33.51 ff.
6. Nonnus, Dionysiaca 1.439 and 2.314.
7. Nonnus, Dionysiaca 41.278 ff.

• Bernhardt, Peter (2008). Gods and goddesses in the garden: Greco-Roman mythology and the scientific names of plants. Rutgers University Press. p. 76. ISBN 0-8135-4266-9.