Venus
Venus, the Roman goddess of beauty and love. She was identified with the Greek goddess Aphrodite. As the mother of Aeneas, whose descendants supposedly founded Rome, Venus occupied an important place in Roman mythology.
Hesiod said that Venus was born of the sea foam. Lucretius saluted her as the goddess of nature and fertility. Shakespeare described her love for a handsome youth in Venus and Adonis.
Venus is a familiar subject in classical sculpture. The 2,000-year-old Venus de Milo, found on the Greek island of Melos in 1820, is regarded by many as a model for perfection in the female form. It is now in the Louvre, Paris. Another famous sculpture is the Venus de Medici, found in Rome in the 16th century.