Venus, the Goddess of…Beetles?

Last updated on: August 28, 2015 at 9:35 am by Jen McConnel

Venus, the Goddess of…Beetles? 2015-08-28T09:35:52-04:00 Jen McConnel

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I know science has a long history of borrowing names from mythology when naming discoveries (look at a map of the solar system for a minute, and you’ll see that often times, these scientists have an interesting sense of humor), but the recent naming of a new species of beetle after Venus seems a bit…odd.

I, Sailko [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

First of all, the bug was discovered in Cambodia, as reported by Entomology Today. That’s not exactly the first place I think of when I think about the Roman pantheon, but I get it, it’s science (and Latin), and tradition must be followed. What has me a bit puzzled, however, is the fact that this beetle is described as having one other close relative, a bug already named after Cupid, and, wait for it, the scientists who made the discovery used this to name the new bug. Yes, Venus and Cupid are traditionally paired, but it’s the explanation of the scientists that keeps eating at me: “The close relation between the two is the reason why it was named after Venus, who is often illustrated next to her male divine counterpart, Cupid.”

Sure, they’re both deities who influence love, but they are parent and child. I’m surprised the scientists didn’t make that connection in naming the related species, since they clearly wanted to hearken back to mythology for the beetles, but maybe the key word here is illustrated: I wonder if the naming convention owes more to the depictions of classical figures in art rather than in myth. If that’s the case, what an interesting question: if we ignore the stories and oral traditions, what do the paintings, frescos, and sculpture of the gods and goddesses tell us about them?

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