Cupid & Psyche

A Roman novel, not a Greek epic

Almost everything we know of this story comes from one ancient source: the Metamorphoses of Apuleius, the Latin novel usually called The Golden Ass, written in the 2nd century AD by a North African author. The characters there are Venus, Cupid, Jupiter and Proserpina, and the Greek names (Aphrodite, Eros, Zeus, Persephone) are the usual modern way of rendering them. No Greek author before Apuleius tells the tale. Psyche does appear in earlier Hellenistic and Roman art, though: a girl with butterfly wings, often embracing or being tormented by Eros. The Greek word psyche means both "soul" and "butterfly".

The setting matters too. The story is told by a drunken old woman in a robbers' cave, to comfort a kidnapped bride named Charite. Apuleius calls it an old wives' tale (anilis fabula). It sits inside a comic and sometimes bawdy novel, and that playful frame shapes its tone, which is witty, sharp and only sometimes solemn.

Episodes that most retellings skip

The oracle and the "monster". Psyche's parents consult Apollo's oracle at Miletus, which orders them to dress her for a funeral-wedding and leave her on a mountain crag. Her husband, it says, will be a cruel winged evil feared even by Jupiter. That is Cupid, described the way his victims experience him. Zephyrus, the West Wind, carries her gently down into a valley with a palace served by bodiless voices.

The pregnancy and the razor. Cupid warns Psyche that she is pregnant. If she keeps his secret the child will be divine, and if she betrays it the child will be mortal. Her sisters persuade her that her husband is a huge serpent who will eat her once the pregnancy is far along. So she goes to the bed with a razor as well as the lamp, meaning to kill him. On seeing him she drops the blade, pricks her finger on one of his arrows and falls in love with Love himself.

Pan at the river. After Cupid flies off, Psyche throws herself into a river, which gently puts her back on the bank. Pan, sitting nearby with the mountain nymph Echo, kindly tells her to stop trying to die and to win the god back with prayers.

The sisters' end. Psyche takes revenge. She tells each sister in turn that Cupid now wants to marry her instead. Each one hurries to the crag, calls on Zephyrus to carry her down, jumps, and is dashed on the rocks.

Venus's household. Ceres and Juno both turn Psyche away to avoid offending Venus. Mercury puts out a reward for her capture. When she finally gives herself up, Venus hands her over to two servants named Anxiety and Sadness to be beaten before the tasks begin.

The rules of the underworld. For the last task, a speaking tower tells Psyche exactly what to do. Carry two barley cakes soaked in honeyed wine for Cerberus, one for each direction, and two coins in her mouth for Charon. Refuse to help a lame donkey driver, a dead man in the river reaching for the boat, and some old women weaving, because these are traps. In Proserpina's hall, sit on the ground and eat only coarse bread. Psyche follows every instruction until the very last test, which is curiosity about the box. See Cerberus and the Underworld.

The wedding. Cupid wipes the sleep off Psyche and puts it back in the box. Jupiter agrees to make the marriage lawful, with a joking condition: Cupid must find him a beautiful girl in return. At the feast Vulcan cooks, the Hours scatter roses, the Graces sprinkle balsam, Apollo sings to the lyre and Venus dances. Their daughter is called Voluptas in Latin, Hedone in Greek.

Afterlife in art and literature

Late antique and medieval readers treated the story as an allegory. Fulgentius (around the 5th–6th century) read Psyche's sisters as the flesh and free will, and Boccaccio's Genealogy of the Pagan Gods made it an allegory of the soul's union with God. In the Renaissance, Raphael and his workshop painted the Loggia of Psyche at the Villa Farnesina in Rome. Antonio Canova's marble Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss in the Louvre is probably the best-known image of the myth. In literature there is Keats's "Ode to Psyche" (1819) and C. S. Lewis's novel Till We Have Faces (1956), which retells the story through the eyes of an elder sister. Folklorists classify it with tales of the "search for the lost husband", such as "East of the Sun and West of the Moon", and its link to "Beauty and the Beast" is one of family resemblance, not direct descent.

One small correction. The line often quoted as Cupid's farewell, "Love cannot dwell with suspicion", comes from Thomas Bulfinch's 19th-century retelling, not from Apuleius. In the Latin, Cupid tells Psyche that his flight alone will be her punishment.

Ancient sources

• Apuleius, Metamorphoses (The Golden Ass) 4.28–6.24: the complete tale, from Psyche's dangerous beauty to the wedding feast on Olympus and the birth of Voluptas.
• Fulgentius, Mythologies, book 3: the earliest surviving allegorical reading, interpreting the characters as parts of the soul.
• Martianus Capella, The Marriage of Philology and Mercury, book 1: a late antique allegory in which Mercury considers Psyche as a bride but finds Cupid has already carried her off, showing how widely Apuleius' character was known.
• Boccaccio, Genealogy of the Pagan Gods: a medieval retelling and allegorisation that passed the story on to Renaissance artists.

Frequently asked questions

Is Cupid and Psyche a Greek or Roman myth?

The only full ancient version is Roman, in Latin prose, by Apuleius. Psyche as a winged soul-figure paired with Eros does appear in earlier Greek art, so the story may draw on older Greek ideas, but no Greek text of it survives.

What does Psyche's name mean?

"Soul" or "breath of life" in Greek. The same word also means "butterfly", which is why Psyche is often shown with butterfly wings.

Did Cupid and Psyche have a child?

Yes. A daughter called Voluptas in Apuleius' Latin (Hedone in Greek), meaning Pleasure or Delight.

Why couldn't Psyche look at Cupid?

Cupid was hiding the marriage from his mother, Venus, who had ordered him to punish Psyche. Seeing him would reveal his identity. He also warned that breaking the rule would make their unborn child mortal.

Books to read next

• Edith Hamilton, Mythology
• Stephen Fry, Mythos
• Robert Graves, The Greek Myths

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