Hermaphroditus,
child of Hermes &
Aphrodite
In Greek mythology, Hermaphroditus
was (originally) the son of Aphrodite and Hermes.
As related by Ovid in Book IV of his "Metamorphoses",
the water nymph Salmacis
conceived a lust for him while he was still a young virgin boy.
Happening on him while he bathed in a pool, she seized and held
him, and prayed that they would never be parted. An (unnamed)
god merged their two forms into one. Hermaphroditus subsequently
prayed that the same transformation would happen to anyone who
bathed in the same pool.
The Greek Sicilian author Diodorus
Siculus (1st cent BCE) suggested that god-like
avatars of Hermaphroditus sometimes still appear among humans.
