A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

Smith, William

A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. William Smith, LLD, ed. 1890

(Πειθώ).

1. The personification of Persuasion (Suada or Suadela among the Romans), was worshipped as a divinity at Sicyon, where she was honoured with a temple in the agora. (Hdt. 8.11; Paus. 2.7.7.) Peitho also occurs as a surname of other divinities, such as Aphrodite, whose worship was said to have been introduced at Athens by Theseus, when he united the country communities into towns (Paus. 1.22.3), and of Artemis (2.21. 1). At Athens the statues of Peitho and Aphrodite Pandemos stood closely together, and at Megara, too, the statue of Peitho stood in the temple of Aphrodite (Paus. 1.43.6), so that the two divinities must he conceived as closely connected, or the one, perhaps, merely as an attribute of the other.