Chrysogonee: The Mother of Amoret and Belphoebe

Chrysogonee is the mother of Amoret and Belphoebe in book 3 of Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene.

Through Chrysogonee, Spencer gives us a virgin birth, where she is impregnated by pure sunlight, and eventually gives birth to Amoret and Belphoebe. Both of her daughters represent two different aspects of love:

• Amoret, representing marriage
• Belphoebe, representing chastity

Eventually, once she has borne her two children, they are both taken away and given to the goddesses Venus and Diana to raise.

See our complete list of Arthurian characters for more entries like this one.

Arthurian Bibliography

• Norris Lacy, Geoffrey Ashe, Debra Mancoff – The Arthurian Handbook (Second Edition)
• Alan Lupack – The Oxford Guide to Arthurian Literature and Legend
• Ronan Coghlan – The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Arthurian Legends
• Anonymous – Lancelot-Grail, the French Vulgate
• Sir Thomas Malory – Le Morte d’Arthur