Cupid and Psyches

The tale of Cupid and Psyche appears in Apuleius's second-century Latin novel The Golden Ass (also called Metamorphoses) and recounts Psyche's trials after she becomes the object of Cupid's love and divine jealousy.

Psyche undergoes a series of arduous tasks imposed by Venus to prove her devotion, including an underworld descent, mirroring motifs repeated in later fairy tales and romances.

The story's themes of love, curiosity, betrayal, and redemption have influenced countless later works, and Dominic highlights its clear structural resonance with Feyre's trials and the Persephone/Hades motif in ACOTAR.

The narrative is a key classical antecedent to modern romantic-fantasy retellings.