Which primordial being was born from Chaos and personified desire or procreation? Eros is the answer.
In Hesiod’s Theogony, composed around 700 BC, Eros appears among the earliest cosmic beings, after Chaos, Gaia, and Tartarus. He represents the generative force that makes reproduction and the formation of new life possible. Hesiod does not explicitly say that Eros was Chaos’s child; rather, Eros emerges in the primordial creation sequence.
This early cosmic Eros differs from the later, more familiar love god. In later Greek poetry and art, Eros is often portrayed as the youthful son of Aphrodite, armed with a bow and arrows and causing gods or mortals to fall in love. The Romans identified this figure with Cupid or Amor.
Eros is also associated with the myth of Eros and Psyche, in which he becomes Psyche’s husband. Anteros, Pothos, and Himeros are related love deities, but they are not the primordial being named in the creation tradition.