The Centaurs lived in the mountains of Thessaly alongside the Lapiths with whom they maintained a constant war because the Centaurs wanted to abduct Hippodamia, the beautiful wife of King Piritoo. Centaurs have the head, arms, and torso of a man and the body and legs of a horse. Public Domain,Ī centaur is a creature that is half man and half horse. Credit: John La Farge – Online Collection– Brooklyn Museum. She was later beheaded by Perseus, who used her head as a weapon and gave it to Athena for her shield. That is why gorgons were carved at the entrances of the temples to ward off visitors.Īthena, jealous of the beauty and attention that Medusa possessed, cursed her. They were beautiful but had snakes instead of hair, and anyone who looked at them was instantly petrified. The gorgons were ruthless female monsters: Medusa, Steno, and Euryale, who were daughters of the sea gods, Forcis and Ceto. Gorgon An archaic Gorgon (around 580 BC), as depicted on a pediment from the temple of Artemis in Corfu, on display at the Archaeological Museum of Corfu. Tornadoes would form when she spit the water back out. She used to swallow large amounts of water each day, forming whirlpools and devouring sailors. This enraged her uncle Zeus, who thus turned her into a monster and banished her to the sea.Ĭharybdis became one of the most fearsome sea monsters. According to myth, she flooded large amounts of the Earth to expand her father’s kingdom and return to him. Public Domain,Ĭharybdis, a nymph, was once the beautiful daughter of Poseidon and Gaea. Charybdis A 19th-century engraving of the Strait of Messina, the site associated with Scylla and Charybdis.
The hydra took care of him and watched over his treasures. One myth tells the story of Apollo, who went in search of griffins and returned to Greece riding a hydra. Demigods were capable of taming them, however, and under them, they became loyal. They usually roamed in packs and were difficult to tame. This mythological creature takes the hybrid form of an eagle and a lion, combining their ferocity and courage into a single being. They are said to have stayed in the waves because a wave created Venus.Griffin Martin Schongauer: The griffin, 15th century. “They (the Greeks) imagine that ‘there were three Sirens, part virgins, part birds,’ with wings and claws, one of them sang, another played the flute, the third the lyre, they drew sailors, decoyed by song, to shipwreck.Īccording to the truth, however, they were prostitutes, who led travelers down to poverty and were said to impose shipwreck on them, they had wings and claws because Love flies and wounds. In his book ‘The Etymologies of Isidore Saville’, Isidore of Seville c. 560–636), states Today, the Leuka islands are ithe islands of Nisi and Leon, in the bay of modern day Souda, on the island of Crete.īelief in sirens was discouraged and although Jerome, priest, confessor, theologian and historian, used the word “Siren” to translate the Hebrew word “Tannim”, meaning jackals, in “Isaiah 13:22” and as the word “Owl” in “Jeremiah 50:39”, when he produced the Latin Vulgate version of the Scriptures Ambrose (Bishop of Milan), explained this to be a mere symbol or allegory for worldly temptations and not an endorsement of the Greek myth. Out of their anguish from losing the competition, the Sirens turned white and fell into the sea at Aptera, (“featherless”), where they formed the islands in the bay that were called Leukai, meaning white. The Muses won the competition and then plucked out all of the Sirens’ feathers and made crowns out of them. Some post-Homeric authors believe the Sirens were sure to die if someone heard their singing and escaped and that after Odysseus passed by, the sirens flung themselves into the sea and drowned.Īccording to GaiusGaius Julius Hyginus, (Latin author), sirens were fated to live only until the mortals who heard their songs were able to pass by them.Īnother story is that Hera, queen of the gods, persuaded the Sirens to enter a singing competition with the Muses. “No seaman ever sailed his black ship past this spot without listening to the honey-sweet tones that flow from our lips and no one who has listened has not been delighted and gone on his way a wiser man.” “Ulysses and the Sirens” – John William Waterhouse
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