Tile mosaic of Pan and a hamadryad, found in Pompeii
A hamadryad or hamadryas (/hæməˈdraɪ.æd/; Ancient Greek: ἁμαδρυάς, pl: ἁμαδρυάδες, romanized: Hamadryás, pl: Hamadryádes[1]) is a Greek mythological being that lives in trees. It is a particular type of dryad which, in turn, is a particular type of nymph. Hamadryads are born bonded to a certain tree on which its life depends.[2][3] Some maintain that a hamadryad is the tree itself, with a normal dryad being simply the indwelling entity, or spirit, of the tree. If the tree should die, the hamadryad associated with it would die as well. For this reason, both dryads and the other gods would punish mortals who harmed trees.
Etymology
The name of the hamadryades was compounded from the ancient Greek words háma (ἅμα, Doric: ἁμᾶ, "together, concurrently"[4][5]) and dryás (δρυάς, "tree, wood nymph"[6]). This informs the understanding that the life of a hamadryas is concurrent with that of its tree: one cannot exist without the other.
The mother, Hamadryas, is immortalized in three scientific names, two of which are still valid: the generic name of the cracker butterfly, the specific name of the northernmost monkey in Asia Minor, the hamadryas baboon, and the original (but no longer valid) genus name of the king cobra (originally Hamadryas hannah, now Ophiophagus hannah). The cracker butterfly is more arboreal than most butterflies, as it commonly camouflages itself on trees. It feeds on sap, rotting fruit and dung. The hamadryas baboon is one of the least arboreal monkeys, but was the most common monkey in Hellenic lands. The king cobra is sometimes considered arboreal or semi-arboreal, and is also referred to by the common name "hamadryad", especially in older literature.
In Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow, Anne Wimbush is referred to as "the slim Hamadryad whose movements were like the swaying of a young tree in the wind".
In Nalo Hopkinson's short story "The Smile on the Face", the main character swallows a cherry from the cherry tree that seems to be inhabited by a hamadryad.
Brandon Mull's Fablehaven series mentions hamadryads in the third book, Grip of the Shadow Plague.
In Seanan McGuire's October Daye series, the hamadryad are a type of fae closely bonded to trees.
The 1990 William Friedkin film, The Guardian, features a hamadryad as the main antagonist.
In the 2001 Science Fiction novel Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds, hamadryads are enormous, deadly snakes that merge into trees when they reach adulthood.
References
^Rhodios, Apollonios; Seaton, Robert Cooper (1900). Argonautika 2.477 (in Greek). Clarendon Press. p. 80. Retrieved 26 July 2023.
