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A host of legendary creatures, animals, and mythic humanoids occur in ancient Greek mythology. Anything related to mythology is mythological. A mythological creature (also mythical or fictional entity) is a type of fictional entity, typically a hybrid, that has not been proven and that is described in folklore (including myths and legends), but may be featured in historical accounts before modernity. Something mythological can also be described as mythic, mythical, or mythologic.

Mythological creatures

Animals from Greek mythology

Dragons

The dragons of Greek mythology were serpentine monsters. They include the serpent-like Drakons, the marine-dwelling Cetea, and the she-monster Dracaenae. Homer describes the dragons with wings and legs.

Drakons

Drakons ("δράκους" in Greek, "dracones" in Latin) were giant serpents, sometimes possessing multiple heads or able to breathe fire (or even both), but most just spit deadly poison. They are usually depicted without wings.

Cetea

Cetea were sea monsters. They were usually featured in myths of a hero rescuing a sacrificial princess.

Dracaenae

The Dracaenae were monsters that had the upper body of a beautiful woman and the lower body of any sort of dragon. Echidna, the mother of monsters, and Ceto, the mother of sea monsters, are two famous dracaenae. Some Dracaenae were even known to have had in place two legs, and one (or two) serpent tails.

Automatons

Automatons, or Colossi, were men/women, animals and monsters crafted out of metal and made animate in order to perform various tasks. They were created by the divine smith, Hephaestus. The Athenian inventor Daedalus also manufactured automatons.

Mythic humanoids

Deified human beings

In addition to the famous deities, the ancient Greeks also worshiped a number of deified human beings. For example, Alabandus at Alabanda, Tenes at Tenedos, Leucothea and her son Palaemon were worshiped throughout Greece.[17]

See also

References

  1. ^ "The Capricorn goat/sea goat". Mythology. Gods and Monsters. Retrieved 2020-03-14.
  2. ^ "Skolopendra", Theoi Project
  3. ^ a b c History of Herodotus
  4. ^ Aristotelian Corpus, On Marvelous Things Heard, 30
  5. ^ Solinus, Polyhistor, 30.24
  6. ^ Suda, eta, 271
  7. ^ Aelian, Characteristics of Animals, § 10.40
  8. ^ "Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities (1898), Ocyrhoë".
  9. ^ Aelian, Characteristics of Animals, § 10.39
  10. ^ The Library of History of Diodorus Siculus, Book III, 54
  11. ^ Aelian, On The Characteristics Of Animals 2.21
  12. ^ Aelian, On The Characteristics Of Animals 6.21
  13. ^ Aelian, De Natura Animalium, 6.21
  14. ^ Aelian, On Animals 16.18
  15. ^ Aelian, De Natura Animalium, 16.18
  16. ^ Strabo, Geography, H.C. Hamilton, Esq., W. Falconer, M.A., Ed., CHAPTER III
  17. ^ Cicero, De Natura Deorum. "In Greece they worship a number of deified human beings, Alabandus at Alabanda, Tennes at Tenedos, Leucothea, formerly Ino, and her son Palaemon throughout the whole of Greece."

Sources