Dragons in Greek mythology

Topics in Greek mythology
Gods Primordial gods and Titans Zeus and the Olympians Pan and the nymphs Apollo and Dionysus Sea-gods and Earth-gods
Heroes Heracles and his Labors Achilles and the Trojan War Odysseus and the Odyssey Jason and the Argonauts Perseus and Medusa/Gorgon Oedipus and Thebes Theseus and the Minotaur Triptolemus and the Eleusinian Mysteries
Related Satyrs, centaurs and dragons Religion in Ancient Greece
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Dragons play a role in Greek mythology.

Lernaean Hydra

Main article: Lernaean Hydra

The Lernaean Hydra was a dragon-like water serpent with fatally venomous breath, blood and fangs, a daughter of Typhon and Echidna. The creature was said to have anywhere between five and 100 heads, although most sources put the number somewhere between seven and nine. For each head cut off, one or two more grew back in its place. It had an immortal head which would remain alive after it was cut off. Some accounts claim that the immortal head was made of gold. It lived in a swamp near Lerna and frequently terrorized the townsfolk until it was slain by Heracles, who cut the heads off, with the help of his nephew Iolaus, who then singed the oozing stump with a blazing firebrand to prevent any new heads from growing, as the second of his Twelve Labors. Hera sent a giant crab to distract Heracles, but he simply crushed it under his foot. Hera then placed it in the heavens as the constellation Cancer. After slaying the serpent, Heracles buried the immortal head under a rock and dipped his arrows in the creature's blood to make them fatal to his enemies. In one version, the poisoned arrows would eventually prove to be the undoing of his centaur tutor Chiron, who was placed in the heavens as the constellation Centaurus.

Pytho or Python

Main article: Python (mythology)

In Greek mythology Pythons was the earth-dragon of Delphi, always represented in the vase-paintings and by sculptors as a serpent. Various myths represented Python as being either male or female (a drakaina).^[1] Python was the chthonic enemy of Apollo, who slew it and remade its former home his own oracle, the most famous in Greece.

There are various versions of Python's birth and death at the hands of Apollo. In the earliest, the Homeric Hymn to Apollo, little detail is given about Apollo's combat with the serpent or its parentage. The version related by Hyginus [1] holds that when Zeus lay with the goddess Leto, and she was to deliver Artemis and Apollo, Hera sent Python to pursue her throughout the lands, so that she could not be delivered wherever the sun shone. Thus when the infant was grown he pursued the python, making his way straight for Mount Parnassus where the serpent dwelled, and chased it to the oracle of Gaia at Delphi, and dared to penetrate the sacred precinct and kill it with his arrows beside the rock cleft where the priestess sat on her tripod. The priestess of the oracle at Delphi became known as the Pythia, after the place-name Pytho, which was named after the rotting (πύθειν) of the serpent's corpse after it was slain. and stuf.

The Colchian Dragon

Main article: Jason

This immense serpent, a child of Typhon and Echidna, guarded the Golden Fleece at Colchis.^[2] It was said to never sleep, rest, or lower its vigilance. According to Ovid's Metamorphoses, the monster had a crest and three tongues.^[3] When Jason went to retrieve the Fleece, the witch Medea put the dragon to sleep with her magic and drugs,^[4] or perhaps Orpheus lulled it to sleep with his lyre. Afterwards, Medea herself had dragons pull her chariot.

The Ismenian Dragon

Main article: Cadmus

The Ismenian Dragon, of the spring of Ismene at Thebes, Greece, was slain by the hero Cadmus.^[5] It was the offspring of Ares, who later turned the hero into a serpent.

See also

Greek mythology portal

• European dragon
• Drakaina

References

1. ^ "Python at Theoi.com"
2. ^ "A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology"
3. ^ Morford, Mark; Robert Lenardon (2003). Classical Mythology (7 ed.). New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 581. 
4. ^ "Colchian Dragon at Theoi.com"
5. ^ Theoi.com: Drakon Ismenios; excerpts of Greek myth in translation.

External links

• Theoi Project - Drakon Hesperios