Accounts vary. In many traditions Bellerophon is named Hipponous originally and later called Bellerophon/Bellerophontes. Some sources present him as a son of the sea-god Poseidon by the mortal Eurynome (or Eurymede); other accounts (notably a tradition recounted in the Homeric scholia) present him as son or foster-son of Glaucus of Potniae. One narrative-gloss for his name holds that he was renamed after accidentally slaying a Corinthian named Belleros while practicing knife-throwing, an act that produced exile and set in motion the sequence of purification, service at royal courts, and the sending on a deadly mission that culminates in his slaying of the Chimera.
The provided sources do not supply a standardized physical portrait of Bellerophon himself. Narrative iconography commonly pairs him with Pegasus, the untamed winged horse he captures (through divine aid), and with his opponent the Chimera, described as a lion-headed, goat-bodied, serpent‑tailed creature that breathes fire — typical visual scenes show Bellerophon astride Pegasus confronting the Chimera.
Bellerophon is portrayed as an exceptional mortal warrior and monster-slayer rather than as innately supernatural. He is credited with taming and riding Pegasus (a feat achieved with divine assistance — Athena provides a charmed/golden bridle in a dream) and with slaying the Chimera. He benefits from seerly counsel (Polyeidos) and divine aid (particularly Athena, and in some accounts Poseidon as progenitor). Narrative traditions also record a moral-ritual dimension to his life: accidental homicide, ritual purification by a king (Proetus), exile, and being sent on a lethal quest by a host-king (Iobates). Some versions recount that he later incurred divine disfavour after attempting to ride Pegasus to Mount Olympus.
Weaknesses
- conditionvulnerability to divine displeasure (hubris/overreaching)
Wards
- ritualpurification/cleansing by a king (expulsion of miasma)
- conditionprotection of xenia (guest-right) as social/ritual safeguard
Poseidon
Poseidon is a principal deity of the ancient Greek pantheon, counted among the Twelve Olympians; he presides over the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses and functions as protector of seafarers and guardian of cities and colonies.
Athena
Athena is a major ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, handicraft (notably weaving), and warfare; she serves as a tutelary protector of cities—most prominently Athens—and is central to myth, cult, and civic identity in the Greek world.
*Péh₂usōn (reconstructed)
Péh₂usōn is a hypothetical Proto‑Indo‑European pastoral guardian reconstructed by comparative scholars from parallels in Greek and Vedic traditions. Proposed as a Graeco‑Aryan ancestor‑figure, the reconstruction describes a protector of flocks, roads, and travellers rather than an attested historical cultic personality.
Aba (disambiguation / name-form)
Aba is a polyvalent name-form attested across many unrelated contexts (place names, personal names, animal names, and brief mythological listings). The provided sources do not support a single, coherent supernatural entity called "Aba" and offer no descriptive or ritual material for such a being.
Abarbarea
Abarbarea is a name attested in classical Greek and Roman sources for freshwater nymphs (naiads). The name appears for at least two individual mythic figures — a naiad wife of Bucolion and a naiad counted among ancestors of the Tyrians — and Hesychius records plural forms that may indicate the name was also used as a class-name (Abarbareai / Abarbalaiai).
Abas
Abas (Ancient Greek: Ἄβας, gen.: Ἄβαντος) is not a single mythic being but a recurring personal name borne by multiple mortals and minor mythic figures in Greek epic and genealogical traditions — kings, founders, seers, warriors, attendants, a centaur, and a youth transformed by a goddess. The name is glossed in the sources as 'guileless' or 'good-hearted' and appears across Argive, Theban, Trojan, Euboean, and other local cycles.
Abderus
Abderus (Ancient Greek: Ἄβδηρος, romanized Ábdēros) is a mortal heroic figure in Greek myth closely associated with Heracles, remembered as the youth left in charge of the Mares of Diomedes who was killed by them. He functions as an eponymous local/divine-hero ancestor for the city of Abdera and received funerary commemoration and athletic agones at his tomb.
Abomination of Desolation
An apocalyptic prophetic phrase originating in the Book of Daniel designating a profaning thing or act that renders the Jerusalem Temple cult desolate; later reused in the Synoptic Gospels as an eschatological sign prompting urgent flight. The term denotes ritual/cultic impurity (Hebrew shiqquts) and is variously interpreted as pagan offerings or altar, a foreign cult statue, or (in some New Testament readings) an acting agent.
Absyrtus
Absyrtus (Ancient Greek: Ἄψυρτος) is a Colchian prince in the Greek Argonautic cycle, son of King Aeëtes and brother or half-brother of Medea. He appears in variant traditions either as a companion taken by Medea during her flight with Jason and murdered/dismembered to delay pursuit, or as a pursuer sent by Aeëtes who is overtaken and slain by Jason; his death functions as a key narrative device in the escape from Colchis.
Acacallis
Acacallis (Ancient Greek: Ἀκακαλλίς; also Acalle) is a mythological princess of Crete in Greek tradition, daughter of King Minos and Pasiphae. She functions primarily as a dynastic and etiological figure: in varying accounts she is mother, by gods such as Hermes (Mercury) or Apollo, of eponymous or founder-figures like Cydon (founder of Cydonia), Miletus, or Lydon/ Lydus.
Acacus
Acacus (Ancient Greek: Ἄκακος) is, in Arcadian Greek tradition, a mortal eponymous founder-king of Acacesium and is remembered as the foster-father who reared the infant Hermes (Mercury) in that local tradition. He is presented in genealogies as a son of Lycaon and functions as a local ancestral/onomastic figure rather than a supernatural spirit.
Academus
Academus (Greek: Akádemos / Hekádemos) is an Attic hero-eponym tied to a sacred grove (Akademeia) on the Cephissus near Athens. In myth he revealed where Helen was hidden to the Dioskouroi, an act said to have saved the city, and the place bearing his name became a long-lived sacred precinct, later the site of Plato's Academy.
Acamas
Acamas (Ancient Greek: Ἀκάμας) is a personal name recurrent in ancient Greek narrative traditions applied to multiple human characters (warriors, princes, suitors), once to a Cyclops, and once as a hound's name. Rather than a single supernatural entity, bearers of the name appear episodically across the Trojan War, Theseid, and Theban cycles as mortal actors whose deeds intersect with gods and fate.
Acantha
Acantha (Ancient Greek: Ἀκάνθα, 'thorn') is a late or secondary mythological figure known from modern retellings as a nymph transformed into the acanthus plant. The tale that she scratched Apollo and was changed into a spiny-leaved plant is not attested in surviving classical corpora and appears to be a modern compilation or invention rather than a firmly documented ancient myth.
Community Record
- [1]Bellerophon — Wikipedia. Wikipedia, article 'Bellerophon'.wiki
- [2]Bellerophon (Wikidata entry for fossil genus). Wikidata entry Q310262 (Bellerophon, fossil mollusc genus).other
- [3]Dictionary of Antiquity (1840) — reference to ship-naming. Dictionary of Antiquity (1840), noted reuse of classical names (e.g., HMS Bellerophon).other