Mythical Creatures

Supernatural creatures, which grew out from mythical stories, specially those from Greece and Egypt, are often believed to be real. Greek and Egyptian mythologies are full of such stories, interest in which remains, till today. Although nobody has ever seen these creatures, they are still believed to exist. Many archeologists have tried to find clues to prove that these creatures existed or that they do exist but nobody, in any part of the world, has ever found a clue or seen any of these creatures with their own eyes! Hence, they remain a mystery.

Let's have a look at some of these creatures which are believed to be real.

In Greek mythology, a gigantic nine headed monster that dwelled in a marsh near Lerna, Greece. This monster had a fatally poisonous breath. Greek legendary hero Hercules destroyed Hydra as part of the 12 Labours. As one head was cut off, two grew in its place; Hercules burned eight heads of the serpent and buried the ninth one under a rock.

In Greek mythology, one of the three monstrous daughters of the sea god Phorcys and his wife Ceto. The Gorgons were terrifying, dragon like creatures, covered with golden-scales with snakes for hair. They had huge wings and round, ugly faces; their tongues were always hanging out, and they had large, tusk-like teeth. They lived on the farthest side of the western ocean, shunned because their glance turned persons to stone.

In European folklore the Werewolf is a man who transforms into a wolf, in nature and appearance, at night but returns to human form by day. It is believed that the Werewolf sometimes transforms under the influence of a full moon, roams about at night, devouring infants or corpses. Stories of such transformations are given in the works of several classical writers and the superstition was common throughout Europe in late mediaeval times, when many men were accused and convicted of being werewolves.

As a subject for 20th-century horror films, the werewolf tradition is second only to the vampire tradition in popularity. Werewolves are believed to turn into vampires after death.

In folklore, supernatural, sea-dwelling creature with the head and upper body of a beautiful woman and the lower body of a fish. The mermaid is frequently described as appearing above the surface of the water and combining her long hair with one hand while holding a mirror in the other. Mermaids, in the numerous tales told of them, often foretell the future, sometimes under compulsion; give supernatural powers to human beings; or fall in love with human beings and entice their mortal lovers to follow them beneath the sea.

Though sometimes kindly, mermaids were usually dangerous to man. Their gifts brought misfortune, and, if offended, the beings caused floods or other disasters. To see one on a voyage was an omen of shipwreck. They sometimes lured mortals to death by drowning, as did the Lorelei of the Rhine, or enticed young people to live with them underwater, as did the mermaid whose image is carved on a bench in the church of Zennor, Cornwall, England.

In Greek mythology, sea nymphs, who have the bodies of birds and the heads of women, are believed the daughters of the sea god Phorcys or of the river god Achelous. The sirens had such sweet voices that sailors who heard their songs were lured into grounding their boats on the rocks on which the nymphs sang.

The Sirens seem to have evolved from a primitive tale of the perils of early exploration combined with an Oriental image of a bird-woman. Anthropologists explain the Oriental image as a soul-bird - i.e. a winged ghost that stole the living to share its fate.

In folklore, a bloodsucking creature, supposedly the restless soul of a heretic, criminal, or suicide corpse that rises from the grave during the night, often in the form of a bat and, for nourishment, sucks the blood of sleeping humans. By daybreak it must return to its grave. Its victims become vampires after death. Various people supposedly avert vampires, but, according to tradition, they can be destroyed only by cremation or by stakes driven through their hearts. Belief in vampires originated in ancient times and was specially widespread among the Slavs.

Typically the vampire had a pallid face, staring eyes, and protruding incisor teeth and fed by biting and sucking blood from the victim's throat.

Among the various demons of ancient folk tradition, the vampire has enjoyed the most conspicuous and continual literary success in the 20th century, owing initially to the popularity of the Gothic novel Dracula (1897) by the Irish author Bram Stoker. Count Dracula, its "undead" villain from Transylvania, became the representative type of vampire.

An Egyptian and Greek mythological, creature with a human head and the body of a lion, and the wings of a bird. Lying crouched on a rock, she accosted all who were about to enter the city of Thebes by asking them a riddle. "What is it that has four feet in the morning, two at noon, and three at night?" If they could not solve the riddle, she killed them. When Oedipus, a legendary hero, solved the riddle by answering, "Man, who crawls on all fours in infancy, walks on two feet when grown and walks with the help of a stick in old age," the sphinx killed herself. From this tale apparently grew the legend that the sphinx was omniscient, and even today the wisdom of the sphinx is proverbial. The ancient Egyptians were very interested in the matter and they made a statue of the sphinx, dating from before 2500 BC. The Great Sphinx is about 20m high and 73m long standing near the pyramids of Giza.

A legendary reptilian monster similar in form to a scaly lizard or snake with a barbed tail and usually represented as having wings, huge claws and a fiery breadth. In some folklore of antiquity, the dragon symbolizes destruction and evil. Christianity inherited the Hebraic conception of the dragon, which figures in all the important apocalyptic literature of the Bible. In Christian art, a dragon is the symbol of sin. It is often represented as crushed under the saints' and martyrs' feet.

In certain mythologies, the dragon is more generally credited with beneficent powers. The ancient Greeks and Romans believed that dragons had the ability to understand and to convey to mortals the secrets of the Earth. The dragon also figures in the mythology of various oriental countries, notably Japan and China. Among the Chinese people, the dragon is traditionally regarded as a symbol of good fortune and is worshipped in the Taost religion.