Chimera (mythology)

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The Chimera on a red-figure Apulian plate, c. 350–340 BC (Musée du Louvre)

The Chimera (/kɪˈmɪərə/ or /kaɪˈmɪərə/,
also Chimaera (Chimæra); Greek: Χίμαιρα, Chímaira "she-goat"), according
to Greek mythology,[1] was a monstrous fire-breathing hybrid creature
of Lycia in Asia Minor, composed of the parts of more than one animal. It is
usually depicted as a lion, with the head of a goat protruding from its back, and a
tail that might end with a snake's head.[2] It was one of the offspring
of Typhon and Echidna and a sibling of such monsters as Cerberus and
the Lernaean Hydra.
The term "chimera" has come to describe any mythical or fictional creature with
parts taken from various animals, to describe anything composed of very
disparate parts, or perceived as wildly imaginative, implausible, or dazzling.

Contents

 1Family
 2Description
 3Killed by Bellerophon
 4Iconography
 5Similar creatures
 6Classical sources
 7Hypothesis about origin
 8Use for Chinese mythological creatures
 9In popular culture
 10See also
 11Notes
 12References
 13External links

Family[edit]
"Chimera of Arezzo": an Etruscan bronze

According to Hesiod, the Chimera's mother was a certain ambiguous “she”,

which may refer to Echidna, in which case the father would presumably
be Typhon, though possibly the Hydra or even Ceto was meant instead.
[3]
 However the mythographers Apollodorus (citing Hesiod as his source)
and Hyginus both make the Chimera the offspring of Echidna and Typhon.
[4]
 Hesiod also has the Sphinx and the Nemean lion as the offspring of Orthus,
and another ambiguous "she", often understood as probably referring to the
Chimera, although possibly instead to Echidna, or again even Ceto.[5]

Description[edit]
Homer gives a description of the Chimera in the Iliad, saying that "she was of
divine stock, not of men, in the fore part a lion, in the hinder a serpent, and in the
midst a goat, breathing forth in terrible wise the might of blazing fire." [6] Both
Hesiod and Apollodorus give similar descriptions: a three-headed creature, with a
lion in front, a fire-breathing goat in the middle, and a serpent in the rear. [7]

Killed by Bellerophon[edit]

Pebble mosaic depicting Bellerophon killing the Chimera, from a Rhodes archaeological museum

According to Homer, the Chimera, who was reared by Araisodarus (the father
of Atymnius and Maris, Trojan warriors killed by Nestor's sons Antilochus and
Trasymedes), was "a bane to many men".[8] As told in the Iliad, the
hero Bellerophon was ordered by the king of Lycia to slay the Chimera (hoping
that the monster would instead kill Bellerophon), but the hero "trusting in the
signs of the gods", succeeded in killing the Chimera. [9] Hesiod adds that
Bellerophon had help in killing the Chimera, saying "her did Pegasus and noble
Bellerophon slay".[10]
A more complete account of the story is given by Apollodorus. Iobates, the king
of Lycia, had ordered Bellerophon to kill the Chimera (who had been killing cattle
and had "devastated the country"), since he thought that the Chimera would
instead kill Bellerophon, "for it was more than a match for many, let alone one".
[11]
 But the hero mounted his winged horse Pegasus, "and soaring on high shot
down the Chimera from the height."[12]

Iconography[edit]
Chimera depicted on an Attic vase

Although the Chimera was, according to Homer, situated in foreign Lycia, [13] her
representation in the arts was wholly Greek.[14] An autonomous tradition, one that
did not rely on the written word, was represented in the visual repertory of the
Greek vase-painters. The Chimera first appears at an early stage in the repertory
of the proto-Corinthian pottery-painters, providing some of the earliest identifiable
mythological scenes that may be recognized in Greek art. The Corinthian type is
fixed, after some early hesitation, in the 670s BC; the variations in the pictorial
representations suggest multiple origins to Marilyn Low Schmitt. [15] The fascination
with the monstrous devolved by the end of the seventh century into a decorative
Chimera-motif in Corinth,[16] while the motif of Bellerophon on Pegasus took on a
separate existence alone. A separate Attic tradition, where the goats breathe fire
and the animal's rear is serpentine, begins with such confidence that Marilyn Low
Schmitt is convinced there must be unrecognized or undiscovered local
precursors.[17] Two vase-painters employed the motif so consistently they are
given the pseudonyms the Bellerophon Painter and the Chimaera Painter.

Similar creatures