Medusa

THE GORGONES (Gorgons) were three powerful, winged daimones named Medousa (Medusa), Sthenno and Euryale. Of the three sisters only Medousa was mortal. King Polydektes of Seriphos once commanded the hero Perseus to fetch her head. He accomplished this with the help of the gods who equipped him with a reflective shield, a curved sword, winged boots and helm of invisibility. When he fell upon Medousa and decapitated her, two creatures sprang forth from the wound--the winged horse Pegasos (Pegasus) and the giant Khrysaor (Chrysaor). Perseus fled with the monster's head in a sack and her two angry sisters chasing close on his heels.

According to late classical poets, Medousa was once a beautiful woman who was transformed into a monster by Athena as punishment for lying with Poseidon in her shrine. Earlier Greek writers and artists, however, simply portray her as a monster born into a large family of monsters.

The three Gorgones were depicted in ancient Greek vase painting and sculpture as winged women with broad, round heads, serpentine locks of hair, large staring eyes, wide mouths, lolling tongues, the tusks of swine, flared nostrils, and sometimes short, coarse beards. Medousa was humanised in late classical art with the face of a beautiful woman. In mosaic art her round face was wreathed with coiling snakes and adorned with a pair of small wings on the brow.