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most natural processes worked. As a result, it was sometimes
easy for them to imagine the existence of bizarre beasts lurking
on the fringes of the known world.

Typhon Versus Zeus

Those creatures from people’s imaginations were amplified by ex-
aggerations that came from retellings of extremely ancient tales
over the course of many generations. One of the oldest stories
of all concerned Gaia, the primordial mother goddess who per-
sonified the earth itself. Supposedly, she frequently mated with
Uranus, the divinity who embodied the sky. Among their offspring
were the first gods—the Titans.
The fertile Gaia also mated with Tartarus, a deep, dark layer
of the vast underworld, and the initial result was a series of mon-
strous, misshapen creatures. One of her children was Echidna,
who was described in classical Greek accounts as half serpent,
half woman and extremely disgusting and foul smelling. Even
more repulsive, as well as dangerous, was one of Echidna’s sib-
lings, Typhon. According to the ancient myth teller known today
as Pseudo-Apollodorus, Typhon was

a mixture of man and beast, the largest and strongest of all
Gaia’s children. Down to the thighs he was human in form,
so large that he extended beyond all the mountains while
his head often touched even the stars. One hand reached
to the west, the other to the east, and attached to these
were one hundred heads of serpents. Also from the thighs
down he had great coils of vipers [poisonous snakes],
which extended to the top of his head and hissed mightily. 7

Multiple myths feature Typhon as the villain. In the best-known
tale, Gaia sent him to fight Zeus, the leader of the Olympians—
the deities who succeeded the Titans as masters of the cosmos.
As mother of the Titans, Gaia favored them and despised Zeus.

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