Delphyne

Q: Who was Delphyne?

Delphyne is a female dragon in Greek mythology, a half-human, half-serpent monster. Two ancient writers mention her in two different stories.

Delphyne is a female dragon in Greek mythology, a half-human, half-serpent monster. Two ancient writers mention her in two different stories. In Apollodorus she guards the stolen sinews of Zeus in a cave in Cilicia after the monster Typhon has defeated him. In Apollonius of Rhodes, Apollo kills her with his bow beneath Mount Parnassus, near Delphi.

The Guardian of Zeus’ Sinews

Apollodorus tells the story in his account of the battle between Zeus and Typhon. Typhon wrestled the sickle from Zeus and cut the sinews from his hands and feet. He carried the helpless god across the sea to Cilicia and put him in the Corycian cave. He hid the sinews in a bearskin there as well, and set the she-dragon Delphyne, “a half-bestial maiden”, to guard them. Hermes and Aegipan stole the sinews and fitted them back onto Zeus without being seen. Zeus recovered his strength and went on to pursue Typhon until he buried him under Mount Etna in Sicily (Apollodorus, Library 1.6.3). Apollodorus does not say that Delphyne was killed, and he does not name Apollo in this story.

Delphyne and Apollo at Parnassus

Apollonius of Rhodes describes how Apollo, still young, beardless and proud of his long hair, killed the huge monster Delphyne with his arrows beneath the rocky ridge of Parnassus (Argonautica 2.705–707). Orpheus sings this in a hymn to Apollo while the Argonauts are sacrificing on a small island in the Black Sea. Delphi lies on the slopes of Parnassus, so this is the Delphic dragon of Apollo’s myth.

The Homeric Hymn to Apollo tells of the same fight but does not give the dragon a name. Beside a sweet-flowing spring, Apollo killed with his strong bow the huge she-dragon (drakaina), a bloated monster that harmed men and their sheep. She was the creature that Hera gave Typhaon to raise, the son she bore in anger at Zeus. After Apollo shot her, she writhed in pain and breathed out her life in blood. Apollo told her to rot on the ground, and the hymn says that the place came to be called Pytho, and Apollo Pythian, because the power of Helios made her rot there (Homeric Hymn to Apollo 300–310, 349–374).

Pausanias records two accounts of the creature Apollo killed at Delphi. The poets, he says, made it a dragon posted by Earth to guard the oracle; others said it was a violent son of Crius who plundered the sanctuary (Pausanias 10.6.6). Neither account names it Delphyne.

Delphyne and Echidna

Hesiod describes Echidna in the Theogony as a being who is half a bright-eyed, fair-cheeked nymph and half a huge, speckled snake that eats raw flesh. She lives in a cave beneath the earth, and Typhon is her mate (Theogony 295–307). Delphyne is a different creature in a different story, though she shares Echidna’s serpent form.