Jon Solo Sebastian 09/06/2024:

In the time since I’ve started writing these pieces, I’ve come to find Greek mythology far more fascinating than I’d ever expected to. Norse mythology is my thing for sure, but all of the similarities between the myths, and some of the characters of Greek mythology are worth learning about. Today’s monster of the week is, Orthrus, a lesser known hound of Greek mythology, but his family ties put him on the list of fascinating creatures.

Unlike his siblings, his job was fairly basic; his appearance was not basic, though. He served as the guard dog for a cattle owner named Geryon. Geryon, a three-headed giant lived on the island of Erytheia, and was the owner of red cattle that is later stolen by the mighty Hercules. I suppose I just spoiled a portion of the story considering Orthrus was guarding the cattle that was stolen.

Who is Orthrus and where does he come from?

The Chimera, whom I recently wrote a piece about (read here), is his sister. An interesting tidbit I found shakes up the background of all these characters if the unnamed source knows something no one else knows. From greekmythology.com: “According to a source. Orthrus mated with Echidna and produced a number of monsters, such as the Chimera, the Sphinx, the Lernaean Hydra, and Nemean Lion.”

Most sources, however, claim that Orthrus is the brother of the mentioned beasts. One monster not named in that list is his brother. You might have heard of Cerberus, the very popular hellhound of all hellhounds; though I’m sure Garmr would argue with that statement. If you’re unfamiliar with Garmr or hellhounds and want to know more, I wrote a piece about them. Click here for more about Hellhounds.

Like his brother, Cerberus, Orthrus is a giant hound. Unlike his brother, he only has two heads. He was said to be a powerful beast which is why a three-headed (and three-bodied according to some folktales) giant brought him on to guard his cattle. Some artistic depictions of Orthrus show him with three heads, sometimes a snake for a tail, but I feel the artist or the describer was getting him confused with Cerberus. Other depictions illustrate Orthrus as multiple dogs rather than one two-headed beast. Lastly, and this one sounds bizarre—he was depicted to have seven serpent heads in addition to his two canine heads.

It is said that Hercules defeated him with one swing of his club. Let’s keep in mind that Hercules is a demi-god who became a god, so his superhuman strength was no joke. But it is a sad and real-life type of ending to Orthrus because like many of us in the real world, we go to our jobs every day and just do our thing basically until we die. Is it weird that I can relate our human lives to a mythical two-headed dog?