page_title: Lamia
section_title: Interpretations
hierarchical_section_title: Lamia / Interpretations
context_page_description: Lamia, in ancient Greek mythology, was a woman who became a child-eating monster after her children were destroyed by Hera, who learned of her husband Zeus's trysts with her. Hera also afflicted Lamia with sleeplessness so she would anguish constantly, but Zeus gave her the ability to remove her own eyes.
  "Lamia" was also used as a bogey word to frighten and discipline children.
  In later traditions and storytelling, the lamiai became a type of phantom, synonymous with the empusai which seduced youths to satisfy their sexual appetite and fed on their flesh afterward. A fabulous biography of Apollonius of Tyana defeating a lamia seductress has inspired the poem Lamia by Keats.
  The lamia has been ascribed serpentine qualities, which some commentators believe can be firmly traced to mythology from antiquity, and they have found analogues in ancient texts that could be designated as lamiai which are part-serpent beings. These include the half-woman, half-snake beasts of the "Libyan myth" told by Dio Chrysostom, and the monster sent to Argos by Apollo to avenge Psamathe.
context_section_description: This Lamia of Libya has her double in Lamia-Sybaris of the legend around Delphi, both indirectly associated with serpents. Strong parallel with the Medusa has also been noted. These, and other considerations have prompted modern commentators to suggest she is a dragoness.
  Another double of the Libyan Lamia may be Lamia, daughter of Poseidon. Lamia by Zeus gave birth to a Sibyl according to Pausanias, and this would have to be the Libyan Lamia, yet there is a tradition that Lamia the daughter of Poseidon was the mother of a Sibyl. Either one could be Lamia the mother of Scylla mentioned in the Stesichorus (d. 555 BC) fragment, and other sources. Scylla is a creature depicted variously as anguipedal or serpent-bodied.
caption: Lamia (second version), with snakeskin on her lap, John William Waterhouse (1909)
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