Half-Horseing Around with Centaurs!

Greeking Out from National Geographic Kids

This episode of Greeking Out explores the mythological origins and complex legacy of centaurs in Greek mythology, focusing on their creation

Key takeaways

• Centaurs were born from Ixion's deception involving a cloud goddess named Nephile, symbolizing both divine trickery and unintended consequences.

Main topics

• Origins of centaurs in Greek mythology
• Ixion's betrayal and creation of the first centaurs

Notable quotes

Silence is not a yes. Only a yes is a yes.

Conclusion

While centaurs are often portrayed as wild and unruly, this episode reveals their deeper

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) The stories featured in Greeking Out are original adaptations of classic Greek myths. This week's story features impressive cloud impersonations, really rude wedding guests, poisoned arrows, wild behavior, and lots of animal eggs. Speaker 1 (0:30) Welcome back to Greeking Out. Now, today's episode is all about some of our favorite furry friends, particularly the ones with human characteristics. Now, there are a few different kinds of half-person, half-animal creatures in Greek mythology, and sometimes sorting them out can be complicated. So feel free to take notes, because this is going to get a little confusing. not confusing. It is just unfamiliar. Or unfamiliar. Whatever. Now, you may or may not know what a centaur is, but that is where we start. A centaur is a half-horse, half-human creature. They have the torso of a person, but the bottom half of their body resembles a horse. Pretty simple, right? Right. Okay, a satyr is just like a centaur, except they only have Two horse legs instead of four. And a fawn is just like a satyr, except they have goat legs instead of horse legs, right? Speaker 1 (1:31) An ichthyocentar is an underwater centaur that is human from the waist up, but also part horse and part fish. Yeah, well, hold on. Wait a second. How is that even possible? They had horse hooves and a fish tail. So they would, so the top was a, and I, okay, all right. I was having a hard time picturing it, but I think I get it now. Okay, top half person, bottom half of the. Horse front and the fish back. Okay. Anyway, thankfully for right now, we're just going to stick with centaurs. The majority of the centaurs that were in the world were descended from Ixion, one of the few mortals who managed to talk their way onto Mount Olympus. Now, King Ixion wasn't exactly a nice guy. Ixion murdered his own father-in-law and was therefore shunned. Speaker 1 (2:26) by both humans and gods. Okay, he was definitely not a nice guy, but he prayed and prayed and prayed and prayed to Zeus and somehow was granted forgiveness from the king of the gods. Probably because Zeus was flattered. He could never resist a good compliment, you know. Eventually, Zeus even invited Ixion up to Mount Olympus to dine with the Olympians. So you would think that Ixion would be aware that he had gotten really lucky and he would be on his best behavior, right? Well, Ixion wasn't that kind of guy. While he was on Olympus, Ixion fell madly in love with a beautiful goddess. Unfortunately, that goddess wasn't exactly on the market. She was married to Zeus. Yeah, Ixion was crushing on Zeus' wife Hera. Big mistake. Speaker 1 (3:22) In addition to being married to Zeus, Hera is also known for being the goddess of family, marriage, and childbirth. But she's mostly known for her quick temper and taste for vengeance. That's true, and Hera would have probably been very annoyed by this unwanted attention, but she didn't even have a chance to react to this little crush of Ixion's. Zeus was the one who noticed it first. And of course, he wasn't going to let someone try to romance his wife, especially not some arrogant king who didn't even understand how to be a good house guest. Crushing on your host's wife is against the laws of hospitality. Yes, it is. Now, Zeus could have just disintegrated Ixion with a thunderbolt or exiled him to Hades or something, but instead, he decided to lay a trap for the lovestruck mortal. Speaker 1 (4:19) He thinks he can try to steal Hera away from me? Who does he think he is? His head must be in the clouds. Speaking of clouds... And Zeus followed that line of thinking, grabbing a cloud from the skies and sculpting it and molding it into the perfect Eidolon of Hera. Long-time listeners will remember that an Eidolon is a spectral version of someone. A duplicate. That is hard to tell apart from the real thing. Then, Zeus breathed life into the Eidolon and allowed it to walk around Olympus just like the real Hera. Scientists estimate that an average cumulus cloud weighs about 1.1 million pounds. Really? Wow, that's a lot of water in those clouds. Anyway, Ixion took the bait and immediately began to follow cloud Hera. Speaker 1 (5:17) all over Olympus. Wow, Hera's looking extra fluffy today. She's