Monsters
MONSTERS. Strictly speaking, a monster is a mythical being and may be human or animal or a combination of both; it may be huge, misshapen, or grotesque, malevolent, savage, or terrifying. Such creatures have been a feature of popular lore and religious cult in all parts of the world from earliest times. The term is applied also to human "freaks," or "monstrous births," that is, persons with more or less than the normal number of limbs or organs, Siamese twins, hermaphrodites, and even albinos.
In popular legend, monsters are commonly portrayed as both stupid and gluttonous. What they have in brawn, they lack in brain, and when they devour their victims, it is not because they are innately hostile to the human race but because they possess insatiable appetites. It is often their obtuseness and greed that prove their undoing.
One kind of mythical monster is the dragon, the embodiment of primordial chaos, who is believed to have been subdued in battle by a leading god before the world order could be established. The Sumerians of Mesopotamia spoke of such a combat between the monster Azag ("demon") and the god Ninurta; the Babylonians, of the defeat of the rebellious Tiamat by their supreme god Marduk; the Hittites, of the defeat of a sea serpent named Illuyankas by the combined efforts of the goddess Inaras and a mortal hero; the Hebrews, of Yahveh's rout of Leviathan; the Hindus, of Indra's subjugation of Vṛtra; the Iranians, of the dispatch of the serpentine Azhi Dahaka; and the Greeks, of the triumph of Zeus over the contumacious Typhon.
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