Pegasus

A winged horse, one of the two offspring which Medusa the Gorgon bore on Poseidon the Lord of the Ocean. (The other was a warrior named Chrysaor.) The horse's name derives from a Greek word meaning 'strong'. It would appear that Medusa was pregnant with her strange children when Perseus streuk off her head, because they both sprang fully developed from her headless body.

When Pegasus first appeared it was as a magnificent white stallion with golden wings, but this colouration may have changed later in life. He ignored the man who had slain his mother and instantly took to the air, his golden wings beating steadily as he flew to Mount Helicon, the home of the nine Muses. He repaid the hospitality of the Muses by using his hooves to dig out a spring named Hippocrene, meaning 'horse well', which flows with waters that give poetical inspiration to anyone who drinks them.

Occasionally a god or mortal attempted to catch Pegasus, but he evaded them with contemptuous ease. A single beat of his wings sent him soaring into the blue, where he circled about Moung Helicon with trumpet-like whinnies of triumph.

But eventually the goddess Athene arranged for his capture, to help Bellerophon to destroy the Chimaera. She appeared to Bellerophon in a dream, telling him to catch Pegasus with a magical golden bridle. When Bellerophon awoke he found the bridle in his hand.

Pegasus submitted meckly to being harnessed by Bellerophon, and then flew off with him to seek the Chimaera. This was a great fire-breathing monster with a lion's head, goat's body and serpent's tail, which was ravaging the country of Lycia. It lived in a cave, but could take to the air and swoop down upon the Lycian communities to blast them with jets of fire.

Bellerophon and Pegasus found the Chimaera hiding in a storm cloud, and in what may be the first recorded aerial combat they pursued the monster through the dark valleys of cloud. The gallant stallion, faster and more manoeuvrable than the ungainly monster, evaded the blasts of flame while Bellerophon fired volleys of arrows, unil they literally shot the monster down in flames.

Bellerophon then flew Pegasus to the south-east, so that he might fly the stallion as a kind of gunship against the Amazons. These fierce female warriors were on one of their raiding expeditions along the coast of Syria, but they soon scattered in confusion when Pegasus swooped upon them and Bellerophon showered them with arrows.

Flushed with success, Bellerophon then decided to fly Pegasus up to Olympus and take his place among the gods. But Zeus saw him coming and sent a horsefly to sting Pegasus, who bucked so frenziedly that Bellerophon fell to the ground. When Pegasus recovered from the pain he flew on up to Olympus, where Zeus took him into his stable and thereafter used him to carry his thunderbolts.