Empusa
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Empusa or Empousa (; ; plural: Empusai) is a shape-shifting female being in Greek mythology, said to possess a single leg of copper, commanded by Hecate, whose precise nature is obscure. In Late Antiquity, the empousae have been described as a category of phantoms or spectres, equated with the lamiai and mormolykeia, thought to seduce and feed on young men.
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- mythical creature
- Part of
- Greek mythology
- Gender
- female organism
Show 1 more fact
- described by source
- Pauly–Wissowa
Sources (1)
via Wikidata · CC0
~4 min read
Encyclopedic overview
10 sectionsContents
- In antiquity
- Aristophanes
- ''Life of Apollonius''
- Modern Greek folklore
- In fiction
- See also
- Notes
- References
- Citations
- Bibliography
Empusa or Empousa (; ; plural: Empusai) is a shape-shifting female being in Greek mythology, said to possess a single leg of copper, commanded by Hecate, whose precise nature is obscure. In Late Antiquity, the empousae have been described as a category of phantoms or spectres, equated with the lamiai and mormolykeia, thought to seduce and feed on young men.
== In antiquity == The primary sources for the empousa in Antiquity are Aristophanes's plays (The Frogs and Ecclesiazusae) and Philostratus's Life of Apollonius of Tyana.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Empusa” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.