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Fantascience Digest, v. 3, issue 3, whole no. 15, November-December 1941

Page 6

Page 6          Fantascience Digest

and Typhon. Eohidna was a monster -- half woman and half serpent. Typhon was a monster with one hundred heads, fearful eyes, and terrible voices.

Either of this pair of horrors sounds like the creations of a fantasy writer's nightmare, but wait! They combined forces to disgorge upon the world more horrors than Edmond Hamilton, H.G. Wells, or Ed Earl Repp ever thought of later. Besides Cerberus, they were parents to the Chimaera, "a fire-breathing monster, the fore part of whose body was that of a lion, the hind part that of a dragon, and the middle part that of a goat"; the many-headed dog Orthus; the hundred-headed dragon appointed guardian of the apples of the Hesperides; the Colchian dragon; the Sphinx, differing from the Egyptian because rather than being a half lion, half human without wings, the daughter of Eohinda and Typhon was a winged half lion, half woman; Scylla, previously described; Gorgon; the Lernaean Hydra; the eagle which consumed Prometheus' liver; and the Nemean lion.

You can really see that Hercules might have been incurring quite a family feud in making off with Cerberus. But he wasn't particularly bothered, having previously killed the Lernean hydra, which "had nine heads, of which the middle one was immortal. ---- In the place of the heads he cut off, two new ones grew forth each time."

Hercules, among other labors put upon him as penance, cleaned the stables of Augeas. Quite a task, since Augeas had a herd of 3,000 oxen whose stalls had not been cleaned for thirty years and probably smelled to high heaven. Employing quite advanced hydraulic principles and utilizing river diversion, Hercules cleaned the stables in a single day. Hercules next destroyed the Stymphalian birds, voracious creatures with brazen claws, wings and beaks, and feathers which they used as arrows. Hercules frightened the birds with a brazen rattle, and as they flew he shot them down.

Modern duck-hunters, take note. Or do you prefer decoying to scaring?

But inasmuch as this little essay deals with scientifiction in the classics, or the application of present-day scientific principles in the classics, perhaps we'd better come down to earth and cite a few more specific and applicable instances before closing.

Perseus, for example, killed Medusa. To look at her turned one to stone. (Modern authors prefer rays or potent drinks). Perseus employed the principle of reflection of light, glancing at her only in a mirrored shield, and so was able to decapitate her. He escaped the vengeance of her sisters through invisibility granted him due to a magic helmet. Who knows but what his helmet might have not contained some scientific device to bend light-rays or reflect light? The helmet is fully as possible as any contemporary creations of invisibility as employed by THE INVISIBLE MAN, THE MOON POOL, THE LARN, TARRANO THE CONQUEROR, or a thousand other books and sources.

So we find that the ancients, the poets and historians of ancient Greece and Rome, wrote more stories with a scientifiction tinge than we might imagine.. Modern writers might in many instances be accused

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Page 6 Fantascience Digest and Typhon. Eohidna was a monster -- half woman and half serpent. Typhon was a monster with one hundred heads, fearful eyes, and terrible voices. Either of this pair of horrors sounds like the creations of a fantasy writer's nightmare, but wait! They combined forces to disgorge upon the world more horrors than Edmond Hamilton, H.G. Wells, or Ed Earl Repp ever thought of later. Besides Cerberus, they were parents to the Chimaera, "a fire-breathing monster, the fore part of whose body was that of a lion, the hind part that of a dragon, and the middle part that of a goat"; the many-headed dog Orthus; the hundred-headed dragon appointed guardian of the apples of the Hesperides; the Colchian dragon; the Sphinx, differing from the Egyptian because rather than being a half lion, half human without wings, the daughter of Eohinda and Typhon was a winged half lion, half woman; Scylla, previously described; Gorgon; the Lernaean Hydra; the eagle which consumed Prometheus' liver; and the Nemean lion. You can really see that Hercules might have been incurring quite a family feud in making off with Cerberus. But he wasn't particularly bothered, having previously killed the Lernean hydra, which "had nine heads, of which the middle one was immortal. ---- In the place of the heads he cut off, two new ones grew forth each time." Hercules, among other labors put upon him as penance, cleaned the stables of Augeas. Quite a task, since Augeas had a herd of 3,000 oxen whose stalls had not been cleaned for thirty years and probably smelled to high heaven. Employing quite advanced hydraulic principles and utilizing river diversion, Hercules cleaned the stables in a single day. Hercules next destroyed the Stymphalian birds, voracious creatures with brazen claws, wings and beaks, and feathers which they used as arrows. Hercules frightened the birds with a brazen rattle, and as they flew he shot them down. Modern duck-hunters, take note. Or do you prefer decoying to scaring? But inasmuch as this little essay deals with scientifiction in the classics, or the application of present-day scientific principles in the classics, perhaps we'd better come down to earth and cite a few more specific and applicable instances before closing. Perseus, for example, killed Medusa. To look at her turned one to stone. (Modern authors prefer rays or potent drinks). Perseus employed the principle of reflection of light, glancing at her only in a mirrored shield, and so was able to decapitate her. He escaped the vengeance of her sisters through invisibility granted him due to a magic helmet. Who knows but what his helmet might have not contained some scientific device to bend light-rays or reflect light? The helmet is fully as possible as any contemporary creations of invisibility as employed by THE INVISIBLE MAN, THE MOON POOL, THE LARN, TARRANO THE CONQUEROR, or a thousand other books and sources. So we find that the ancients, the poets and historians of ancient Greece and Rome, wrote more stories with a scientifiction tinge than we might imagine.. Modern writers might in many instances be accused