Kentaurides
Encyclopedia
Kentaurides are the female
Female
Female is the sex of an organism, or a part of an organism, which produces non-mobile ova .- Defining characteristics :The ova are defined as the larger gametes in a heterogamous reproduction system, while the smaller, usually motile gamete, the spermatozoon, is produced by the male...

 members of the Kentauroi
Centaur
In Greek mythology, a centaur or hippocentaur is a member of a composite race of creatures, part human and part horse...

, a tribe of centaurs in Greek mythology
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

. The most referenced of the Kentaurides is Hylonome
Hylonome
Hylonome was a female centaur in Greek mythology. She was present at the battle against the Lapiths, where she lost her husband, the centaur Cyllarus, whom she loved very much. Heartbroken, she then took her own life to join him....

, the wife of Centaur Cyllarus
Cyllarus
Cyllarus was a centaur in Greek mythology. He was handsome and valiant, and dearly loved his centaur wife Hylonome. He participated in the battle against the Lapiths and was fatally wounded by a spear. He died in the arms of his beloved wife, who then took her own life shortly afterwards to join him....

. Although rarely mentioned in Greek writing, Kentaurides were depicted most often in Greek art
Greek art
Greek art began in the Cycladic and Minoan prehistorical civilization, and gave birth to Western classical art in the ancient period...

 and later Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

 mosaics. The Greek rhetorician Philostratus the Elder gives a brief description of Kentaurides:

"How beautiful the Centaurides are, even where they are horses; for some grow out of white mares, others are attached to chestnut mares, and the coats of others are dappled, but they glisten like those of horses that are well cared for. There is also a white female Centaur that grows out of a black mare, and the very opposition of the colours helps to produce the united beauty of the whole."

Roman poet Ovid
Ovid
Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...

, in his epic Metamorphoses, gives a brief description of Hylonome as well.


"In the high woods there was none comelier of all the centaur-girls, and she alone by love and love’s sweet words and winning ways held Cyllarus, yes, and the care she took to look her best (so far as that may be with limbs like that). She combed her glossy hair, and twined her curls in turn with rosemary or violets or roses, and sometimes she wore a pure white lily. Twice a day she bathed her face in the clear brook that fell from Pagasae’s high forest, twice she plunged her body in its flow, nor would she wear on her left side and shoulder any skin but what became her from best-chosen beasts."

  • The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and Prince Caspian
    The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
    The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is a 2008 epic fantasy film based on Prince Caspian, the second published, fourth chronological novel in C. S. Lewis's epic fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. It is the second in The Chronicles of Narnia film series from Walden Media, following The...

    depict kentaurides but are simply referred to as "female centaurs".
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