Descriptions Descriptions of Cerberus vary, including the number of his heads. Cerberus was usually three-headed, though not always. Cerberus had several multi-headed relatives. His father was the multi snake-footed Typhon,Hesiod, Theogony 300–314, Acusilaus, fragment 6 (Freeman, p. 15), Hyginus, Fabulae Preface, 151 , and Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica (or Fall of Troy) 6.260–268 (pp. 272–275) all have Cerberus as the offspring of Typhon and Echidna, while Bacchylides, Ode 5.56–62, Sophocles, Women of Trachis 1097–1099, Callimachus, fragment 515 Pfeiffer (Trypanis, pp. 258–259), and Ovid, Metamorphoses 4.500–501, 7.406–409 all have Cerberus as the offspring of Echidna without naming a father. and Cerberus was the brother of three other multi-headed monsters, the multi-snake-headed Lernaean Hydra; Orthrus, the two-headed dog that guarded the Cattle of Geryon; and the Chimera, who had three heads: that of a lion, a goat, and a snake.Hesiod, Theogony 309–324 (although it is not certain whom Hesiod meant as the mother of the Chimera: Echidna, the Hydra, or Ceto); Apollodorus, 2.5.10, 2.3.1; Hyginus, Fabulae Preface. And, like these close relatives, Cerberus was, with only the rare iconographic exception, multi-headed.
Descriptions Descriptions of Cerberus vary, including the number of his heads. Cerberus was usually three-headed, though not always. Cerberus had several multi-headed relatives. His father was the multi snake-footed Typhon,Hesiod, Theogony 300–314, Acusilaus, fragment 6 (Freeman, p. 15), Hyginus, Fabulae Preface, 151 , and Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica (or Fall of Troy) 6.260–268 (pp. 272–275) all have Cerberus as the offspring of Typhon and Echidna, while Bacchylides, Ode 5.56–62, Sophocles, Women of Trachis 1097–1099, Callimachus, fragment 515 Pfeiffer (Trypanis, pp 258–259), and Ovid, Metamorphoses 4.500–501, 7.406–409 all have Cerberus as the offspring of Echidna without naming a father. and Cerberus was the brother of three other multi-headed monsters, the multi-snake-headed Lernaean Hydra; Orthrus, the two-headed dog that guarded the Cattle of Geryon; and the Chimera, who had three heads: that of a lion, a goat, and a snake.Hesiod, Theogony 309–324 (although it is not certain whom Hesiod meant as the mother of the Chimera: Echidna, the Hydra, or Ceto); Apollodorus, 2.5.10, 2.3.1; Hyginus, Fabulae Preface. And, like these close relatives, Cerberus was, with only the rare iconographic exception, multi-headed.