Delphyne- Greek CreatureCreature · Monster

The Sinews of Zeus

When Typhon overpowered Zeus at Mount Casion in Syria, he wrested away the god's weapons and used a sickle to cut the sinews from Zeus's hands and feet. With the king of the gods helpless, Typhon carried the severed sinews to the Corycian Cave in the Taurus Mountains of Cilicia and set Delphyne to guard them — a she-dragon, half woman and half serpent, who coiled around the hidden tendons in the darkness. Without his sinews, Zeus could neither stand nor wield his thunderbolts. Typhon left, confident the ruler of the gods was crippled for good.

The Rescue

One tradition, preserved in Apollodorus, has Hermes and the goat-footed Aegipan creep into the cave and steal the sinews while Delphyne slept, then fit them back into Zeus's body. Nonnus tells a longer story. Cadmus came to the cave disguised as a shepherd, carrying nothing but a set of reed pipes. He sat at the cave's mouth and played — a melody so natural it could have been any herdsman playing to his flock. The music drifted into the darkness, and Delphyne, who had known nothing but silence in her long vigil, crept out to listen. She coiled at the entrance, swaying. Cadmus played on, and when she wanted more, he said he needed gut strings to make his pipes truly sing — pointing to the sinews she guarded. Charmed beyond caution, Delphyne let him take them.

Once the sinews were restored, Zeus regained his strength, took up his thunderbolts, and resumed his war against Typhon. Delphyne's fate after losing her charge goes unrecorded. Her name echoes Delphi and its serpent Python, and some later writers used "Delphyne" as a name for the Pythian dragon, though in her earliest sources she belongs to the Cilician cave alone.