The List of Mythical Creatures

I'll be honest, putting together a complete list of mythical creatures is intimidating, mostly because there are so many.  So forgive me if I'm a little slow on putting this list together.  Of all of the projects here on Gods-and-Monsters.com, compiling a list of mythical creatures and their stories is going to be one of the toughest.  But then again, how could you have a site called "Gods and Monsters" without mentioning myth's most famous beasts?

You might notice that a lot of the monsters listed here are from ancient Greek and Roman origin.  As this list of mythical creatures starts to grow the Greek monsters will probably shrink down relatively, but the truth is, Greek monsters are the heart and soul, and in many cases the origin of where our more modern monsters come from.

To that degree I'm going to lump all of the mythologies together.  I hope you'll explore the areas that you may not be as familiar with along with the creatures you think you know well.

Since certain creatures have so much information about them, I've made more than a single page for a select few of these mythical creatures, including Vampires and Werewolves.

Enjoy...

The Alphabetical
List of Mythical Creatures

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List of Mythical Creatures
A-C

• Alicorn - The name for a winged unicorn.

• Banshee - A spirit appearing as a frenzied old woman whose high pitched shriek prophesied a death soon to come.

• Basilisk - A legendary lizard who could kill a man with its stare.

• Bigfoot - A type of Sasquatch native to North American forests.

• Black Dog - An evil spirit dog that stalks city streets at night.

• Black Eyed Beings  - They take human form but have black, soulless eyes and emanate a sense of pure evil.

• Bogeyman - A semi-corporeal being whose sole purpose is to scare children.

• Bogle - A ghostly being whose purpose is to confuse and scare humans and other creatures.

• Bray Road Beast  - The nickname for a werewolf-like creature seen multiple times in Wisconsin.

• Brownies - Small humanoid creatures wearing all brown clothing who sneak into homes at night to help with household chores.

• Centaur  - Half-men, half-horse creatures that ran wild and unruly.

• Cerberus  - The three-headed dog that guards the entrance to Hades.

• Charybdis  - The whirlpool on one side of the Strait of Messina that swallowed ships that came too close to it.

• Chimera  - Part-lion, part-goat, part-snake - all monster.

• Cockatrice - A flying part-rooster/part-snake that could kill with its stare.

• Cyclops - The one-eyed giant who captured and ate people.

• Cynocephalus  - A member of an ancient race of men with the heads of dogs.

List of Mythical Creatures
D-G

• Demon  - Malevolent spirits of Hell who battle humans for control of their souls.

• Doppelganger  - Apparitions of people that occur in impossible situations.

• Dragon - Giant, flying, fire-breathing lizards who often guard treasure.

• Dwarf - A short, stalky humanoid who live in underground mining communities.

• Echidna  - The snake-woman who became the mother of most Greek monsters.

• Elf - A race of pointy-eared humanoids who excel in magic and archery.

• Fairy  - A small, flying humanoid with magical abilities.

• Ghosts - Spirits of the dead whose souls remain in the realm of the living.

• Gnome - A small, humanoid creature who lives and moves beneath the earth.

• Goblin - A grotesque, troublesome little creature with a strong greed for gold and jewels.

• Golem  - Magically animated human-shaped creatures typically made of solid stone.

• Gorgon - The snake-haired and snake-bodied humanoid that was created in its mother's image. Its stare could turn a person to stone. Medusa became one of these creatures in a later myth.

• Griffin  - A creature with the body of a lion, the tail of a snake, and the head and wings of an eagle.

• Grim Reaper - The embodiment of death itself, the Grim Reaper comes to take your soul to the afterlife.

List of Mythical Creatures
H-N

• Hobgoblin - A type of Brownie who is inherently less helpful and more mischievous, even to the point of causing harm if antagonized.

• Hydra - The nine-headed serpent who grew two new heads for every one that was cut off.

• Imp - Small, mischievous creatures who liked to play pranks on people.

• Ladon (Python) - The snake that guarded the golden apples in the Garden of the Hesperides.

• Leprechauns - Small, bearded men who have a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

• Loch Ness Monster - The elusive sea-monster from the Loch Ness in Scotland.

• Manticore  - A mythical beast with a lion's body and a human's head.

• Medusa - A disciple of Athena who was turned into a gorgon.  She had the hair of snakes and could turn men to stone with her gaze.

• Mermaids  - Sea creatures with the head and torso of a woman and the tail of a fish.

• Minotaur  - The creature with the head and legs of a bull and the torso of a man, who guarded the exit to The Labyrinth.

• Mothman  - A winged creature in the shape of a man with hypnotic red eyes sighted in West Virginia.

• Mutants  - A term describing abnormal creatures created by genetic or environmental mutations.

• Nemean Lion  - The giant lion with impenetrable hide who becomes the constellation Leo.

• New Jersey Devil  - A flying creature with a high-pitched scream and a horse-like head native to the New Jersey Pine Barrens.

• Nymph - Divine female nature spirits who inhabit certain natural sites.

List of Mythical Creatures
O-S

• Ogre - An ugly, oversized humanoid creature with great physical strength and little intelligence.

• Orthros  - The two-headed monster dog.

• Pegasus - Technically the proper name of Bellerophon's winged horse, which became the general name for winged horses.

• Phoenix - The golden bird who, at the end of its life, burst into flames only to be reborn again.

• Pixie - A small humanoid creature with pointy ears who likes to cause mischief.

• Sasquatch - Large, hairy, man-like beasts that live in the woods.

• Satyr - Half-men, half-goats who were wild and lustful.  The god Pan was one of these.

• Scylla  - The man-eating beast that lived on the opposite side of the Strait of Messina from Charybdis.

• Sea Monsters - The generic term for several breeds of water-based monsters.

• Sea-Goat  - The half-goat, half-fish who are the children of Pricus, who becomes the constellation Capricorn.

• Shade - The ghosts of dead people before they are admitted entrance to Hades.

• Shapeshifters  - Humans who can willingly take the form of an animal while maintaining their consciousness.

• Sirens  - Man-eating beautiful women whose song compels men to them.

• Sphinx - The half-human, half-lion that forces those it meets to answer its riddles, or die.

• Sprite - A category of elemental, fairy-like spirits, invisible to humans (a Sylph is one of these).

• Sylph - An invisible, fairy-like being dedicated to the element of air.

List of Mythical Creatures
T-Z

• Thunderbird  - A giant bird that creates storms with its wings.

• Typhon  - The fire-breathing giant who challenged Zeus for control of Mount Olympus. Also the father of most Greek monsters.

• Unicorn  - A magical horse with a single horn on its forehead.

• Valkyries - Mythical Norse female divinities who choose heroes to die in battle and carry them to the great Valhalla.

• Vampire  - Legend's most charming bloodsucker gets a whole section of this website all to itself.

• Wendigo  - An evil spirit that possesses humans and turns them into cannibals.

• Will-o'-the-wisp  - Strange flame-like lights that seem to beckon travelers to follow.

• Werewolf  - Human by day, wolf by night.

• Wraith - Evil spirits of the dead who are trapped on Earth.

• Zombie  - The living dead who feed on human flesh.

Not looking for Monsters?  Check out our list of Greek Gods and Goddesses.