Medusa part of their religion. Medusa was beheaded by the hero Perseus, who thereafter used her head, which retained its ability to turn onlookers to stone, as a weapon until he gave it to the goddess Athena to place on her shield. In classical antiquity the image of the head of Medusa appeared in the evil-averting device known as the "Gorgoneion". The three Gorgon sisters—Medusa, Stheno, and Euryale—were all children of the ancient marine deities Phorcys (or "Phorkys") and his sister Ceto (or "Keto"), chthonic monsters from an archaic world. Their genealogy is shared with other sisters, the Graeae, as in
HNLMS Medusa (1911) HNLMS Medusa (1911) HNLMS Medusa ("HW 1", "A 890") was a Dutch , built in Amsterdam and named after Medusa in Greek mythology. In the late afternoon of 14 May 1940, under constant heavy attack, the "Medusa" sailed for the United Kingdom, reaching The Downs the following day. She was first stationed at Falmouth alongside the two ships of the Douwe Aukes class before being transferred to Holyhead on 31 July 1940 to be the tender to the Dutch depot ship "Stuyvesant". After the war the "Medusa" remained in the UK until 15 January 1946, before returning to the Netherlands