Yamata no Orochi food, but lacks a phonological connection. Polycephalic or multi-headed animals are rare in biology but common in mythology and heraldry. Multi-headed dragons, like the 8-headed "Orochi" and 3-headed "Trisiras" above, are a common motif in comparative mythology. For instance, multi-headed dragons in Greek mythology include the wind-god Typhon who had several polycephalic offspring, including the 9-headed Lernaean Hydra and the 100-headed Ladon, both slain by Heracles. Two other Japanese examples derive from Buddhist importations of Indian dragon myths. Benzaiten, the Japanese name of Saraswati, supposedly killed a 5-headed dragon at Enoshima in 552 AD. Kuzuryū 九頭龍 "9-headed dragon", deriving from
Dragons in Greek mythology Dragons in Greek mythology Dragons play a significant role in Greek mythology. The word dragon derives from the Greek δράκων (drakōn) and its Latin cognate draco. Ancient Greeks applied the term to large, constricting snakes. Daniel Ogden speaks of three ways to explain the origins of Greek dragon myths: as "vertical" evolution from (reconstructed) Proto-Indo-European mythology, as "horizontal" adaptation from Ancient Near Eastern mythology, or as sitting within "the cloud of international folktale". Regarding theories of vertical transmission, Ogden argues that they carry "an unspoken assumption that prior to such a transfer the Greeks' own myth-world was a "tabula rasa"",