Giants are treated in the sources as a class of beings appearing in the mythic or deep past rather than as a single origin narrative. In Greek myth the term Gigantes (Γίγαντες) designates a stock of large mythic beings; in Abrahamic texts groups named in Genesis and later books (e.g., Nephilim, Anakim, Rephaites, Amorites) are described as unusually large peoples encountered in the sacred past. Folktales and local legends incorporate giants as ancient occupants of the landscape (for example traditions that ascribe the building of features such as the Giant's Causeway to Fionn mac Cumhaill) or as figures in heroic-age narratives (Paul Bunyan and analogous tall-man culture-hero traditions). Antiquarian and proto-scientific writers historically used giant narratives to account for large bones and anomalous remains, treating giants as explanatory actors for physical traces of the distant past.
Across the collected material giants are depicted primarily as humanoid but of prodigious size and strength. Specific facial features, skin, hair, or clothing are not consistently specified in the sources and instead vary by cultural context and genre: from monstrous, ogre-like antagonists in fairy tale to more humanized or sympathetic large figures in some modern literary portrayals. The only persistent descriptive markers in the sources are exceptional bodily scale and a notable physical presence that sets them apart from ordinary humans.
The principal attributes ascribed to giants in the sources are extraordinary physical size and strength. Narratively these attributes make them fearsome opponents or capable builders and landscape-shapers; in folktale contexts giants are often violent predators of humans or livestock and act as antagonists (e.g., Jack-the-Giant-Killer motifs), while other traditions present them as helpers, ancestors, or culture-heroes (e.g., Paul Bunyan or the Fionn mac Cumhaill causeway tradition). The sources also record beliefs—reflected in antiquarian discourse—that giant races were invoked to explain unusually large bones or remains found in the earth; this is a cultural use of the giant concept rather than a supernatural ability attributed to the beings themselves. Some narrative traditions include interbreeding with humans, producing offspring variously described as half-giants or large humans.
Abcán (Abhcán)
Abcán (modern spelling Abhcán) is a named dwarf poet and musician of the Tuatha Dé Danann in Irish myth. He appears in a small number of narratives as a musician whose art has soporific power and as the ferryman who brings the goddess Ruad from the Otherworld to the human world.
Acanthus (son of Autonous)
Acanthus is a mythic human figure in a Greek metamorphosis tale (recorded by Antoninus Liberalis) who, with his family, was transformed by Zeus and Apollo into a bird named after him. The story functions etiologically, explaining the origin and behaviors of certain birds by linking them to formerly human persons and their experiences.
Admetus
Admetus is a mortal king of Pherae in Thessaly in the Greek tragic tradition (notably Euripides' Alcestis). His life becomes the subject of a divine bargain in which Apollo intervenes to delay his appointed death, a bargain that requires another to die in his stead — most famously his wife Alcestis.
Admetus of Pherae
Admetus of Pherae is a mortal king of Thessaly in Greek myth whose household and fate intersect with Olympian gods (notably Apollo and Artemis), the Fates, the personification of Death (Thanatos), and the hero Heracles. He is celebrated for hospitality and justice and is best known from the tragic cycle surrounding his wife Alcestis, who dies in his stead and is later recovered.
Aegiale
Aegiale is a mortal woman in Greek mythic tradition, best known as the wife of the hero Diomedes. In post‑Trojan War nostos narratives she is depicted in several accounts as unfaithful and as plotting against her husband; some traditions attribute her conduct to the vengeance of the goddess Aphrodite.
Aeopolus
Aeopolus (Ancient Greek: Αἰπόλος, gen.: Αἰοπόλου, romanized Aipolus or Aiopólos, lit. 'goatherd') is a mortal figure in Greek mythic genealogical tradition recorded only in brief scholia and summaries. He is named as the father of Cleobule, who in one variant is cited as a possible mother of Myrtilus by Hermes; some sources note he was also called Aeolus. Attestations are limited and no cult, deeds, or narratives are preserved for him.
Aerope
Aerope (Ancient Greek: Ἀερόπη) is a mythological mortal woman of Greek tradition, a Cretan princess connected to the royal house of Mycenae (the Atreidai). In surviving accounts she functions as a human agent whose sexual relationships and/or the transfer of a symbolic object (the "golden lamb") are narrated as catalysts in the dynastic feuds of Atreus and Thyestes; sources preserve variant and sometimes conflicting traditions about her fate and parentage.
Aesacus
Aesacus (Ancient Greek: Αἴσακος) is a mythic son of King Priam of Troy who, grieving the death of a river-nymph beloved, throws himself from a cliff and is transformed mid-plunge by the sea-goddess Tethys into a diving seabird (mergus). In some traditions (Apollodorus and Tzetzes) he is also described as a seer who learned dream-interpretation from his grandfather Merops and interprets Hecabe’s dream about Paris.
Aeëtes
Aeëtes is a mythic, semi-divine king of Aea (identified with Colchis) in the Greek heroic tradition, son of Helios and the Oceanid Perseis. He is guardian of wondrous objects—most famously the Golden Fleece—and functions as a royal task-master whose demands and possessions test visiting heroes (notably Jason and the Argonauts).
Agrius and Oreius
Agrius (Ἄγριος) and Oreius/Orius (Ὄρειος) are twin sons of Polyphonte and a bear in a Greek mythic tale. Presented as 'twin savage bear-like children,' they committed acts of impiety and violence and were ultimately transformed by the gods into ominous birds (vulture and eagle-owl) as part of divine punishment and resolution.
Alcimenes
Alcimenes (Ancient Greek Ἀλκιμένης) is a personal name borne by multiple mortal figures in Greek myth and literary history — including a Boeotian prince, one of the sons of Jason and Medea, and several authors. The sources treat Alcimenes as human characters within mytho-historical narratives and literary tradition rather than as a distinct supernatural class or spirit.
Aloadae
The Aloadae (Otus and Ephialtes) are twin, exceptionally large brothers of Greek myth—variously portrayed as gigantic, hubristic challengers to the Olympian order and as local culture-bringing founders and worshipers of the Muses. Traditions report prodigious growth and strength, an attempt to scale the heavens by stacking mountains, the capture of Ares in some versions, and several differing accounts of their deaths or posthumous punishment.
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- [1]Giant — Wikipedia. Wikipedia contributors, 'Giant', Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giantwiki