Chrysaor

C3H4R1Y4S1A1O1R1

proper noun

A son of Poseidon and Medusa and brother of the winged horse Pegasus, often depicted as a young man, who sprang along with Pegasus from the blood of the decapitated Medusa.

Scrabble 16

Meanings

proper noun

alternative Khrysaor

  1. Greekhuman sciencesA son of Poseidon and Medusa and brother of the winged horse Pegasus, often depicted as a young man, who sprang along with Pegasus from the blood of the decapitated Medusa.

    Pegasus alone issues from the neck of the winged and decapitated Medusa,ᵇ or Chrysaor and Pegasus at the same moment.ᶜ

    1855, Archaeologia, or Miscellaneous Tracts Relating to Antiquity, Volume 36, Society of Antiquaries of London, page 59
    2 more examples

    Medusa embraces a winged horse and a youth who have been identified as her sons, Pegasus and Chrysaor. This interpretation is problematic because it involves a temporal impossibility:⁷⁶ the inversion of time sequence. The myth, which is as early as Hesiod (Theogony, 270–82), states clearly that Pegasus was born after Medusa was decapitated.

    2002, Nannó Marinatos, The Goddess and the Warrior, Taylor & Francis (Routledge), page 65

    An innovation comes with Chrysaor, an enigmatic figure who appears in myth in multiple forms: the most famous is the offspring of Medusa and the progenitor of various monsters, including Geryon,³⁴ making Chrysaor hardly a heroic figure.

    2010, Lee E. Patterson, Kinship Myth in Ancient Greece, University of Texas Press, page 120

Origin

  1. Ancient GreekΧρυσάωρ
  2. EnglishChrysaor

Borrowed from Ancient Greek Χρυσάωρ (Khrusáōr).

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

French Chrysaor
  • Chrysaormythological brother of Pegasus
German Chrysaor
  • Chrysaormythological brother of Pegasus
Cite this entry
APA

Chrysaor. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Chrysaor

MLA

“Chrysaor.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Chrysaor. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Chrysaor,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Chrysaor.

Source: Chrysaor on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.