Gĭgantes

, the sons of Cœlus and Terra, who, according to Hesiod, sprang from the blood of the wound which Cœlus received from his son Saturn; whilst Hyginus calls them sons of Tartar us and Terra. They are represented as men of uncommon stature, and with strength proportioned to their gigantic size. Some of them, as Cottus, Briareus, and Gyges, had 50 heads and 100 arms, and serpents instead of legs. They were of a terrible aspect; their hair hung loose about their shoulders, and their beards were suffered to grow untouched. Pallene and its neighbourhood was the place of their residence. The defeat of the Titans, with whom they are often ignorantly confounded, and to whom they were nearly related, incensed them against Jupiter, and they all conspired to dethrone him. The god was alarmed, and called all the deities to a ist him against a powerful enemy who made use of rocks, oaks, and burning woods for their weapons, and who had already heaped mount O a upon Pelion, to scale with more facility the walls of heaven. At the sight of such dreadful adversaries, the gods fled with the greatest consternation into Egypt, where they a umed the shape of different animals to screen themselves from their pursuers. Jupiter, however, remembered that they were not invincible, provided he called a mortal to his a istance; and by the advice of Pallas, he armed his son Hercules in his cause. With the aid of this celebrated hero, the giants were soon put to flight and defeated. Some were crushed to pieces under mountains, or buried in the sea, and others were flayed alive, or beaten to death with clubs. See: Enceladus , Aloides , Porphyrion , Typhon , Otus , Titanes , . The existence of giants has been supported by all the writers of antiquity, and received as an undeniable truth. Homer tells us that Tityus, when extended on the ground, covered nine acres; and that Polyp hem us ate two of the companions of Uly es at once, and walked along the shores of Sicily, leaning on a staff which might have served for the mast of a ship. The Grecian heroes, during the Trojan war, and Turnus in Italy, attacked their enemies by throwing stones, which four men of the succeeding ages would have been unable to move. Plutarch also mentions, in support of the gigantic stature, that Sertorius opened the grave of Antæus in Africa, and found a skeleton which measured six cubits in length. Apollo dor us , bk. 1 , ch. 6 .— Pausanias , bk. 1 , ch. 2 , . — Ovid , Metamorphoses , bk. 1 , li. 151 .— Plutarch , Sertorius .— Hyginus , fable 28, . — Homer , Ody ey , bks. 7 & 10.— Virgil , Georgics , bk. 1 , li. 280 ; Æneid , bk. 6 , li. 580 .