Harpies, The (Har´pies), (literally, snatchers, demons of destruction, or, in the modern sense, extortioners). They were monsters, half-birds, half-maidens, having the heads and breasts of women, the bodies of birds, and the claws of lions. Their names were Aello, Ocypete, and Celeno. They were loathsome creatures, living in filth, and poisoning everything they came in contact with.
“Such fiends to scourge mankind, so fierce, so fell,
Heaven never summoned from the depth of hell.
A virgin face, with wings and hooked claws,
Death in their eyes, and famine in their jaws,
While proof to steel their hides and plumes remain
We strike the impenetrable fiends in vain.”
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