Standard Lemma guide

Hecatoncheires

noun · 1 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

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  • /ˌhɛkətɒŋˈkaɪɹiːz/

1

noun

Meaning 1

Three monstrous giants of enormous size and strength, each with fifty heads and one hundred arms, who were offspring of Uranus by Gaia, whom Zeus freed from captivity and who in return aided the Olympians in the Titanomachy.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: Greek, plural, plural-only

Topics: human-sciences, mysticism, mythology, philosophy, sciences

Examples

  • The three Hecatoncheires were named Cottus, Briareus (or Aegaeon) and Gyges (or Gyes).
  • 1840, George Cornewall Lewis (translator), John William Donaldson (translator, later chapters), Karl Otfried Müller, History of the Literature of Ancient Greece: To the Period of Isocrates, Robert Baldwin, page 92, [...] nor is it until the poet has related how Zeus set free these Hecatoncheires, by the advice of the Earth, that we are introduced to the battle with the Titans, which has already been some time going on.
  • 1993, Tim Parks (translator), Roberto Calasso, The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony, [1988, R. Calasso, Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia], Random House (Vintage), page 202, By this time many beings had spread out across space, both on high and below: the Titans, the Cyclopes, the Hecatoncheires.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: Centimanes, Hundred-Handers

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

From Ancient Greek ἑκᾰτόν (hekătón, “hundred”) + χείρ (kheír, “hand”), compare the adjective ἑκατόγχειρος (hekatónkheiros, “hundred-handed”). The putative *Ἑκατόγχειρες (*Hekatónkheires) is unattested in Hesiod's Theogony, which instead describes the giants with the phrase ἑκατὸν μὲν χεῖρες (hekatòn mèn kheîres).

Across languages

Translations

8 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Esperanto: Hekatonĥiroj — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • French: Hécatonchires — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • German: Hekatoncheiren — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • Greek: Εκατόγχειρες (Ekatóncheires) — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • Ancient Greek: Ἑκατόγχειρες (Hekatónkheires) — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • Italian: Ecatonchiri — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • Portuguese: hecatônquiros — mythological giants with 100 arms
  • Spanish: Hecatónquiros — mythological giants with 100 arms