Gorgo

Gorgo, or GORGON, according to Homer, a frightful female monster inhabiting the infernal regions. Hesiod mentions three Gorgones—Stheno, Euryale, and Medusa, of whom the last named is the chief inheritor of the characteristic attributes of the single Homeric Gorgon. Their habitation was on the brink of the Western Ocean, in the neighbourhood of Night and the Hesperides; but Herodotus and other later writers place it in Libya. They were generally represented as winged virgins with brazen claws and enormous teeth, having on their heads serpents in place of hair, and two serpents round their bodies by way of girdle. According to later legends, Medusa was originally a very beautiful maiden, and the only one of three sisters who was mortal. Having become a mother by Neptune in one of Minerva's temples, that virgin goddess changed her hair into serpents, which gave her so fearful an appearance that whoever looked on her was turned into stone. She was slain by Perseus, and her head placed in the shield of Minerva.