Medical Mythology:Chiron the Centaur

Marc A. Shampo, Ph.D.,and Robert A. Kyle, M.D.

In ancient mythology, not all centaurs were violent andlustful. Although their general character was that of wild,lawless, and inhospitable beings, one-Chiron-was wiseand just. Chiron, the wisest of all centaurs, was the teacher ofthe Greek heroes Jason, Hercules, Asklepios, and Achilles.Chiron was well versed in medicine, music, prophecy, andhunting, having been raised and educated by Apollo and his

wife, Artemis. Chiron was the son of the god Cronus and thesea nymph Philyra. He lived in a cave at the foot of MountPelion in Thessaly (a region in eastern Greece).

Centaurs were a race of beings that were part horse and partman: the head, neck, and arms of a man and the body, legs, andtail of a horse. They lived in the mountains of Thessaly andArcadia (a region in southern Greece). Traditionally, theywere the offspring of Ixion, the king of the Lapiths, a Thes­salian people. The centaurs were best known for their fightwith the Lapiths. They lost the battle and were driven fromMount Pelion.

When Chiron was accidentally pierced by a poisonedarrow shot by Hercules, he renounced his immortality in favorofPrometheus (god offire) and was placed among the stars inthe constellation Sagittarius-a southern constellation thathas the form of a centaur shooting an arrow.

Chiron and the centaurs have been depicted on manystamps. Chiron is shown on this stamp issued by Spain in1956.

CORRECTION

In the October 1991 issue of the Mayo Clinic Proceedings, an editorial by Rozanski("Limitations to the Electrocardiographic Prediction of Myocardial Area at Risk," pages 1082 to1084) cites a previous study (Am J Cardiol 61:749-753,1988) that suggested that the number ofleads with more than 0.1 mm of ST change could be used to predict the final size of a myocardialinfarct. This number, which appears in the second paragraph on page 1082, should be 1.0 mm. (Thenumber was incorrect in the abstract of the original article.)

Mayo Clin Proc 67:158, 1992 158