Dryads are land nymphs associated with forests..

KEYWORDS: dryads land nymphs tree

nymph greek mythology creatures mythical creatures

Dryads (or "tree spirits") are nymphs associated with Greek mythology and Hinduism, which
live near, or in, trees.
Dryads are born bonded to a specific tree, originally, in the Indo-European Celtic-Druidic
culture, an oak tree.

Drys in Greek signifies 'oak,' from an Indo-European root *derew(o)- 'tree' or 'wood.'

In the primitive times, the Greeks imagined, people were able to live on acorns. Caryatids were
associated with various edible nut trees, before they were pressed into architectural uses.

The dryads of ash trees were called the Meliai. The ash-tree sisterhood tended the infant Zeus in
Rhea's Cretan cave. Rhea had born the Meliai herself, made fertile by the cast-away genitals of
Ouranos.

If the dryad nymphs lived in the trees, they were referred to as hamadryads, like Atlantia, one of
the wives of Danaus. Otherwise, they were simply dryads.

Dryads, like all nymphs were supernaturally long-lived, but if the tree died, the dryad associated
with it died as well. For that reason, dryads and the Greek gods punished any mortals who
harmed trees without first propitiating the tree-nymphs.

Daphne, who was pursued by Apollo, became a dryad associated with the laurel.