E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Briar’eos or Æge’on.
A giant with fifty heads and a hundred hands. Homer says the gods called him Briar’eos, but men called him Ægeon. (Iliad, i. 403.)
1
“Not he who brandished in his hundred hands
His fifty swords and fifty shields in fight,
Could have surpassed the fierce Argantes might.”
Tasso: Jerusalem Delivered, book vii.
The Briareus of languages. Cardinal Mezzofanti, who knew fifty-eight different tongues. Byron called him “a walking polyglot; a monster of languages; a Briareus of parts of speech.” (1774–1849.) Generally pronounced Bri’-a-ruce.
