This snarling, fire-snorting Chimera, which has a storied history, epitomizes the mythical monster that figures in many classical Greek texts and was first mentioned, among those that survive, in Homer's "Iliad": it's a dramatic fusion of a lion's head and body, a serpent forming the tail, and a horned, bearded goat's head and neck protruding from the spiked spine of the lion.