Abstract
Unlike other androcephals present in medieval imagery, sirens, chiefly in the form of mermaids, and centaurs have been the object of a true humanisation expressed in many diverse ways in art and in literature. Thus the hagiographer and the poet will sometimes evocate mermaids as compassionate towards men, and the cleric, as maternal. Elsewhere, the sculptor will often represent sirens and centaurs in family surroundings, dressed in the fashion of the time. In a more significant way, a few mermaids breast-feeding their young, are depicted with both a fish tail and a pair of legs. This humanisation which appears to be a truly medieval creation, cannot be dissociated from secular theological thinking on the chances of redemption of the hybrids of man. However it imposes itself most of all as a result of a formidable osmosis with Nordic cultures, and as an euphemistic means of self protection against monsters which still frighten.
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