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(Greekmythology) A monster preying upon human beings, who sucked the blood of children, often described as having the head and breasts of a woman and the lower half of a serpent.
1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy:, 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition III, section 2, member 1, subsection i:
Apollonius […] by some probable conjectures, found her out to be a serpent, a lamia, and that all her furniture was like Tantalus' gold described by Homer, no substance, but mere illusions.
lamia(a monster preying upon human beings, who sucked the blood of children, often described as having the head and breasts of a woman and the lower half of a serpent)
1371, A. López Ferreiro, editor, Fueros municipales de Santiago y de su tierra, Madrid: Ediciones Castilla, page 434:
Demays lançaron lámeas trauesas grandes de ferro enna porta do dito thesouro con clauos que passauan da outra parte, en tal maneyra, que os enssarraron enno dito thesouro; et en todo aquel dia non les leixaron dar nen auer pan, nen vino, nen outra vianda nihua
And also they nailed large crossed iron plates on that treasury's door, with nails that pierced through the door, so that they were shut up in the mentioned treasury; and throughout that day they didn't let them have bread, nor wine, nor any other viand whatsoever
References
Xavier Varela Barreiro, Xavier Gómez Guinovart (2006–2018) “lámea”, in Corpus Xelmírez - Corpus lingüístico da Galicia medieval (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: ILG
“lamia”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
“lamia”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
lamia in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
lamia in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
“lamia”, in The Perseus Project (1999) Perseus Encyclopedia
“lamia”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
“lamia”, in William Smith, editor (1848), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London: John Murray
“lamia”, in William Smith, editor (1854, 1857), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, volume 1 & 2, London: Walton and Maberly