The Origami Forum

I would like to make a Hydra (multi headed dragon type), but I haven’t found diagrams for a high quality model. I know of: http://dev.origami.com/images_pdf/dragon_3heads.pdf, but I want something better than that.

My preference would be to modify Kamiya’s Ancient Dragon, but I have no experience designing models. (I would try changing the wings into heads, except I don’t want heads sticking out of all sides of the body. I would rather the heads all be in the front of the model.)

If anyone has any pointers on how to modify the Ancient Dragon, or knows where to get some diagrams, I would appreciate the help.

Thank you.

I'm not really sure if there are any good diagrams for a Hydra. The only good Hydra model I've seen is Wolf's 12 Headed Hydra, which can be found here. But that is only a CP.
I think you should only fold it if you have a large sheet of paper, because a 48 by 48 grid is hardly managable with 6 inch kami!

I might diagram my 7-headed hydra in the Christmas Origami Book. However, it's a very simple traditionally folded model and doesn't have any toes.

Sorry for the lousy photo. This was taken when I was just learning about photography.

I really recommend Eileen's Hydra, this model is sooo cute. I've folded it some time ago from 25cm paper. Unfortunately non of the pictures I took turned out right. For comparison reasons, the man was folded from 15cm paper.

I never understood why the Hydra has feet, it's a water snake and water snakes doesn't have feet!
I remember very well, when I was young and read the story about Herakles and Iolaos, fighting the mighty Hydra. I always imagined a large snake with nine heads and was very disappointed when I saw the first pictures of a Hydra with feet a water snake shouldn't have feet

That would make it nearly impossible to go anywhere. It would have to be forced to drag all its heads along the ground in order to move. If it raised its heads while moving it would tip over. With all that friction rubbing against the heads, it would probably skin itself and die of infection. That would be a very lame battle.

you know that we're talking about a creature that has renewable heads and one that is even (at least theoretically) immortal? Nine heads with a brain each... try to imagine what happens if one head wants to go left and three to the right... who wins, and how has control about the legs??? we speak about a world, where there are creatures with snakes instead of hair or single eyes in the center of the head (what makes it impossible to have spatial sense!!!).
logic doesn't really lead into anything in a world of mythological creatures

But then who would control the body?? One muscle could go one way, and another one could go the other, and pretty soon it's going to tear itself apart. BAM!! Snake...atoms all over the place!!

Maybe the brains have some kind of strange life force connection between them, so they all think the same thoughts. And when they are fighting, one head slinks down into the coils of necks and controls the body, while the other heads attack.

Well, I think if the body head proportion is right (huge body and very small heads) it would be possible that such a creature could move and held it's head above the ground. Maybe a main head that is responsible for movements would be advantageous, but not necessarily needed. The heads of such a creature would have to be able to communicate with each other or think alike.
Who knows maybe the hydra myth derived from a Siamese snake? I've seen pictures and videos of many Siamese animals and humans with two heads, so a Siamese snake with more than one head doesn't sound all too stupid to me. To design such a thing shouldn't be hard. You could for example take a waterbomb base sink it a few times in and out, form three ends into heads and one into the body. Like this:



To angrydemon and ftangdude55, if your following posts remain that brutal, they will be deleted.

Thank you for the feedback you’ve provided.

ftangdude55 wrote:Wolf's 12 Headed Hydra

I will try this, but I don’t have experience making models from CPs.

origami_8 wrote:I really recommend Eileen's Hydra

Is your hydra the same as: Eileen's Hydra? They look different. Where can I find diagrams (or a CP) for this model? I didn’t find any on either Eileen’s web page, or the origami database.

origami_8 wrote:You could for example take a waterbomb base sink it a few times in and out, form three ends into heads and one into the body. Like this:

I tried that basic idea with Charles Esseltine’s dragon, but the result wasn’t what I was looking for.

Wolf and Eileen Tan are the same person. The Hydra I referred to was the same twelve headed hydra like recommended before by ftangdude55.
I wasn't aware of the other hydra model, but it looks very simple.

john montrols origami mythical beasts and chinese zodiac has a three headed dragon that's pretty cool.

I thought that, as soon as you cut off one of a hydra's heads, two (more) replace that head. Just imagine that in a video game!!!!!

thats true, but Herakles burned the stump to avoid the renewal of the head.