Centaurs, according to Greek mythology, were said to be the offspring of Ixion, son of Ares, and a cloud. These strange creatures had the head arms and chest of a man but the legs and lower half of a horse. In later myths and stories they sometimes had horns, wings or both. Back to Greek mythology, these Man-Horse beasts lived in Thessaly, fed on meat and were given to riotous revelries. They came to symbolize the dark, unruly forces of nature. They were usually depicted as drunken followers of Dionysus, except for Cheiron who was the tutor to several heroes...

Cheiron (or Chiron) was a Centaur, half man and half horse, and the son of the Titan Cronos. Cronos disguised himself as a horse in order to seduce Philyra without his wife Rhea discovering the affair. Unlike other centaurs, who are descended from Ixion, Cheiron was among the gentlest, wisest, and most learned of creatures. As a result, he was asked to tutor several of the greatest of Greek heroes, including Achilles, Asclepius, Heracles, Jason, Aeneas, and Peleus. Being the son of a god he was immortal, but Heracles
accidentally wounded him with a poisoned arrow when fighting the other Centaurs. According to one tradition, in order to be relieved of the unrelenting torment of the wound, he gave his immortality to the Titan Prometheus and allowed himself to die. According to another, he appealed to Zeus and was transformed into the constellation Sagittarius.

When Hercules was taking his wife to his home in Tiryns, they
came to a swollen river. Nessus, a centaur, offered to help Hercules get Deianira across the river. Hercules swam across and heard Deianira yelling for him. Assuming that the centaur was kidnapping her to rape her, Hercules shot him with an arrow tipped with Hydra's poison. The centaur, seeking vengeance, gave his shirt covered in Hydra's poison to Deianira and told her that it was a talisman that would renew love.

Years later, when Hercules had completed his labors and was
still far from home, Deianira heard that his heart had been captured by another woman. She sent him the shirt not realizing that it was poisoned. Hercules, unaware of its taint, wore the shirt.