Dogs in religion being in use the Anubieion catacombs at Saqqara saw the burial of dogs. Dogs were closely associated with Hecate in the Classical world. Dogs were sacred to Artemis and Ares. Cerberus was the three-faced guard dog of the Underworld. Laelaps was a dog in Greek mythology. When Zeus was a baby, a dog, known only as the “golden hound” was charged with protecting the future King of Gods. The dogs are worshipped as a part of a five-day Tihar festival that falls roughly in November every year. The dog ("Shvan") is also the vahana or mount of the Hindu god
Grünes Gewölbe is suspended in place of the shaft, while the bowl seems to float on the tips of the stag's antlers. This masterpiece depicts the mythological scene in which the unapproachable Diana changes the hunter Actaeon into a deer and has him torn to pieces by his own dogs for having watched her bathing. The base of the piece presents the forest floor, upon which lies the head of the stag Actaeon, with the dogs falling ravenously upon it. The inscription picked out in diamonds on the rim of the base reads, "DISCRETION SERT EFFRONTERIE PERD" ("Discretion is laudable, indiscretion unwise").