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
Diana and Actaeon the transformation still in progress; like many depictions the head is shown transformed, but most of the body remains human. Less often Actaeon is fully transformed when caught by his dogs. The story was popular on Italian Renaissance maiolica. The origins of the "Diana and Actaeon Pas de Deux," a "divertissement" created for a 1935 version of "La Esmeralda," lie in two earlier ballet productions. The first of these was "Tsar Kandavl" (aka "Le Roi Candaule"), premiered in 1868 by the Imperial Russian Ballet in Saint Petersburg. Based on a story told by Herodotus in his "Histories," this four-act ballet,