 Odysseus describes the Laestrygonians (another race encountered by Odysseus in his travels) as more like Giants than men.Pausanias, the 2nd century AD geographer, read these lines of the "Odyssey" to mean that, for Homer, the Giants were a race of mortal men.The 6th–5th century BC lyric poet Bacchylides calls the Giants "sons of the Earth".