This Chiron-type object is being named by the Minor Planet Names Committee for a centaur who, like Chiron {see planet  (2060)}, was hospitable, charitable and shunned violence. Pholus entertained Heracles {see planet  (5143)} and gave him wine, the smell of which attracted and maddened the other centaurs, who were known for their brutal behavior and who began to fight with Heracles. Heracles used his poisoned arrows and killed many of them. As Pholus buried them, he wounded himself in extracting one of the arrows. Heracles tried to save him, but the poison was too deadly. Heracles buried Pholus on a mountain that he named Pholoe. (M 20523) _ _.