Griffin

The Griffin (Ancient Greek: Γρύψ Grū́ps) is a legendary creature from Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Persian, Minoan, Greek, and Roman mythology that has the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. Since the lion was considered the "King of the Beasts" and the eagle the "King of the Air," the griffin was thought to be an especially powerful and majestic creature with both royal and divine associations. In later time periods, the griffin became a symbol of Christ, representing His divine and earthly natures.

Etymology
Griffin derives from the Old French "grifon," which was a word for both the mythical creature as well as birds of prey more generally. The Old French "grifon" was derived from the Late Latin "gryphus," which itself was based off of a misspelling of the ancient Greek "grypus," a variant of the ancient Greek term γρύψ (grū́ps).

In ancient Greece the term γρύψ (grū́ps) literally meant "curved or hooked nose," referencing the griffin's curved beak. The term was used by the ancient Greeks to describe what modern people would refer to as a griffin, but could also used to describe dragons.

Appearance
The griffin is usually depicted with four legs, wings and a beak. Its eagle head and neck are covered in (typically brown) feathers that fade into the tawny fur of a lion, and its forelegs are eagle talons. It has a lion's body and a tufted tail. It also possesses feathered eagle wings and prominent, horse-like ears. In "The Travels of Sir John Mandeville," which was a supposed travel memoire written in the 14th century CE by an unknown author, the griffin is described as being extremely large and powerful- with talons the size of ox's horns and the pens of their feathers large enough to make arrows out of:


 * "In that country [Bacharia (Bactria)] be many griffins, more plenty than in any other country. Some men say that they have the body upward as an eagle and beneath as a lion; and truly they say sooth, that they be of that shape. But one griffin hath the body more great and is more strong than eight lions, of such lions as be on this half, and more great and stronger than an hundred eagles such as we have amongst us. For one griffin there will bear, flying to his nest, a great horse, if he may find him at the point, or two oxen yoked together as they go at the plough. For he hath his talons so long and so large and great upon his feet, as though they were horns of great oxen or of bugles or of kine, so that men make cups of them to drink of. And of their ribs and of the pens of their wings, men make bows, full strong, to shoot with arrows and quarrels."

Though most depictions show the griffin as having a brownish color, different authors have given varied descriptions of the color of the griffin. The Greek geographer Pausanias, from the 2nd century CE, claimed that griffins had spots like a leopard. The Roman author Claudius Aelianus, also from the 2nd century CE, in his work "On Animals" gives a description of the griffin that is even more colorful:


 * "I have heard that the Indian animal the Grupa (Gryphon, Griffin) is a quadraped like a lion; that it has claws of enormous strength and that they resemble those of a lion. Men commonly report that it is winged and that the feathers along its back are black, and those on its front are red, while the actual wings are neither but are white. And Ktesias (Ctesias) records that its neck is variegated with feathers of a dark blue; that it has a beak like an eagle's, and a head too, just as artists portray it in pictures and sculpture. Its eyes, he says, are like fire. It builds its lair among the mountains, and although it is not possible to capture the full-grown animal, they do take the young ones."

Early Depictions
Though the first written descriptions of the griffin can be found as early as the 7th century BCE, visual depictions of the griffin can be found even earlier. Images of griffins can be found throughout ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, and the Mediterranean, and were part of a broader Near Eastern tradition of composite creatures, such as sphinxes, lamassu, the Imdugud, and the cherubim. Scholars debate the exact culture that the first griffins originated from, but it is typically thought that they originated in either ancient Egypt or Susa (located in modern-day Iran).

Ancient Egypt
In ancient Egypt, griffins were typically depicted with falcon heads instead of eagle heads, and as such, likely had associations with the falcon-headed god Horus. They are also shown either wingless or with wings folded. Typically, griffins were shown trampling people under their feet. In such scenes the griffin was meant to represent the triumphal pharaoh defeating his enemies and the enemies of Egypt. In the image shown on the right, is an image of a piece of jewelry from the tomb of Mereret, daughter of Pharaoh Sesostris III of the twelfth dynasty, who ruled from about 1878 BCE to 1839 BCE.

Ancient Assyria
Found within the palace at Acemhöyük, an ancient Assyrian trading colony in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey), was a carved piece of ivory, considered to be a piece of furniture tile, with an image of a griffin that dates to the 18th century BCE. Similar to the earlier Egyptian griffin, the Assyrian depiction of a griffin also features a falcon head as opposed to an eagle's head. The griffin motif found on this artifact is believed to have influenced later Minoan artisans who adopted the style in their own depictions of griffins.

Minoan Civilization
The ancient Minoans were a Bronze Age civilization that existed on the island of Crete between 3000 and 1100 BCE. The Minoans greatly influenced the later Greek civilization, with Greek tales like that of the Minotaur being set in Crete during Minoan times. The Minoan palace in Knossos, Crete was excavated in 1900 CE, and featured extensive frescos dating from between 1550 and 1450 BCE. Once of these frescos features a wingless griffin. These frescos are not without controversy though. The British archaeologist Arthur Evans, who headed the excavation of Knossos, hired artists to reconstruct the frescos within the palace. The methods that were used have garnered criticism over the years, with some archaeologists claiming that the artists imagined details and took artistic liberty in their reconstruction.

In Mythology
The earliest written references to the griffin come from Greek mythology, where they were considered to be "The Hounds of Zeus." To the Greeks, the griffin lived in the mountainous regions of Hyperborea, a mythic land that existed far to the north where the sun never set, and where the god Apollo resided during the wintertime. These griffins were said to guard hordes of gold from the river of Plutus, the Greek god of wealth, and were constantly at war with the Arimaspi, a race of cyclopses who repeatedly appeared on horseback in order to to steal the griffin's gold. In later times, the griffin was said to have lived either in the mountains of Bactria (modern-day Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, as well as parts of northern Afghanistan) or in the mountains of India.

The Griffin in Ancient Greek Sources
According to later sources such as Herodotus and Pliny the Elder, the earliest known reference to the griffin was in the "Arimaspea," a poem (sadly, now lost to time) from the 7th century BCE (700-600 BCE), attributed to Aristeas of Proconnesus. The Arimaspea catalogued Aristeas' travels to the far north, and of tales he heard from the Issedonians (a tribe from central Asia) of griffins battling a tribe of cyclopses called the Arimaspi.

Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound
One of the earliest references to the griffin that has survived to this day is a line from the ancient Greek tragedy, "Prometheus Bound," written by the playwright Aeschylus between 479 and 424 BCE. In the tragedy, Prometheus warns Io of the dangers she must face during her travels- one of which being the fearsome griffins to the northern lands:


 * "Keep watching out for gryphons, hounds of Zeus, who have sharp beaks and never bark out loud, and for that one-eyed Arimaspian horde on horseback, who live beside the flow of Pluto’s (Plutus) gold-rich stream."

Herodotus' Histories
At roughly around the same time Aeschylus was writing Prometheus Bound, the Greek writer and Historian Herodotus wrote a complete description of the myth of the griffin. In his famous work "Histories," dated to 430 BCE, he states:


 * "But in the north of Europe there is by far the most gold. In this matter again I cannot say with assurance how the gold is produced, but it is said that one-eyed men called Arimaspians steal it from griffins. But I do not believe this, that there are one-eyed men who have a nature otherwise the same as other men. The most outlying lands, though, as they enclose and wholly surround all the rest of the world, are likely to have those things which we think the finest and the rarest."

The Griffin in Ancient Roman Sources
The griffin can also be found in the writings of Roman historians and mythographers, who relied heavily on Greek sources.

Pliny the Elder's Roman Encyclopedia
Pliny the Elder, a Roman author and philosopher from the 1st century CE, also conveys the myth of the griffin, and directly references Herodotus as one of his sources, along with Aristeas of Proconnesus:


 * "Also a tribe is reported next to these [i.e. the tribes of Skythia (Scythia)], towards the North, not far from the actual quarter where Aquilo (the North Wind) [Boreas] rises and the cave that bears its name, the place called the Earth's Door-Bolt (Ges Clithron)--the Arimaspi (Arimaspians) whom we have spoke of already, people remarkable for having one eye in the centre of their forehead. Many authorities, the most distinguished being Herodotus [Greek historian C5th B.C.] and Aristeas of Proconnesus [Greek poet C7th B.C.], write that these people wage continual war with the Grypes (Griffins), a kind of wild beast with wings, as commonly reported, that digs gold out of mines, which the creatures guard and the Arimaspi try to take from them, both with remarkable covetousness."

Medieval Griffin Claws and Eggs
In the year 1095 CE the First Crusade began, which was a European Christian campaign to capture the city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land from Muslim control. In total there were a series of eight crusades, with the final one occurring in the 14th century CE. During these travels European crusaders collected curiosities from the strange lands they were visiting. Among such curiosities were griffin claws and eggs, sold to them by Middle-Eastern traders. These artifacts lead Medieval Europeans to believe that griffins were real flesh-and-blood creatures, and not just creatures of pagan imagination. Such artifacts were highly valued, and believed to have magical powers. One such belief was that drinking from a drinking horn made from a griffin's claw could cure poison.

These curiosities were all forgeries though, with altered ibex horns being sold a griffin claws, which lead to European myths of griffins being exceptionally large in size, and ostrich (or sometimes even fossilized dinosaur) eggs being sold as griffin eggs. Nevertheless, these forgeries were brought back to Europe where they were put on display. One such example is the griffin claw that was brought back from the Holy Land by King Henry the Lion of Saxony (1129 or 1131-1195) which was then placed in the Brunswick Cathedral in Germany until 1906 CE.

The Griffin in Medieval Christian Bestiaries
Medieval bestiaries were not naturalistic or scientific descriptions of animals, like what one would expect from a modern encyclopedia. Instead, their purpose was theological. Bestiaries were collections of moral and symbolic stories about animals, plants, and sometimes stones which served to show how all of the natural world is part of God's creation. Even with this being the case, most mentions of the griffin found in medieval bestiaries are merely Christianized retellings of the Greek legends.

Bartholomaeus Anglicus' De Proprietatibus Rerum
Bartholomaeus Anglicus was an English monk of the Franciscan order from the 13th century CE. Bartholomaeus' most famous work "De proprietatus rerum" ("On the Nature of Things"), was a widely cited compendium that served as a precursor to the encyclopedia. According to "Mediæval lore from Bartholomaeus Anglicus," written by William Morris and published in 1907, Bartholomaeus' sources for De proprietatus rerum include Greek and Roman sources, notably, Pliny the Elder. De proprietatus rerum was comprised of nineteen chapters and covered a variety of subjects. In the twelfth book in the series, "De avibus" ("On Birds"), Bartholomaeus briefly discusses the griffin:


 * "A griffin is accounted among flying things (Deut. xiiii.) and there the Gloss saith, that the griffin is four-footed, and like to the eagle in head and in wings, and is like to the lion in the other parts of the body. And dwelleth in those hills that are called Hyperborean, and are most enemies to horses and men, and grieveth them most, and layeth in his nest a stone that hight Smaragdus against venomous beasts of the mountain."

Bartholomaeus mentions the griffin a second time in the eighteenth book in his series, "De animalibus" ("On Land Animals"):


 * "The griffin is a beast with wings, and is four footed: and breedeth in the mountains Hyperborean, and is like to the lion in all the parts of the body, and to the eagle only in the head and wings. And griffins keep the mountains in which be gems and precious stones, and suffer them not to be taken from thence."

Griffins in Heraldry
In medieval Europe griffins were frequently depicted in heraldry, often as a heraldic "charge," which was an image that occupied a shield or background of a heraldic achievement. In heraldry, griffins were depicted in the same standardized manner as other four legged animals such as lions or leopards. This included being depicted as typically facing left, and in standardized positions, such as standing, walking or reared-up on one leg. One feature unique to griffins is that the reared-up position is called a "segreant" when describing a griffin and a "rampant" when describing other creatures, such as a lion.

Literature

 * In the Harry Potter series, one of the four class houses is called "Gryffindor" ("Gryffon d'or" means "golden griffon" in French)
 * A character in The Mage Wars Trilogy named Skandranon is a griffon.
 * The Griffin and the Minor Canon by Frank R Stockton, illustrated by Maurice Sendak (1968)
 * The Crossroads series by Nick O'Donohoe is a series about veterinary students called upon to help mythological creatures including griffons.
 * A griffin (spelled "gryphon") is featured in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland in which the Queen of Hearts' orders the gryphon to take Alice to see the Mock Turtle and hear its story.
 * A griffin is featured in the Chronicles of Narnia.
 * In Mark of the Thief, there is a griffin named Caela who befriends the main character, Nic.

Gallery
Griffin/Gallery