Instead their name translates as half horse, half griffin – griffins being half eagle and half lion (the Greeks and Romans were keen on the ‘cut-and-shut’ method of creating mythical creatures!). Hippogriffs are half horse but not, as Harry initially thinks, half eagle. Hippos is the ancient Greek for horse, hence the mythical ‘hippocampus’ (half horse, half sea monster) and the decidely non-mythical hippopotamus (river-horse). They had the bodies, hind legs and tails of horses, but the front legs, wings and heads of what seemed to be giant eagles… Trotting towards them were a dozen of the most bizarre creatures Harry had ever seen. ![]() It is appropriate, then, that Basilisk venom is one of the few substances that can destroy horcruxes. In Pliny’s Natural History the Basilisk truly is a ‘little’ King, for he describes it as being only 12 inches in length, but able to kill with a single glance from its eyes, and so venemous that it can burn grass and break stones with its breath. ![]() The name ‘Basilisk’ itself is also Greek, and translates as ‘little King’ – hence ‘King of Serpents’. Nowadays ‘herpetology’ is the technical name for the study of reptiles and amphibians. It is again a Greek wizard who is responsible for the first Basilisk in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – Herpo the Foul, whose name comes from the Greek herpein, meaning to slither or creep. Of the many fearsome beasts and monsters that roam our land, there is none more curious or more deadly than the Basilisk, known also as the King of Serpents. The fact that Fluffy can be put to sleep by music also has its roots in classical myth, for in his Georgics Virgil writes that the great musician Orpheus put Cerberus to sleep by playing his lyre when he travelled down to the underworld to beg for the return of his wife Eurydice. Why Greek? Because the original three-headed dog is Cerberus, guardian of the underworld in Greek mythology – although some early accounts vary on the exact number of Cerberus’ heads, with Hesiod saying fifty, Pindar claiming one hundred and the Roman poet Horace saying just one dog’s head, but a hundred snake’s heads. Hagrid says that he bought the incongruously named Fluffy, guardian of the Philosopher’s Stone, from ‘a Greek chappie’ he met in a pub. ![]() Three pairs of rolling, mad eyes three noses, twitching and quivering… ![]() They were looking straight into the eyes of a monstrous dog, a dog which filled the whole space between ceiling and floor. So to celebrate this month’s release of the new Fantastic Beasts film, The Crimes of Grindelwald, let’s indulge with a look back at various classical creatures from throughout J.K. With the very name of the supposed author of Fantastic Beasts being steeped in classical myth, it is little surprise that the answer to the question ‘where to find them?’ is often ‘in Greek mythology’. Meanwhile Scamander is the name of an ancient river that flowed past the city of Troy, and against which Achilles battles in Homer’s Iliad. ‘Artemis’ is the Greek goddess (not god as Colbert claims) of hunting* and ‘Fido’ is a classic pet name because it comes from the Latin ‘fidus’, meaning faithful. You might know that Draco’s name means dragon or snake, but did you know that the star of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Newt Scamander, also has a classical background to his name? David Colbert, in The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter, points out that Scamander’s full name – Newton Artemis Fido Scamander – is filled with classical puns.
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