Hippogryph
The hippogryph (re- latinisierte form of the Italian Ippogrifo , composition of ancient Greek ἵππος hippos "horse", and Italian grifo " gripping ", this from latin gryphus , this in turn from ancient Greek γρύψ Gryps ) is a mythical creature , the other one half gripping and Half horse is. The term is derived from the Greek and an invention of Ariostus . The mythical creature is based on the saying that a cross between a griffin and a horse is an impossibility. Probably Ariosto was supported by a passage in the Eclogues of Virgil in which such a pairing is used as a metaphor for an absurd marriage inspired.
The mythical creature appears in the epic “ Der raging Roland ” ( Orlando Furioso ). There it serves various heroes as a fast riding or flying animal. Roland ( Ruggiero ) saves the beautiful Princess Angelica from a sea monster with his help and the English prince Astolfo even flies to the moon on the hippogryph to find Roland's lost mind there.
In later stories, e.g. B. with the German poet Christoph Martin Wieland ( Oberon ), the hippogryph often appears as a synonym for Pegasus . Joseph von Eichendorff wrote the poem "Hippogryph" and Friedrich Schiller "Pegasus im Joche". Wilhelm Raabe used the term in the story "Die Gänse von Bützow".
Occasionally the hippogryph appears in modern fantasy , for example in Eric Rücker Eddison's The Worm Ouroboros (1922) and in the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons . In the German translation of the Harry Potter novels by Joanne K. Rowling , the form "Hippogriff" is used, which did not previously exist in German, but which comes closer to the terms used in other languages. In English, both hippogriff (as in Rowling) and hippogryph are used. The hippogriff Buckbeak plays a key role in the third volume, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban .
In Greek mythology there is a similar hybrid being, the Hippalectryon , whose front part comes from the horse and the rear part from the rooster. The hippalectryon has four legs and wings.
Web links
Individual notes
- ↑ Meyers Konversations-Lexikon , Volume 9. Leipzig 1907, pp. 359-360.
- ^ Hippogriff in Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved December 12, 2019 .
- ^ Virgil, Eclogae 8.27 ( Latin / German ).
- ↑ Meyers Konversations-Lexikon , Volume 9. Leipzig 1907, pp. 359-360.
- ↑ See list of poems by Joseph von Eichendorff .
- ↑ Pegasus im Joche on Wikisource .
- ^ Wilhelm Raabe: Selected works in six volumes . Volume 1, Berlin and Weimar 1964-1966, pp. 597-605.