The Hippogriff (Hippogriffe) is the eagle-horse of European, especially Renaissance Italian, legend: a noble winged creature with the head, wings, and foretalons of a griffin (eagle) and the hindquarters and body of a horse, the offspring of a [griffin] and a mare, swift as the wind and able to fly around the world, famous as the magical steed of the knights of chivalric romance. It is the eagle-horse, the flying steed of romance.
The Offspring of Griffin and Mare
The Hippogriff (from Greek hippos, “horse,” and the griffin) is a creature most famously given form by the Italian Renaissance poet Ludovico Ariosto in his epic Orlando Furioso (1516), though it draws on older ideas. It is the offspring of a [griffin] (itself half-eagle, half-lion) and a mare — an unlikely union, since the griffin was the natural enemy of horses (it preyed on them), so that a hippogriff was proverbially a thing as rare and impossible as the love of enemies. It has the eagle’s head, feathered wings, and clawed forelegs of its griffin sire, and the body, hindquarters, and hooves of a horse.
The Steed of the Knights
In Orlando Furioso the hippogriff is a marvellous flying mount, swift as thought, that carries the knights on fantastic aerial journeys — the sorcerer Atlante rides it, and then the heroes Ruggiero and Astolfo, who fly upon it to far lands, even (Astolfo) to the moon. Tamed and bridled, it is a steed of incomparable speed and the freedom of the skies, soaring above the earth and bearing its rider wherever it will. Unlike a mere monster, the hippogriff is a noble and beautiful creature, the perfect magical steed of chivalric fantasy.
The Emblem of the Impossible
Because of the natural enmity of griffin and horse, the hippogriff became a symbol of the impossible made real, of paradox and of love uniting opposites — the very phrase “to mate griffins with mares” meant to join irreconcilable things. As a beautiful flying steed it has remained a beloved creature of literature and fantasy, distinct from its fiercer griffin parent. In the Hippogriff, the European (and especially Italian Renaissance) imagination gave form to the eagle-horse — the noble winged offspring of griffin and mare, swift magical steed of the knights of romance and emblem of the impossible made real, the flying steed of the chivalric world.