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I have a story that I am writing that has a fantasy creature in it that I am trying to remember/find a name for.
The creature looks like a griffin (eagle head/lion body) except rather than feathers and fur the creature is scaly with leathery wings. In my head I see the hide of the creature looking like one of the dinosaurs from the “Jurassic Park” movies.
Does this sound familiar to anyone? If so what is it called? I know it’s not a dragon, but other than that I’m stumped.
Oh, and in another unrelated story I have a race of winged horses featured in it, but I don’t want to use pegasus as the race name (thanks a lot DnD Monster Manual for tuning an individual’s name into a species name). Any ideas for alternate pegasus names? I tried to get some translations of “Horse of the Wind” in other lanquages, but none of those seemed right.
The alternate ones I have so far are (translated with some online help so may not be exactly right):
Paard van de Wind – Dutch
Cheval du Vent – French
Pferd des Winds – German
Cavallo del vento – Italian
Cavalo do Vento – Portuguese
Caballo del Viento – Spanish
equi venti – LatinI had one person suggest “aviequinus”, a combination of the Latin words for bird and horse. It’s almost right, but not quite.
Thanks!
So, I’ve been thinking about this since last night. I can’t help you with identifying the scaly griffin thing, but I’m pretty good at making up names.
For my novel-in-progress, I need a lot of names for creatures and cities, and for each one, I settle on German word that somehow fits the yet-nameless thing, and I just scramble the letters. You could do something similar for your race of winged horses. It is more interesting that just using Latin, since most folks seem to do that.
If I wanted to name a race of winged horses, I would take Pferd des Windes (horse of the wind) or Fliegendes Pferd (flying horse) and play with the letters.
Derfin
Sedwin
Leref
Predeli
Predefin
And so on and so forth. Maybe that’ll help you.
Will you share your story when it’s done?Things get named around here spontaneously. “Allas” was what the Pegasus print was called. Means “wings” in Spanish.
Thank you for all the ideas. I’ll keep playing with them and see if something strikes a chord. It’s probably going to be a long time before I ever finish either story as I tend to write in spurts with months in between. When I do finish I’ll share them here for sure.
names can be found everywhere. with the weirdest sources 😉
my main charactere from my novel is partially named after…. *drumroll* printing paper.
Isnt that glorious?
anyhow, I quite often have to find names for my creatures. Sometimes they are not at all original like Velvina the velvet dragon (she still remains a sweety though). I try to listen to what name comes to me in the process. Of course I have a visualisation like a sculpture/painting but usually the name comes to me after the work is done. I sit down and think of relations of the charactere, what it represents. Often they are names related to the looks of the figure, may it be appearance or resemblance in personal view and then change a bit.
Races are harder. Sentient races even more. Because you have to keep in mind what they would want to be called. Else you could grab the classical science trick of Dracus Akeylus with the name of the “finder”.
Its important to take your time and listen to the name when it hits you. I found it useful to take whatever comes into my mind, and I think I only once used a name that was suggested (it was Diego for a doglike race). Have no fears or doubts in weirdness, I have weirdisms like Meme-Heyley and boredisms as False Gorgon too 😉PS: sounds like an awesome plot and characteres… when can we buy the published version? 😉
Not as a bird head. I know manticores have leathered wings though. *runs through DND creature catalogs*
I thought manticores had no wings at all, thats what I read in many books and saw in many artworks (older ones)
Please dont bite my head off but I found rechearching in DnD books for roleplays not that good, I’d rather try to use old mythology books or online lexika
/end twocentsI got online and did some digging today and discovered the proper Greek name for winged horses is pterippus (pl. pterippi). I’d never heard the term before. It still doesn’t sound right to my ear. And how in the heck do you pronounce that?
From everything2.org
Quote:In Greek myth, pterippi are winged horses. They are the children (and grandchildren, etc.) of Pegasus and Euippe (or Ocyrrhoe).
Pegasus could be considered a pterippus himself, pterippus being the class of winged horses.
From Wikipedia’s List of Legendary Creatures
Quote:Pterippus (Greek) – Winged horse
From Wikipedia’s Pegasus Article
Quote:In his later life, Pegasus took a mate, Euippe (or Ocyrrhoe), and had two children Celeris and Melanippe. This family is the origin of the winged horses.
The closest thing I could think of to what your describing is a Hippogriff. Not exactly what you’re describing buy pretty close.
RiDuvessa wrote:The closest thing I could think of to what your describing is a Hippogriff. Not exactly what you’re describing buy pretty close.
For the first critter? No it’s not a hippogriff. No horse to that body at all.
A better description of it would be to take one of Melody’s male griffins stripped of feathers & fur and overlay the body with the pebbley texture of her dragon and dinosaur skins and you’ve got the one I’m trying to find a name for.
Pterippus would be pronounced with a silent first “p”: Terippus.
As for naming the critters – they do have feathery wings, right? – you’ll probably want to invent a name, because the first thing that came to mind at your decription was a Lamia (a creature with the hind end of a goat, the forebody of a bear, the head and breasts of a woman and scaled all over like a serpent). And that’s not even close.
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