Welcome to the inaugural edition of Fantastic Bones and Where to Find Them! You can follow along on twitter with the hashtag #FantasticBones. For our first instalment we’re going to look at the creature that started it all – the hippogriff!
Hippogriffs
Perhaps best known as the delightful but easily offended Buckbeak from the Harry Potter Books, the hippogriff is said to be born of a griffin and a mare, with the head, wings and claws of an eagle with the hindquarters of a horse. Thus, hippogriffs have six limbs – three pairs – that I will be referring to as wings, forelimbs and hindlimbs throughout this post.
As an animal that can fly and presumably do a fair gallop, the hippogriff’s skeleton is more complex than other mythical flying quadrupeds (animals that walk on four limbs) as it has to contend with two different animal classes in its legs. The Griffin, part eagle and part lion, has a similar problem, but other mythical animals like the Pegasus (horse) and Dragon (lizard?) only have one ‘animal’ making up their ground-movement anatomy.
I’ve found a few different skeletons in an internet search that I’ll be referring to throughout this post, all of which treat the hippogriff skeleton slightly differently. I have labelled and coloured in one of the figures, showing the different anatomical elements of the animal and which ones are avian (bird-like) and equid (horse-like). I’ll be discussing them throughout the post, which will work through the skeleton and discuss how different artists have dealt with hippogriff conundrums, and how I personally think the skeleton should be built!
Skeleton
WEIGHT: First off, bird bones are very different from mammal bones, being thin-walled and light-weight. Although we can’t really see this in the pictures we’re using today, we must assume that the hippogriff skeleton has some adaptation to make it lighter than mammal bones.
HEAD: The head is easy enough – birdlike, specifically an eagle, with a big carnivorous beak. Hippogriffs are indeed carnivorous and eat mainly insects, birds, and small mammals such as ferrets. The heads in figure 1 and 3 are clearly more eagle-like than figure 2, which has a skull more like a vulture.
SPINAL COLUMN: In figures 1 and 3, the cervical vertebrae (neck), the thoracic and lumbar vertebrae (body), and the caudal vertebrae (tail) are very ‘quadruped’. However, figure 2 has given the hippogriff a very bird-like neck, with a much greater number of cervical vertebrae than figures 1 and 3. Birds have many more cervical vertebrae than mammals – in fact, eagles have 14, twice as many as horses. In this way, figure 2 gives the hippogriff the head manoeuvrability of a bird, and the thoracic, lumbar and caudal vertebrae needed to support quadrupedal movement. The tail is universally horsey. This however is a little problematic, as the tail is a crucial part of bird flight anatomy (indeed, any flight anatomy – think flying squirrel!). Horses do tend to extend their tails out behind them when they run, and you can see that buckbeak flies with his tail all extended behind him, so perhaps we can assume that there’s a lot of musculature hidden under all that horse hair!
RIBCAGE and STERNUM: figure 3 favours a very quadrupedal ribcage; figure 2 a very bird-like one. Figure 1 has a little mixture of both, which I am inclined to agree with, due to the modifications made for wings and the orientation of quadrupedal gait. All three depictions add a huge bird-like sternum for those all-important flight muscles, and figures 1 and 3 also include a furcula (wishbone) and coracoid. These are essential adaptations for flight. The sternum rotation is interesting – figure 2 has it much longer and extended back along the chest cavity, while figure 1 and 3 have it slightly further forwards and perhaps rotated a little more towards the front of the animal. I think the sternum probably should be a little further back, as the wings are going to have to support the heavy hindlimbs.
WING: all depictions obviously bird-like, although where the wing attaches does differ. Figure 1 I think is the best, with a bird-like scapula, humerus, radius, ulna, carpometacarpus (the fused version of our wrist and palm) and phalanges. Figure 2 and 3 miss the scapula, but otherwise follow figure 1.
FORELIMB: this is the most variable part of the animal, and the hardest to reconcile anatomically, due to two key factors. The first is the nature of the forelimb – is it a quadruped forelimb, or a bird hindlimb? Outwardly, this set of limbs are bird “legs”, yet to be able to act in conjunction with the horse hind-limbs for reasonable forward motion they arguably should have some forelimb anatomy. The second problem is that two sets of limbs (the wings and the forelimbs) articulate very close to each other. This means that there’s a lot of skeleton (not to mention musculature) needed in this area. Let’s see how our depictions deal with these problems.
Figure 1 has a whole bird hindlimb articulating with the sternum, although there is a bit of a mystery bone in here so maybe . Figure 2 has a horse forelimb (scapula, humerus, radius and ulna) attaching straight to a bird foot (notably without any bird or mammalian metapodia). Figure 3 is very similar to figure 2, although they also include a horse-like metacarpal. My opinion is that the hippogriff would have to have horse skeletal anatomy in its upper forelimb to allow the forelegs to work in conjunction with the hindlegs, thus I think that figure 3 has it the most correct in this instance, but the horse metapodia needs to be replaced with a bird tarsometatarsus. Why? Well it’s all about the claws!
CLAWS: The horse only has one set of phalanges (first, second and third / proximal, medial and distal), so it walks on one digit – the hoof – and the metacarpal only has an articulation for one bone. Cattle walk on two digits and, along with deer, sheep, goats, and loads of other animals called artiodactyls, have cloven hooves, and their metacarpal is actually two bones fused into one, and has two articulations. Pigs, dogs, cats and humans have 5 digits, although in dogs the first digit is the vestigial dewclaw. These animals have 5 separate metacarpals on each hand. Birds have four digits – one that sits behind the other three, and have their own particular bone to handle this – the tarsometatarsus. So let’s put that one on the end of a horse forelimb!
HINDLIMBS: easy – horsey! With a pelvis, femur, patella (although figure 1 is lacking), tibia, tarsals and metatarsal with single digit articulation, the hoof. The pelvis is possibly problematic as hippogriffs lay eggs, although if the (muggle) platypus can manage it with a mammalian pelvis then we can imagine so can the hippogriff?!
Skele Summary
So in summary, the hippogriff should have a bird-like skull and cervical (neck) vertebrae, so it has the head manoeuvrability of birds. The rest of the spine should be horse-like to allow quadrupedal gait, although the tail should be a little more robust to reflect its importance in flight. The rib cage is likely a mix of animals, needing to support the weight of a large quadruped but also be light enough for flight. The wing should be avian of course, with the addition of a large bird sternum, furcula, coracoid and dedicated scapula. The forelimb should begin horse-like, with a second scapula, humerus, radius and ulna so it can walk on all-fours, but end with an avian tarsometatarsus to allow for the morphology of the claw! On top of this, all of these bones, including the equid bits, need to have adaptations to make them lightweight to allow for flight.
And it’s all probably held together with magic.
What do you think about the hippogriff skeleton? Would you have done anything differently? Leave a comment below!
References
Cohen, A., Serjeantson, D., 1996. A manual for the identification of bird bones from archaeological sites, Archetype, London.
All hippogriff facts from http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Hippogriff
Hippogriff skeleton by rattlecat
Hippogriff skeleton by fishtankbabe
Hippogriff model by mythic articulations
I FEEL IT IN MY BONES 
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