Griffin bio poster

GRIFFIN
Did you know?
• Griffins are about
eight times the size
of a normal lion!
• The rare offspring
of a horse and
griffin is called a
‘hippogriff’
The griffin lives
mostly in South
Europe, North Africa,
and the Middle
East/South Asia. The
areas circled in red
indicate the range of
the griffin with the
red dot depicting the
island of Crete, their
most dominant
habitat.
Island of Crete
Canyons
in Egypt
The griffin is a legendary
creature whose lower body
resembles that of a lion while
its head and wings are those
of an eagle. Since the Lion is
considered ‘king of the
beasts’ and the eagle, ‘king of
the air’, griffins are portrayed
as exceptionally powerful
creatures. Griffins also eat
mammals as their main
source of nutrition.
rank TAXON REASON (Latin derivatives)
DOMAIN Eukaryote The griffin is a unicellular
organism that contains
eukaryotic cells
KINGDOM Animalia The griffin has no cell walls,
it is a heterotroph, and
therefore belongs in the
animal kingdom
PHYLUM Chordata Belongs in Phylum Chordata
as it has ‘cords’ (vertebrae)
CLASS Mammaves The hind of a lion gives it its
mammal base (‘Mammalia’
the front of an eagle, gives it
‘Aves’ (bird in Latin)
ORDER Carniformes The first part of the name
refers to carnivores (eat
meat) as the griffin eats
meat. ‘iformes’ means to
look like. The griffin looks
like a carnivore hence its
name ‘carniformes’
FAMILY Felidaccipitrid The first part ‘felid’ refers
to being a big cat carnivore
since the griffin has the
hind of a lion. The
‘accipitrid’ means they
belong to the family
‘acciptridae’, which have
large beaks. (the griffin has
the beak of an eagle).
‘bestia’ means beast, thus the
GENUS Aquilabestia ‘Aquila’ means eagle, while
genus being ‘Aquilabestia’
(the eagle beast)
SPECIES Albidus leo ‘albidus’ means white in latin
referring to the eagles white
head and ‘leo’ means lion,
the griffin’s lion body.