Dante's Griffin

The Griffin is a hybrid creature with the features of an eagle (wings and head) and a lion (body). Griffins were depicted in ancient Egyptian art (the myth is likely eastern in origin), and, as actual creatures, were thought to live at the northern limits of the world. They are included among unclean birds in the Bible (Lev. 11:13; Deut. 14:12), and Isidore of Seville, an early medieval encyclopedist, says Griffins are "fierce enemies of horses" and, he adds, they "tear men to pieces" (Etymologiae 12.2.17). Dante's Griffin pulls a gorgeous two-wheeled chariot bearing Beatrice at the end of the elaborate procession in the terrestrial paradise. The chariot is yoked to the neck of the Griffin, whose wings (stretching high out of sight) and other aquiline features are gold in color, while his hind quarters are a mixture of white and deep red. Of multiple symbolic meanings that may be attached to this Griffin, its Christ-like role--"one person in two natures" (31.81)--is the most obvious. Dante dramatizes this incarnational symbolism when he has the Griffin's image, reflected in Beatrice's eyes, miraculously alternate between a complete eagle and a complete lion, while the creature itself remains fixed in its hybrid form (31.118-26).

http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/purgatory/10terrestrialparadise.html

Unto the Griffin's breast they led me with them,
Where Beatrice was standing, turned towards us.

"See that thou dost not spare thine eyes," they said;
"Before the emeralds have we stationed thee,
Whence Love aforetime drew for thee his weapons."

A thousand longings, hotter than the flame,
Fastened mine eyes upon those eyes relucent,
That still upon the Griffin steadfast stayed.

As in a glass the sun, not otherwise
Within them was the twofold monster shining,
Now with the one, now with the other nature.

Think, Reader, if within myself I marvelled,
When I beheld the thing itself stand still,
And in its image it transformed itself.

While with amazement filled and jubilant,
My soul was tasting of the food, that while
It satisfies us makes us hunger for it,

Themselves revealing of the highest rank
In bearing, did the other three advance,
Singing to their angelic saraband.

"Turn, Beatrice, O turn thy holy eyes,"
Such was their song, "unto thy faithful one,
Who has to see thee ta'en so many steps.

In grace do us the grace that thou unveil
Thy face to him, so that he may discern
The second beauty which thou dost conceal."

O splendour of the living light eternal!
Who underneath the shadow of Parnassus
Has grown so pale, or drunk so at its cistern,

He would not seem to have his mind encumbered
Striving to paint thee as thou didst appear,
Where the harmonious heaven o'ershadowed thee,

When in the open air thou didst unveil?

So steadfast and attentive were mine eyes
In satisfying their decennial thirst,
That all my other senses were extinct,

And upon this side and on that they had
Walls of indifference, so the holy smile
Drew them unto itself with the old net

When forcibly my sight was turned away
Towards my left hand by those goddesses,
Because I heard from them a "Too intently!"

And that condition of the sight which is
In eyes but lately smitten by the sun
Bereft me of my vision some short while;

But to the less when sight re-shaped itself,
I say the less in reference to the greater
Splendour from which perforce I had withdrawn,

I saw upon its right wing wheeled about
The glorious host returning with the sun
And with the sevenfold flames upon their faces.

As underneath its shields, to save itself,
A squadron turns, and with its banner wheels,
Before the whole thereof can change its front,

That soldiery of the celestial kingdom
Which marched in the advance had wholly passed us
Before the chariot had turned its pole.

Then to the wheels the maidens turned themselves,
And the Griffin moved his burden benedight,
But so that not a feather of him fluttered.