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Description
Evolution of the griffins in my Metkya stories.

Top shows the first thing that could truly be called a griffin, being hextapodal, flighted (though not a terribly good flier) and feathered. Their immediate ancestors are the long-tailed, fanged ornithopods the Heterodontosaurs.

The Aaljhar is a small, opportunistic predator. They are nonsentient, about as smart as a rather clever cat or fox. Unstable phenotype (from Urvogel's interference) means they adapt traits of their most common prey, small mammals (thus explaining the ears, which at this point are ratlike).

At this point, the hands were still largely heterodontosaurid in design, though Digit IV had developed an ungual and was gaining in length and Digit I's formidable thumbclaw was somewhat reduced.

The Aaljhar, for all its oddity, was a fairly successful animal, and spread and advanced. It is quite likely that there were several basic offshoots, explaining Wingwalkers and various other griffin-like creatures. The Wingwalker, in particular, appears to have codified the phenotypic instability.

The next specimen shown are the Eurogriffs, of which there are several species. I'm leaning toward separating them out into their own genus, Protheroavus. They are significantly larger, ranging from a large dog to a deer, and are sentient. They speak several languages, most of which are tonal, and I don't know much about their culture.

Note the more muscular hindlegs and the retention (in most species) of a vestigeal Digit V.

Their Resskar name is Makkajhar, or "Strange Griffin", for that is what the American Griffins called them when they met.

Finally, at bottom, those American Griffins, Theroavus peregrineus. They are descended from griffins who made their way across the sea to North America, and even penetrated so far inland as what is today Utah, Colorado, New Mexico- the Ahraulakana.

The Resskar name for them is jhar "griffin" or Chyyjhar "true griffin". More politically, they would be Ahraulajhar "allosaur griffins", for their association with the allosaurs and their Hjakrahl-derived language.

From them come all Uumet'kyan griffins, including the lupogriffs and short-tailed griffins.

Description
Evolution of the griffins in my Metkya stories.

Top shows the first thing that could truly be called a griffin, being hextapodal, flighted (though not a terribly good flier) and feathered. Their immediate ancestors are the long-tailed, fanged ornithopods the Heterodontosaurs.

The Aaljhar is a small, opportunistic predator. They are nonsentient, about as smart as a rather clever cat or fox. Unstable phenotype (from Urvogel's interference) means they adapt traits of their most common prey, small mammals (thus explaining the ears, which at this point are ratlike).

At this point, the hands were still largely heterodontosaurid in design, though Digit IV had developed an ungual and was gaining in length and Digit I's formidable thumbclaw was somewhat reduced.

The Aaljhar, for all its oddity, was a fairly successful animal, and spread and advanced. It is quite likely that there were several basic offshoots, explaining Wingwalkers and various other griffin-like creatures. The Wingwalker, in particular, appears to have codified the phenotypic instability.

The next specimen shown are the Eurogriffs, of which there are several species. I'm leaning toward separating them out into their own genus, Protheroavus. They are significantly larger, ranging from a large dog to a deer, and are sentient. They speak several languages, most of which are tonal, and I don't know much about their culture.

Note the more muscular hindlegs and the retention (in most species) of a vestigeal Digit V.

Their Resskar name is Makkajhar, or "Strange Griffin", for that is what the American Griffins called them when they met.

Finally, at bottom, those American Griffins, Theroavus peregrineus. They are descended from griffins who made their way across the sea to North America, and even penetrated so far inland as what is today Utah, Colorado, New Mexico- the Ahraulakana.

The Resskar name for them is jhar "griffin" or Chyyjhar "true griffin". More politically, they would be Ahraulajhar "allosaur griffins", for their association with the allosaurs and their Hjakrahl-derived language.

From them come all Uumet'kyan griffins, including the lupogriffs and short-tailed griffins.