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A wyvern or wivern (pronounced /ˈwaɪvərn/) is a legendary winged
reptilian creature with a dragon's head, the hindquarters of a snake
or lizard with two legs or none, and a barbed tail. The wyvern was often found
in mediaeval heraldry.
The word is derived from Middle English wyvere, from Old North French
wivre "viper" Wyverns are
mentioned in Dante's Inferno (Canto XVII) as the body for one of his creatures
in hell.
The wyvern is a frequent mascot, especially in Wales and Wessex, but also
farther afield in Herefordshire and Worcestershire, as the rivers Wye and Severn run through Hereford and Worcester respectively. For example, one of the local
radio stations is called Wyvern FM.
Vauxhall Motors had
a model in its range in the 1950s called the Wyvern. The Westland Wyvern was a British single-seat
carrier-based multi-role strike aircraft built by Westland Aircraft that served
in the 1950s, seeing active service in the 1956 Suez Crisis. The wyvern is also
a frequent mascot of athletic teams, particularly in the United Kingdom and United States, and is the
mascot of the Korean Baseball Organization team
SK Wyverns, established in
2000.
Wyverns frequently appear in video games, such as in the Warcraft series,
the Monster Hunter series,
the Kingdom Under Fire series, the Fire Emblem series, the Dragon Quest series, and the
Heroes of Might and Magic series.
Wyvern is also used as a name for a supercarrier class capital ship for
the Caldari race in the MMORPG EVE Online. In the Disney
cartoon series Gargoyles, "Castle Wyvern" was the
ancestral home of the Scottish Gargoyles, who bore some resemblance to the
mythical creature.
Some cryptozoologists
have interpreted wyverns as surviving pterosaurs, which were extinct around 65 million
years ago. There are alleged sightings in remote areas of pterosaur-like
creatures such as the Kongamato in
Africa
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