Myth & LegendGreek → English
Harpy
/ˈhɑːrpi/noun
A winged monster with a woman's face, and by extension a grasping, tormenting person.
The Greek roots
ἁρπάζειν
harpázein
to snatch, seize
Literally: “the snatchers”
Follow a root:ἁρπάζειν1 word
The story of the word
Ἅρπυιαι means the snatchers. In Homer they are wind spirits who carry people off without leaving a trace, with no bird bodies anywhere in sight; the vulture-women come from later poets and from Virgil. Phineus, blinded and starving because they fouled his food at every meal, was rescued by the Argonauts. Linnaeus gave the name to the harpy eagle of South America, which lifts monkeys out of the canopy.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → Old French → English
- First recorded
- 14th century
In a sentence
In the play the mother-in-law is written as a harpy and the actress refuses to play her that way.