The Hero and the Griffin

Alexander the Great was, from the 3rd century B.C.E. until the medieval Alexander Romance, the hero of fabulous adventures. Foremost among these was the story of his ascension towards the sun in a gondola drawn by griffins: attracted by a piece of fresh meat fixed at the end of a pike, they carried him ever higher, watched by his astonished army.
Griffins, hybrids of eagle and lion, are ferocious guardians of the treasure and of the mounts of the gods. Still today in fantasy, they are associated with the creation of certain heroes: Harry Potter, affiliated to the house of Godric Gryffindor, rides his cousin the hippogriff (with the body of a horse), and the young Yukiko revives the lost tradition of "storm dancers" by taming a griffin in The Lotus War by Jay Kristoff (2014-2015).