Baks
03-15-2006, 03:57 PM
Throughout all the Final Fantasy games we have been allowed to summon some really cool beasts to aid your party. But where does Square Enix get their ideas from? Some of the beasts are entirely made up by SE, but some of them are brought in from different religions and mythologies.
As i was bored and had nothing to do I decided to look for info about where some of the summons came from in the first place. The result was surprising. I found out that there were summons from many different religions and mythologies.
Ifrit
Ifrits in common mythology are jinn spirits that embody the elemental fire. They consider themselves superior to all races because they supposedly "came first," and they resent deeply that humans have found magical ways to take control over them. Even when tasked, they tend to show a ironic and malicious attitude, tending to subvert their masters' orders everytime they can.
They often appear as individuals of superhuman beauty and strength, but are very difficult to deal with.
Bahamut
This monstrous fish comes from Moslem traditions. The legend goes that it floats in a vast sea. A giant bull rides on its back and on the bull is a ruby mountain. There is an angel on the mountain over which are six hells, then the Earth, and then seven heavens. The bahamut is so huge and dazzling that human beings cannot look upon it. Its name may have lead to the
source
Shiva
Shiva (Sanskrit: शिव, and written Œiva in IAST transliteration) is a form of God in Hinduism. Adi Sankara interprets the name Siva to mean "One who purifies everyone by the utterance of His name" or the Pure One, that is, one who is not affected by the three gunas (characteristics) of Prakrti (matter): Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas. Additionally, Siva can also mean, "the Auspicious One."
Shiva is the third form of God as the Destroyer, one of the trimurti (popularly called the "Hindu trinity"). In the trimurti, Shiva is the destroyer, while Brahma and Vishnu are creator and preserver, respectively. However, even though He represents destruction, He is viewed as a positive force (The Destroyer of Evil), since creation follows destruction. Worshippers of Shiva are called Shaivaites. For Shaivaites, however, Shiva is the only Ultimate Reality (see Ishta-Deva for fuller discussion).
Ixion
Though little information survives about him, Ixion is a fundamental character in Greek mythology. The most complete account of Ixion's tale comes from Pindar in his Pythian Odes. Ixion was the son the Phlegyas, descendent of Ares, and king of the Lapiths in Thessaly. He is significant in many respects, but is chiefly known as the first human to shed kindred blood. This occurred when Ixion invited his father-in-law, Deioneus, to come and collect the price that Ixion owed him for his bride. Upon his arrival, Deioneus fell into a pit filled with burning coals Ixion had camouflaged.
Because this was a crime new to the human race, nobody could purify Ixion and he wandered an exile. Zeus took pity on him and decided not only to purify Ixion, but to invite him to Olympus as a guest. Once in Olympus though, Ixion became so enamored of Hera, and he desired to sleep with her. Zeus did not believe that Ixion would be so disrespectful as to have designs upon the wife of his host. To see if the rumors were true, Zeus made an image of Hera out of a cloud, and impregnated it. The cloud bore Ixion the monster Centaurus, who was unloved by the Graces and had no honor among men or the gods. Centaurus then mated with the mares of Mt. Pelion in Magnesia, and so from Ixion the race of centaurs was born.
To punish him, Zeus bound Ixion to a winged (sometimes flaming) wheel, which revolved in the air in all directions. Also, by order of the gods, Ixion was forced to call out continuously call out: "You should show gratitude to your benefactor." Ixion became one of the more famous sinners on display on Tartarus, and most writers mention him when describing the place. For example, Ovid wrote of him, and Vergil, with his moralistic interpretation of how sin should be punished, awards Ixion a special mention in the Aenead.
The focus of Ixion's mythology on the guest/host relationship shows the venerable age of Ixion's story. Of all the attributes Zeus became associated with, he was originally particularly worried that the custom of Xenia, the formal institution of friendship that ensured traveling archaic Greeks could count on each other for safety in antiquity, be enforced (for more on this in all the Greek world see Powell 150; the importance of the guest/host relationship is fundamental to all world mythology, take the Biblical story of Sodom and Gommorah, for example).
Aeschylus remembered Ixion's role as the purified progenitor of blood guilt in the Euminides. Athena, before she will hear Orestes' case refers to him as Ixion, an allusion Orestes balks at and tries to convince her is false (Euminides. 450-455).
Pirithous, king of the Lapiths, good friend of Theseus, and important in later myth, is considered to be one of Ixion's children. There is another claimant to Pirithous' paternity though. Zeus, in the Iliad 14. 317-318, claims to have seduced Dia, Ixion's wife, and fathered Pirithous.
Valefor
In demonology Valefar is a Duke of Hell. He tempts people to steal and is in charge of a good relationship among thieves, but later he brings them to the gallows. Valefar is considered a good familiar. He commands ten legions of demons.
He is represented as a lion with the head of a man, or as a lion with the head of a donkey.
Other spellings: Malaphar, Valafar, Valefor.
Yojimbo
In Japanese, Yojimbo (ÓÃÐÄ°ô; Y¨*jinb¨*) is a bodyguard, security person or sometimes assassin. Ronin and samurai with low salaries were sometimes hired as yojimbo. Often Yojimbo were Ronin hired by the Yakuza and rather used as executioners and assassins than bodyguards.
Yojimbo is also a 1961 action film by Akira Kurosawa, starring Toshiro Mifune.
Usagi Yojimbo ("Rabbit Bodyguard") is a comic book character created by Stan Sakai.
Hades
Hades is the lord of the dead and ruler of the nether world, which is referred to as the domain of Hades or, by transference, as Hades alone. He is the son of Cronus and Rhea. When the three sons of Cronus divided the world among each other, Hades was given the underworld, while his brothers Zeus and Poseidon took the upperworld and the sea respectively. For a while Hades ruled the underworld together with Persephone, whom he had abducted from the upperworld, but Zeus ordered him to release Persephone back into the care of her mother Demeter. However, before she left he gave her a pomegranate and when she ate of it, it bound her to the underworld forever.
Hades sits on a throne made of ebony, and carries a scepter. He also has a helmet, given to him by the Cyclopes, which can make him invisible. Hades rules the dead, assisted by various (demonic) helpers, such as Thanatos and Hypnos, the ferryman Charon, and the hound Cerberus. Many heroes from Greek mythology have descended into the underworld, either to question the shades or trying to free them. Although Hades does not allow his subjects to leave his domain, on several occasions he has granted permission, such as when Orpheus requested the return of his beloved Eurydice.
Hades possesses the riches of the earth, and is thus referred to as 'the Rich One'. Possibly also because -- as Sophocles writes -- 'the gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears'. Of all the gods, Hades is the one who is liked the least and even the gods themselves have an aversion of him. People avoided speaking his name lest they attracted his unwanted attention. With their faces averted they sacrificed black sheep, whose blood they let drip into pits, and when they prayed to him, they would bang their hands on the ground. The narcissus and the cypress are sacred to him.
Odin
For the Norsemen, his name was synonymous with battle and warfare, for he appears throughout the myths as the bringer of victory.
Odin was a shape-changer, able to change his skin and form in any way he liked. He was said to travel the world disguised as an old man with a staff, one-eyed, grey-bearded and wearing a wide-brimmed hat.
Odin is deeply associated with the concept of the Wild Hunt, a noisy, bellowing movement across the sky, leading a host of the slain, directly comparable to Vedic Rudra. Odin and Frigg participated in this together.
Leviathan
The Christian interpretation of Leviathan is often considered to be a demon associated with Satan or the Devil, and held by some to be the same monster as Rahab (Isaiah 51:9). The Biblical references to Leviathan appear to have evolved from a Canaanite legend involving a confrontation between Hadad (Baal) and a seven headed sea monster which Hadad defeats, and they also resemble the Babylonian creation epic "Enuma Elish" in which the storm god Marduk slays his mother, the sea monster and goddess of chaos and creation Tiamat and creates the earth and sky from the two halves of her corpse.
Some biblical scholars considered Leviathan to represent the pre-existent forces of chaos. In Psalm 74:13-14 it says "it was You who drove back the sea with Your might, who smashed the heads of the monsters in the waters; it was You who crushed the heads of Leviathan, who left him as food for the creatures of the wilderness. (JPS edition)" God drove back the waters of the pre-existent Earth (Genesis 1:2 "the earth being unformed and void with darkness over the surface of the deep and a wind from God sweeping over the water-" [JPS edition]) and destroyed the chaotic marine monster Leviathan in order to shape the unformed and void Earth in his liking.
Some interpreters suggest that Leviathan is a symbol of mankind in opposition to God, and is no more literal than the beasts mentioned in Daniel and Revelation.
In medieval demonology, a leviathan is an aquatic demon that tries to possess people, being very difficult to exorcise.
Titan
Greeks of the Classical age knew of several poems about the war between the gods and Titans. The dominant one, and the only one that has survived, was the Theogony attributed to Hesiod. A lost epic Titanomachy attributed to the blind Thracian bard Thamyris, himself a legendary figure, was mentioned in passing in an essay On Music that was once attributed to Plutarch. And the Titans played a prominent role in the poems attributed to Orpheus. Although only scraps of the Orphic narratives survive, they show interesting differences with the Hesiodic tradition.
These Greek myths of the titanomachy fall into a class of similar myths throughout Europe and the Near East, where one generation or group of gods opposes the dominant one. Sometimes the Elder Gods are supplanted. Sometimes the rebels lose, and are either cast out of power entirely or incorporated into the pantheon. Other examples might include the wars of the Aesir with the Vanir and Jotuns in Scandinavian mythology, the Babylonian epic Enuma Elish, the Hittite "Kingship in Heaven" narrative, the obscure generational conflict in Ugaritic fragments. The Christian Book of Revelation also describes a "War in Heaven."
Sylph
Sylph is a faux-mythological creature in the Western tradition. The term "Sylph" originates in Paracelsus, who describes sylphs as invisible beings of the air, his elementals of air. There is no substantial mythos associated with them.
Phoenix
In ancient Egyptian mythology and in myths derived from it, the phoenix is a mythical sacred firebird.
Said to live for 500 or for 1461 years, the phoenix is a male bird with beautiful gold and red plumage. At the end of its life-cycle the phoenix builds itself a nest of cinnamon twigs that it then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix arises. The new phoenix embalms the ashes of the old phoenix in an egg made of myrrh and deposits it in Heliopolis ("the city of the sun" in Greek), located in Egypt.
Although descriptions (and life-span) vary, the phoenix became popular in early Christian art and literature as a symbol of the resurrection, of immortality, and of life-after-death.
Originally, the phoenix was identified by the Egyptians as a stork or heron-like bird called a benu, known from the Book of the Dead and other Egyptian texts as one of the sacred symbols of worship at Heliopolis, closely associated with the rising sun and the Egyptian sun-god Ra.
Siren
In Greek mythology, the Sirens or Seirenes (Greek Σειρῆνας) were Naiads (sea nymphs) who lived on an island called Sirenum scopuli which was surrounded by cliffs and rocks. Approaching sailors were drawn to them by their enchanting singing, causing them to sail on the cliffs and drown.
Carbuncle
Carbuncle is also the term given to a mythical beast reportedly sighted in the Americas by early Spanish conquistadors. Although no firm eyewitness accounts are available, they have been described as small creatures, either birds or mammals. It is certain that they wear gems on their foreheads; such gems come from the brains of dragons. According to myth, dragons have inside their brain a liquid that crystallizes into a solid gem when they die. According to superstition, it is good luck to catch a carbuncle.
Cerberus
In Greek mythology, Cerberus (from Κέρϐερος, Kerberos, demon of the pit), was the hound of Hades—a monstrous three-headed dog (sometimes said to have 50 or 100 heads), (sometimes) with a snake for a tail and innumerable snake heads on his back.
He guarded the gate to Hades (the Greek underworld) and ensured that the dead could not leave and the living could not enter. His brother was Orthrus.
Cerberus is the offspring of Echidna and Typhon.
He was overcome several times:
Heracles' final labour was to capture Cerberus, which he did by treating it with the first kindness it had ever received.
Orpheus used his musical skills to lull Cerberus to sleep.
In Roman mythology, Aeneas lulled Cerberus to sleep with drugged honeycakes.
In Roman mythology, Psyche also lulled Cerberus to sleep with drugged honeycakes.
In Greek mythology, Hermes puts him to sleep with water from the river Lethe.
He can be found also in Dante's Divine Comedy, in Canto VI of Inferno (third circle).
Cerberus has also made numerous appearances in video games, most notable is the Final Fantasy, Castlevania and Devil May Cry series.
Unicorn
The unicorn is a legendary creature shaped like a horse, but slender and with a single — usually spiral — horn growing out of its forehead. Though the popular image of the unicorn is that of a white horse differing only in the horn, the traditional unicorn has a billy-goat beard, a lion's tail, and cloven hoofs, which distinguish him from a horse. Marianna Mayer has observed (The Unicorn and the Lake), "The unicorn is the only fabulous beast that does not seem to have been conceived out of human fears. In even the earliest references he is fierce yet good, selfless yet solitary, but always mysteriously beautiful. He could be captured only by unfair means, and his single horn was said to neutralize poison."
In medieval lore, the alicorn is the spiraled horn of the unicorn and is said to be able to heal and neutralize poisons. This is derived from Ctesias's reports on the unicorn in India, where it was used by the rulers of that place for anti-toxin purposes so as to avoid assassination.
The qilin (麒麟, Chinese), a creature in Chinese myth, is sometimes called "the Chinese unicorn", but it is not directly related to the classical Western unicorn, having the body of a deer, the head of a lion, green scales and a long forth-curved horn. Currently, the word "kirin", in Japan, written with the same Chinese ideograms, is used to designate the giraffes as well as the mythical creature. Curiously, the Japanese mythological creature is usually portrayed as more closely resembling the Western Unicorn than the Chinese qilin, even though based on the Chinese myth.
Adrammelech - Adar the king. (1.) An idol; a form of the sun-god worshipped by the inhabitants of Sepharvaim (2 Kings 17:31), and brought by the Sepharvite colonists into Samaria. (2.) A son of Sennacherib, king of Assyria (2 Kings 19:37; Isa. 37:38).
Kujata
The Kujata is a gigantic bull that has 4000 eyes, mouths, ears, nostrils and feet. This creature that comes from Moslem cosmology, and it stands on the giant fish Bahamut. On Kujata's back is a rock of ruby on which stands an angel. The body of the earth rests on the angel's shoulders. Under bahamut, lies an ocean; under the ocean an abyss of air; under that realm is fire; under that a serpent so omnipotent that, if it wasn't for its fear of Allah, it would swallow all creation. It is said that Kujata is so large that to travel from one ear to another or from on eye to another, it would take a journey of 500 years.
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Golem
In Jewish legend the Golem is a man made of clay. It is said that the most famous Golem, created by Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague, was created to protect the Jewish people from persecution. To animate the Golem, a small tablet is placed under its tongue daily, and the Hebrew word Ameth (truth) is written on its forehead. To kill the Golem, the tablet had to be removed, and the word Ameth had to be changed to Meth (death) by erasing the first letter.
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Fenrir
Fenrir, also known as Fenris-wolf, is from Norse mythology. He is the son of Loki and the giantess, Angrboda. The brother of Hel and the Midgard Serpent, Fenrir was a fierce giant wolf. He was so dangerous the the gods decided to bind him in chains. After trying the strongest chains, which Fenrir broke, the gods made a magical invisible chain called Gleiphir which was made from many impossible substances including the roots of a mountain, the noise of a moving cat, the breath of a fish, the sinews of a bear, etc. It is said that during the mythical battle of Ragnorok, Fenrir will break free of the chain and will devour everything, including Odin, the king of the gods. However, Fenrir dies after killing Odin, as his son Vidar stabs him.
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Ramuh
Or Indra, god of weather and war, and Lord of Heaven or Swargaloka, was the supreme deva of Hinduism during the early Vedic period. (Basic summary, WAY too much for you guys to read and most of it is pretty irrelivent too).
Alexander
From the Greek Alexandros meaning "Defender of Mankind".
Anima
Anima is a feminine Latin noun for "spirit, soul, breath". Ancient Romans believed that your anima was in your chest - it was your feelings, your breath et cetera. Therefore, when you died, your breath (soul) escaped. Aforementioned, anima was related to feelings and heart; the counter part (masculine) animus was the logic and brain.
Cockatrice
A cockatrice is a legendary creature about the size and shape of a dragon or wyvern, but in appearance resembling a giant rooster, with some lizard-like characteristics. It was supposed to be born from an egg laid by a Cock and incubated by a toad or serpent. A female cockatrice is, by analogy, sometimes termed a chickatrice.
Its reputed magical abilities include turning people to stone by either looking at them, touching them, or sometimes breathing on them, like a dragon breathing fire. The cockatrice is very similar (if not identical) to another legendary creature, the basilisk. Its name may come from a folk etymology for crocodile.
Like the head of Medusa, the cockatrice's powers of petrification are still effective after death.
Diablos
Is pretty obvious but if you didn't know, 'Diablo' means 'Devil' in French.
Quezalcoatl
Was the Aztec serpent/bird god.
Seraphim
A Seraph was an angel with six wings; 2 covering it's legs, 2 covering it's upper body and face and the last 2 for flying. I believe they were somewhat divine among even other angels.
I think that is more or less all the summons in ths series. :)
As i was bored and had nothing to do I decided to look for info about where some of the summons came from in the first place. The result was surprising. I found out that there were summons from many different religions and mythologies.
Ifrit
Ifrits in common mythology are jinn spirits that embody the elemental fire. They consider themselves superior to all races because they supposedly "came first," and they resent deeply that humans have found magical ways to take control over them. Even when tasked, they tend to show a ironic and malicious attitude, tending to subvert their masters' orders everytime they can.
They often appear as individuals of superhuman beauty and strength, but are very difficult to deal with.
Bahamut
This monstrous fish comes from Moslem traditions. The legend goes that it floats in a vast sea. A giant bull rides on its back and on the bull is a ruby mountain. There is an angel on the mountain over which are six hells, then the Earth, and then seven heavens. The bahamut is so huge and dazzling that human beings cannot look upon it. Its name may have lead to the
source
Shiva
Shiva (Sanskrit: शिव, and written Œiva in IAST transliteration) is a form of God in Hinduism. Adi Sankara interprets the name Siva to mean "One who purifies everyone by the utterance of His name" or the Pure One, that is, one who is not affected by the three gunas (characteristics) of Prakrti (matter): Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas. Additionally, Siva can also mean, "the Auspicious One."
Shiva is the third form of God as the Destroyer, one of the trimurti (popularly called the "Hindu trinity"). In the trimurti, Shiva is the destroyer, while Brahma and Vishnu are creator and preserver, respectively. However, even though He represents destruction, He is viewed as a positive force (The Destroyer of Evil), since creation follows destruction. Worshippers of Shiva are called Shaivaites. For Shaivaites, however, Shiva is the only Ultimate Reality (see Ishta-Deva for fuller discussion).
Ixion
Though little information survives about him, Ixion is a fundamental character in Greek mythology. The most complete account of Ixion's tale comes from Pindar in his Pythian Odes. Ixion was the son the Phlegyas, descendent of Ares, and king of the Lapiths in Thessaly. He is significant in many respects, but is chiefly known as the first human to shed kindred blood. This occurred when Ixion invited his father-in-law, Deioneus, to come and collect the price that Ixion owed him for his bride. Upon his arrival, Deioneus fell into a pit filled with burning coals Ixion had camouflaged.
Because this was a crime new to the human race, nobody could purify Ixion and he wandered an exile. Zeus took pity on him and decided not only to purify Ixion, but to invite him to Olympus as a guest. Once in Olympus though, Ixion became so enamored of Hera, and he desired to sleep with her. Zeus did not believe that Ixion would be so disrespectful as to have designs upon the wife of his host. To see if the rumors were true, Zeus made an image of Hera out of a cloud, and impregnated it. The cloud bore Ixion the monster Centaurus, who was unloved by the Graces and had no honor among men or the gods. Centaurus then mated with the mares of Mt. Pelion in Magnesia, and so from Ixion the race of centaurs was born.
To punish him, Zeus bound Ixion to a winged (sometimes flaming) wheel, which revolved in the air in all directions. Also, by order of the gods, Ixion was forced to call out continuously call out: "You should show gratitude to your benefactor." Ixion became one of the more famous sinners on display on Tartarus, and most writers mention him when describing the place. For example, Ovid wrote of him, and Vergil, with his moralistic interpretation of how sin should be punished, awards Ixion a special mention in the Aenead.
The focus of Ixion's mythology on the guest/host relationship shows the venerable age of Ixion's story. Of all the attributes Zeus became associated with, he was originally particularly worried that the custom of Xenia, the formal institution of friendship that ensured traveling archaic Greeks could count on each other for safety in antiquity, be enforced (for more on this in all the Greek world see Powell 150; the importance of the guest/host relationship is fundamental to all world mythology, take the Biblical story of Sodom and Gommorah, for example).
Aeschylus remembered Ixion's role as the purified progenitor of blood guilt in the Euminides. Athena, before she will hear Orestes' case refers to him as Ixion, an allusion Orestes balks at and tries to convince her is false (Euminides. 450-455).
Pirithous, king of the Lapiths, good friend of Theseus, and important in later myth, is considered to be one of Ixion's children. There is another claimant to Pirithous' paternity though. Zeus, in the Iliad 14. 317-318, claims to have seduced Dia, Ixion's wife, and fathered Pirithous.
Valefor
In demonology Valefar is a Duke of Hell. He tempts people to steal and is in charge of a good relationship among thieves, but later he brings them to the gallows. Valefar is considered a good familiar. He commands ten legions of demons.
He is represented as a lion with the head of a man, or as a lion with the head of a donkey.
Other spellings: Malaphar, Valafar, Valefor.
Yojimbo
In Japanese, Yojimbo (ÓÃÐÄ°ô; Y¨*jinb¨*) is a bodyguard, security person or sometimes assassin. Ronin and samurai with low salaries were sometimes hired as yojimbo. Often Yojimbo were Ronin hired by the Yakuza and rather used as executioners and assassins than bodyguards.
Yojimbo is also a 1961 action film by Akira Kurosawa, starring Toshiro Mifune.
Usagi Yojimbo ("Rabbit Bodyguard") is a comic book character created by Stan Sakai.
Hades
Hades is the lord of the dead and ruler of the nether world, which is referred to as the domain of Hades or, by transference, as Hades alone. He is the son of Cronus and Rhea. When the three sons of Cronus divided the world among each other, Hades was given the underworld, while his brothers Zeus and Poseidon took the upperworld and the sea respectively. For a while Hades ruled the underworld together with Persephone, whom he had abducted from the upperworld, but Zeus ordered him to release Persephone back into the care of her mother Demeter. However, before she left he gave her a pomegranate and when she ate of it, it bound her to the underworld forever.
Hades sits on a throne made of ebony, and carries a scepter. He also has a helmet, given to him by the Cyclopes, which can make him invisible. Hades rules the dead, assisted by various (demonic) helpers, such as Thanatos and Hypnos, the ferryman Charon, and the hound Cerberus. Many heroes from Greek mythology have descended into the underworld, either to question the shades or trying to free them. Although Hades does not allow his subjects to leave his domain, on several occasions he has granted permission, such as when Orpheus requested the return of his beloved Eurydice.
Hades possesses the riches of the earth, and is thus referred to as 'the Rich One'. Possibly also because -- as Sophocles writes -- 'the gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears'. Of all the gods, Hades is the one who is liked the least and even the gods themselves have an aversion of him. People avoided speaking his name lest they attracted his unwanted attention. With their faces averted they sacrificed black sheep, whose blood they let drip into pits, and when they prayed to him, they would bang their hands on the ground. The narcissus and the cypress are sacred to him.
Odin
For the Norsemen, his name was synonymous with battle and warfare, for he appears throughout the myths as the bringer of victory.
Odin was a shape-changer, able to change his skin and form in any way he liked. He was said to travel the world disguised as an old man with a staff, one-eyed, grey-bearded and wearing a wide-brimmed hat.
Odin is deeply associated with the concept of the Wild Hunt, a noisy, bellowing movement across the sky, leading a host of the slain, directly comparable to Vedic Rudra. Odin and Frigg participated in this together.
Leviathan
The Christian interpretation of Leviathan is often considered to be a demon associated with Satan or the Devil, and held by some to be the same monster as Rahab (Isaiah 51:9). The Biblical references to Leviathan appear to have evolved from a Canaanite legend involving a confrontation between Hadad (Baal) and a seven headed sea monster which Hadad defeats, and they also resemble the Babylonian creation epic "Enuma Elish" in which the storm god Marduk slays his mother, the sea monster and goddess of chaos and creation Tiamat and creates the earth and sky from the two halves of her corpse.
Some biblical scholars considered Leviathan to represent the pre-existent forces of chaos. In Psalm 74:13-14 it says "it was You who drove back the sea with Your might, who smashed the heads of the monsters in the waters; it was You who crushed the heads of Leviathan, who left him as food for the creatures of the wilderness. (JPS edition)" God drove back the waters of the pre-existent Earth (Genesis 1:2 "the earth being unformed and void with darkness over the surface of the deep and a wind from God sweeping over the water-" [JPS edition]) and destroyed the chaotic marine monster Leviathan in order to shape the unformed and void Earth in his liking.
Some interpreters suggest that Leviathan is a symbol of mankind in opposition to God, and is no more literal than the beasts mentioned in Daniel and Revelation.
In medieval demonology, a leviathan is an aquatic demon that tries to possess people, being very difficult to exorcise.
Titan
Greeks of the Classical age knew of several poems about the war between the gods and Titans. The dominant one, and the only one that has survived, was the Theogony attributed to Hesiod. A lost epic Titanomachy attributed to the blind Thracian bard Thamyris, himself a legendary figure, was mentioned in passing in an essay On Music that was once attributed to Plutarch. And the Titans played a prominent role in the poems attributed to Orpheus. Although only scraps of the Orphic narratives survive, they show interesting differences with the Hesiodic tradition.
These Greek myths of the titanomachy fall into a class of similar myths throughout Europe and the Near East, where one generation or group of gods opposes the dominant one. Sometimes the Elder Gods are supplanted. Sometimes the rebels lose, and are either cast out of power entirely or incorporated into the pantheon. Other examples might include the wars of the Aesir with the Vanir and Jotuns in Scandinavian mythology, the Babylonian epic Enuma Elish, the Hittite "Kingship in Heaven" narrative, the obscure generational conflict in Ugaritic fragments. The Christian Book of Revelation also describes a "War in Heaven."
Sylph
Sylph is a faux-mythological creature in the Western tradition. The term "Sylph" originates in Paracelsus, who describes sylphs as invisible beings of the air, his elementals of air. There is no substantial mythos associated with them.
Phoenix
In ancient Egyptian mythology and in myths derived from it, the phoenix is a mythical sacred firebird.
Said to live for 500 or for 1461 years, the phoenix is a male bird with beautiful gold and red plumage. At the end of its life-cycle the phoenix builds itself a nest of cinnamon twigs that it then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix arises. The new phoenix embalms the ashes of the old phoenix in an egg made of myrrh and deposits it in Heliopolis ("the city of the sun" in Greek), located in Egypt.
Although descriptions (and life-span) vary, the phoenix became popular in early Christian art and literature as a symbol of the resurrection, of immortality, and of life-after-death.
Originally, the phoenix was identified by the Egyptians as a stork or heron-like bird called a benu, known from the Book of the Dead and other Egyptian texts as one of the sacred symbols of worship at Heliopolis, closely associated with the rising sun and the Egyptian sun-god Ra.
Siren
In Greek mythology, the Sirens or Seirenes (Greek Σειρῆνας) were Naiads (sea nymphs) who lived on an island called Sirenum scopuli which was surrounded by cliffs and rocks. Approaching sailors were drawn to them by their enchanting singing, causing them to sail on the cliffs and drown.
Carbuncle
Carbuncle is also the term given to a mythical beast reportedly sighted in the Americas by early Spanish conquistadors. Although no firm eyewitness accounts are available, they have been described as small creatures, either birds or mammals. It is certain that they wear gems on their foreheads; such gems come from the brains of dragons. According to myth, dragons have inside their brain a liquid that crystallizes into a solid gem when they die. According to superstition, it is good luck to catch a carbuncle.
Cerberus
In Greek mythology, Cerberus (from Κέρϐερος, Kerberos, demon of the pit), was the hound of Hades—a monstrous three-headed dog (sometimes said to have 50 or 100 heads), (sometimes) with a snake for a tail and innumerable snake heads on his back.
He guarded the gate to Hades (the Greek underworld) and ensured that the dead could not leave and the living could not enter. His brother was Orthrus.
Cerberus is the offspring of Echidna and Typhon.
He was overcome several times:
Heracles' final labour was to capture Cerberus, which he did by treating it with the first kindness it had ever received.
Orpheus used his musical skills to lull Cerberus to sleep.
In Roman mythology, Aeneas lulled Cerberus to sleep with drugged honeycakes.
In Roman mythology, Psyche also lulled Cerberus to sleep with drugged honeycakes.
In Greek mythology, Hermes puts him to sleep with water from the river Lethe.
He can be found also in Dante's Divine Comedy, in Canto VI of Inferno (third circle).
Cerberus has also made numerous appearances in video games, most notable is the Final Fantasy, Castlevania and Devil May Cry series.
Unicorn
The unicorn is a legendary creature shaped like a horse, but slender and with a single — usually spiral — horn growing out of its forehead. Though the popular image of the unicorn is that of a white horse differing only in the horn, the traditional unicorn has a billy-goat beard, a lion's tail, and cloven hoofs, which distinguish him from a horse. Marianna Mayer has observed (The Unicorn and the Lake), "The unicorn is the only fabulous beast that does not seem to have been conceived out of human fears. In even the earliest references he is fierce yet good, selfless yet solitary, but always mysteriously beautiful. He could be captured only by unfair means, and his single horn was said to neutralize poison."
In medieval lore, the alicorn is the spiraled horn of the unicorn and is said to be able to heal and neutralize poisons. This is derived from Ctesias's reports on the unicorn in India, where it was used by the rulers of that place for anti-toxin purposes so as to avoid assassination.
The qilin (麒麟, Chinese), a creature in Chinese myth, is sometimes called "the Chinese unicorn", but it is not directly related to the classical Western unicorn, having the body of a deer, the head of a lion, green scales and a long forth-curved horn. Currently, the word "kirin", in Japan, written with the same Chinese ideograms, is used to designate the giraffes as well as the mythical creature. Curiously, the Japanese mythological creature is usually portrayed as more closely resembling the Western Unicorn than the Chinese qilin, even though based on the Chinese myth.
Adrammelech - Adar the king. (1.) An idol; a form of the sun-god worshipped by the inhabitants of Sepharvaim (2 Kings 17:31), and brought by the Sepharvite colonists into Samaria. (2.) A son of Sennacherib, king of Assyria (2 Kings 19:37; Isa. 37:38).
Kujata
The Kujata is a gigantic bull that has 4000 eyes, mouths, ears, nostrils and feet. This creature that comes from Moslem cosmology, and it stands on the giant fish Bahamut. On Kujata's back is a rock of ruby on which stands an angel. The body of the earth rests on the angel's shoulders. Under bahamut, lies an ocean; under the ocean an abyss of air; under that realm is fire; under that a serpent so omnipotent that, if it wasn't for its fear of Allah, it would swallow all creation. It is said that Kujata is so large that to travel from one ear to another or from on eye to another, it would take a journey of 500 years.
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Golem
In Jewish legend the Golem is a man made of clay. It is said that the most famous Golem, created by Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague, was created to protect the Jewish people from persecution. To animate the Golem, a small tablet is placed under its tongue daily, and the Hebrew word Ameth (truth) is written on its forehead. To kill the Golem, the tablet had to be removed, and the word Ameth had to be changed to Meth (death) by erasing the first letter.
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Fenrir
Fenrir, also known as Fenris-wolf, is from Norse mythology. He is the son of Loki and the giantess, Angrboda. The brother of Hel and the Midgard Serpent, Fenrir was a fierce giant wolf. He was so dangerous the the gods decided to bind him in chains. After trying the strongest chains, which Fenrir broke, the gods made a magical invisible chain called Gleiphir which was made from many impossible substances including the roots of a mountain, the noise of a moving cat, the breath of a fish, the sinews of a bear, etc. It is said that during the mythical battle of Ragnorok, Fenrir will break free of the chain and will devour everything, including Odin, the king of the gods. However, Fenrir dies after killing Odin, as his son Vidar stabs him.
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Ramuh
Or Indra, god of weather and war, and Lord of Heaven or Swargaloka, was the supreme deva of Hinduism during the early Vedic period. (Basic summary, WAY too much for you guys to read and most of it is pretty irrelivent too).
Alexander
From the Greek Alexandros meaning "Defender of Mankind".
Anima
Anima is a feminine Latin noun for "spirit, soul, breath". Ancient Romans believed that your anima was in your chest - it was your feelings, your breath et cetera. Therefore, when you died, your breath (soul) escaped. Aforementioned, anima was related to feelings and heart; the counter part (masculine) animus was the logic and brain.
Cockatrice
A cockatrice is a legendary creature about the size and shape of a dragon or wyvern, but in appearance resembling a giant rooster, with some lizard-like characteristics. It was supposed to be born from an egg laid by a Cock and incubated by a toad or serpent. A female cockatrice is, by analogy, sometimes termed a chickatrice.
Its reputed magical abilities include turning people to stone by either looking at them, touching them, or sometimes breathing on them, like a dragon breathing fire. The cockatrice is very similar (if not identical) to another legendary creature, the basilisk. Its name may come from a folk etymology for crocodile.
Like the head of Medusa, the cockatrice's powers of petrification are still effective after death.
Diablos
Is pretty obvious but if you didn't know, 'Diablo' means 'Devil' in French.
Quezalcoatl
Was the Aztec serpent/bird god.
Seraphim
A Seraph was an angel with six wings; 2 covering it's legs, 2 covering it's upper body and face and the last 2 for flying. I believe they were somewhat divine among even other angels.
I think that is more or less all the summons in ths series. :)