Misplaced Pages

#149850

81-741: Opened on 11 June 1929, the Châteauesque -styled building is 124 metres (407 ft) tall, and contains 28 floors. It is considered one of Canada's grand railway hotels . After its completion, the building was briefly the tallest building in Toronto , as well as the tallest building in the country , and the British Empire, until the nearby Canadian Bank of Commerce Tower was built the following year. The building has undergone several extensive renovations since it first opened, with its first major renovation in 1972. An underground walkway linking

162-663: A day. Restaurants located within the hotel include Benihana Japanese Steakhouse , and the Library Bar , the latter also offering afternoon tea . The fourteenth floor of the Royal York houses the hotel's roof herb garden, which provides the hotel's restaurants with fresh honey , herbs, vegetable, and flowers. The roof garden was opened at the hotel on 12 June 1929. In June 2008, the hotel installed three beehives on its fourteenth floor to serve as an in-house garden for its restaurants. The apiary presently has six beehives, and

243-429: A hand-carved wood lobby ceiling. The building stands 124-metre-tall (407 ft), containing 28 floors primarily made up of guest rooms and other hotel amenities. After the building's completion, it was briefly the tallest building in the British Empire, and Canada . The building would lose the record the following year, with the erection of the nearby Canadian Bank of Commerce Tower on King Street . Work to enlarge

324-460: A pollinator bee hotel , installed in 2014. Approximately 350,000 honey bees reside at the apiary during the summer, with the six beehives producing 205 kilograms (450 lb) of honey a year. The hotel also operates a health club , which offers a number of amenities including an indoor pool with a skylight , a fitness centre, a whirlpool, a sauna, and steam rooms. In 1929, a tunnel was built under Front Street West, in order to provide guests of

405-485: A red chest and white wings". Aelian was the last source on the griffin to add fresh information on the griffin, and late writers (into medieval times) merely rehashed existing material on griffins, with the exception of the lore about their "agate eggs" which emerged at some indistinct time later on (cf. infra). The griffin has been associated with various deities (Apollo, Dionysus, Nemesis), in Greek mythography but here,

486-413: A region of very rich soil but quite uninhabitable because griffins, a savage and tenacious breed of wild beasts, love.. the gold that is mined from deep within the earth there, and because they guard it with an amazing hostility to those who set foot there. The aforementioned Aelian ( Claudius Aelianus , d. 235 AD) added certain other embellishments, such as its reputation of "black plumage on its back with

567-589: A revival style, buildings in the châteauesque style do not attempt to completely emulate a French château. Châteauesque buildings are typically built on an asymmetrical plan, with a roof-line broken in several places and a facade composed of advancing and receding planes. The style was popularized in the United States by Richard Morris Hunt . Hunt, the first American architect to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, designed residences, including those for

648-534: Is described as having a " visor " (i.e., beaks) made by Urartian craftsmen, similar to what is found on Greek protomes. Representations of griffin-like hybrids with four legs and a beaked head appeared in Ancient Egyptian art dating back to before 3000 BC. The oldest known depiction of a griffin-like animal in Egypt appears as a relief carving on slate on the cosmetic palette from Hierakonpolis ,

729-459: Is not uniquely applied to the griffin beast, and tštš ( Teš-teš ) has also been used to denote the god Osiris elsewhere. Most statuary representations of griffins depict them with bird-like forelegs and talons , although in some older illustrations griffins have a lion's forelegs (see bronze figure, right); they generally have a lion's hindquarters. Its eagle's head is conventionally given prominent ears ; these are sometimes described as

810-618: Is that these derive from the bumps (furrows) on a lion's snout. Another view regards the wart as deriving from the bumpy cockscomb on a rooster or other such fowls. Griffin-like animals were depicted on cylinder seals in Mesopotamia c. 3000 BC, perhaps as early as the Uruk period (4000–3100BC) and subsequent Proto-Elamite ( Jemdet Nasr ) period. An example of a winged lion with beaks, unearthed in Susa (cf. fig. right ) dates to

891-554: The Achaemenian Persian Empire . Russian jewelry historian Elena Neva maintained that the Achaemenids considered the griffin "a protector from evil, witchcraft, and secret slander", but no writings exist from Achaemenid Persia to support her claim. R.L. Fox (1973) remarks that a "lion-griffin" attacks a stag in a pebble mosaic at Pella , from the 4th century BC, perhaps serving as an emblem of

SECTION 10

#1732780418150

972-657: The Château Style ) is a revivalist architectural style based on the French Renaissance architecture of the monumental châteaux of the Loire Valley from the late fifteenth century to the early seventeenth century. The term châteauesque (literally, " château -like") is credited (by historian Marcus Whiffen ) to American architectural historian Bainbridge Bunting , although it can be found in publications that pre-date Bunting's birth. As of 2011,

1053-433: The Châteauesque -styled hotel includes a row of pointed arches on the third story and a small peaked roof with tiny dormers at the top of the pitched roof. In addition, grotesques shaped as griffins are present at various corners of the hotel. The building's exterior is made of Indiana Limestone , which encases the hotel's 28-story steel frame . Along with traditional features found in most Chateauesque-styled hotels,

1134-522: The Getty Research Institute 's Art & Architecture Thesaurus includes both "Château Style" and "Châteauesque", with the former being the preferred term for North America. The style frequently features buildings heavily ornamented by the elaborate towers, spires, and steeply-pitched roofs of sixteenth century châteaux, themselves influenced by late Gothic and Italian Renaissance architecture. Despite their French ornamentation, as

1215-516: The Grand Trunk Railway . Griffin The griffin , griffon , or gryphon ( Ancient Greek : γρύψ , romanized :  grýps ; Classical Latin : grȳps or grȳpus ; Late and Medieval Latin : gryphes , grypho etc.; Old French : griffon ) is a legendary creature with the body, tail, and back legs of a lion , and the head and wings of an eagle with its talons on

1296-511: The Lamassu , an Assyrian protective deity, often depicted with a bull or lion's body, eagle's wings, and human's head. Sumerian and Akkadian mythology feature the demon Anzu , half man and half bird, associated with the chief sky god Enlil . This was a divine storm-bird linked with the southern wind and the thunder clouds. Jewish mythology speaks of the Ziz , which resembles Anzu, as well as

1377-537: The President of France , and Ronald Reagan , the President of the United States . Other foreign dignitaries that have stayed at the Royal York include American Senator Robert F. Kennedy , and the 14th Dalai Lama . As Ontario does not have a government house , the Royal York was the residence of choice for Queen Elizabeth II and other members of the Canadian royal family when in Toronto. Elizabeth first visited

1458-919: The Two Dog Palette dated to the Early Dynastic Period , c.  3300–3100  BC. Griffin-type creatures combining raptor heads and mammalian bodies were depicted in the Levant , Syria , and Anatolia during the Middle Bronze Age , dated at about 1950–1550 BC. Griffin-type animals appeared in the art of ancient Crete in the MM III Period (1650–1600 BC) in Minoan chronology , found on sealings from Zakro and miniature frescos dated to this period. One early example of griffin-types in Minoan art occurs in

1539-569: The Vanderbilt family , during the 1870s, 1880s and 1890s. A relatively rare style in the United States, its presence was concentrated in the Northeast , although isolated examples can be found in nearly all parts of the country. It was mostly employed for residences of the extremely wealthy, although it was occasionally used for public buildings. The first building in this style in Canada was

1620-588: The "curled tresses" that are the signature of Uratrian workmanship. Even the ornate crests on Minoan griffins (such as the fresco of the Throne Room, figure top of page) may be a development of these curled tresses. One prominent characteristic of the cauldron griffins is the "top-knob between the brows" (seemingly situated at the top of the head ). The top-knob feature has clear oriental origins. Jack Leonard Benson says these appendages were "topknots" subsequently rendered as "knobs" in later development of

1701-592: The 15th century BC frescoes of the Throne Room of the Bronze Age Palace of Knossos , as restored by Sir Arthur Evans . The griffin-like hybrid became a fixture of Aegean culture since the Late Bronze Age , but the animal called the gryps, gryphon, or griffin in Greek writings did not appear in Greek art until about 700 BC, or rather, it was "rediscovered" as artistic motif in

SECTION 20

#1732780418150

1782-718: The 1850s to the present day. Historic buildings within this district include the Dominion Public Building , and The Toronto Club . Shortly after acquiring the property, Canadian Pacific Hotels , a division of the Canadian Pacific Railway , announced its plan to demolish the Queen's Hotel to construct a new hotel. The building was designed by a Canadian architectural firm, Ross and Macdonald , in association with Sproatt and Rolph. Both firms had designed buildings for Canadian Pacific Hotels before

1863-766: The 1887 Quebec City Armoury (now named the Voltigeurs de Québec Armoury, formerly called the Grande-Allée Armoury (French: Manège militaire Grande-Allée, or simply Manège militaire) designed by Eugène-Étienne Taché . Many of Canada's grand railway hotels , designed by John Smith Archibald , Edward Maxwell , Bruce Price and Ross and Macdonald , were built in the Châteauesque style, with other mainly public or residential buildings. The style may be associated with Canadian architecture because these grand hotels are prominent landmarks in major cities across

1944-723: The 4th millennium B.C., and is a unique example of a griffin-like animal with a male lion's mane . However, this monster then ceased to continue to be expressed after the Elamite culture. What the Sumerians of the Early Dynastic period portrayed instead were winged lions, and the lion-headed eagle ( Imdugud ). In the Akkadian Empire that succeeded Sumer, early examples (from early 3rd millennium BC ) of lions with bird heads appeared on cylinder seals, shown pulling

2025-623: The 8th to 7th centuries BC, adapting the style of griffin current in Neo-Hittite art. It became quite popular in the 6th and 5th centuries BC, when the Greeks first began to record accounts of the "gryps" creature from travelers to Asia, such as Aristeas of Proconnesus. A number of bronze griffin protomes on cauldrons have been unearthed in Greece (on Samos , and at Olympia , etc., cf. fig. right). Early Greek and early Etruscan (e.g.

2106-535: The Barberini) examples of cauldron-griffins may have been of Syric-Urartian make, based on evidence (the "tendrils" or "tresses" motif was already touched upon, above), but "Vannic (Urartian) originals" have yet to be found (in the Orient). It has thus been controversially argued (by Ulf Jantzen  [ de ] ) that these attachments had always since the earliest times been crafted by Greek workshops, added to

2187-708: The Lake , but when McGaw died, Winnett purchased the partnership from his estate in 1919 and in 1920 formed a limited liability company of which he was president, also later acquiring McGaw's interests in their hotels. The Queen's Hotel was billed as "One of the largest and most comfortable hotels in the Dominion of Canada." After Winnett's death in 1925, his estate sold the Queen's Hotel to the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR), run by then-president Sir Edward Wentworth Beatty . Later, Canadian Pacific announced its intention to demolish

2268-770: The Mesopotamian lion-griffin. There is also the Armenian term Paskuč ( Armenian : պասկուչ ) that had been used to translate Greek gryp 'griffin' in the Septuagint , which H. P. Schmidt characterized as the counterpart of the simurgh. However, the cognate term Baškuč (glossed as 'griffin') also occurs in Middle Persian, attested in the Zoroastrian cosmological text Bundahishn XXIV (supposedly distinguishable from Sēnmurw which also appears in

2349-661: The Ontario Terrace. After the original hotel was refurbished in 1853, the building was renamed the Sword's Hotel, and then the Revere Hotel after a change in ownership in 1860. Thomas Dick bought the hotel back in 1862, renovated it again, and named it Queen's Hotel . In 1874, the Queen's Hotel was purchased by Thomas McGaw and Henry Winnett, hoteliers of Upper Canada, who also owned the Queen's Royal Hotel in Niagara on

2430-558: The Queen's Hotel to build the largest hotel in the British Commonwealth on its site. Construction on the new hotel began in 1927 and was completed in 1929. Named the Royal York, the new hotel cost $ 16 million when built. The completed hotel featured over 1,000 guest rooms, each equipped with radios, private showers, and bathtubs, a library, a 12-bed hospital, and a 20.1-metre-tall (66 ft) telephone switchboard. The hotel also operated St. George's Golf and Country Club as

2511-620: The Royal Suite herself. The floors above and below the Royal Suite are vacated two weeks prior to the Queen's arrival and remain that way until her departure. The hotel includes amenities and furnishings reserved exclusively for the royal family, including a private elevator to the Royal Suite. Furniture and hardware reserved for the royal family, including mattresses and toilets, are placed in storage when not in use. Ch%C3%A2teauesque Châteauesque (or Francis I style, or in Canada ,

Fairmont Royal York - Misplaced Pages Continue

2592-638: The Royal York Golf Club from 1930 to 1946, when the hotel's parent company, Canadian Pacific Railway, divested itself from the golf course property. The building was officially opened on 11 June 1929 by the Viscount Willingdon , the Governor General of Canada , in "one of the most glittering social events in Toronto's history." The Toronto Board of Trade hosted a luncheon in the hotel's banquet hall for E.W. Beatty and

2673-681: The Royal York Hotel during her 1951 royal tour of the country, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh . The first members of the royal family to visit the hotel were King George VI and Queen Elizabeth , during their 1939 royal tour of Canada . Other members of the royal family that have visited the Royal York include Prince Andrew, Duke of York ; Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall ; and Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex , and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex . The Queen usually had an entire floor reserved for her and her entourage, occupying

2754-560: The Royal York Hotel on 26 June 2010. Due to its usage, the hotel was included in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police 's designated security zones for the G20 summit. The hotel was used as a filming location for Red in 2010, standing in for a Chicago venue. On 28 October 2014, it was announced the hotel's ownership was reorganized. In a joint venture, KingSett Capital Inc. and InnVest Real Estate purchased 80 percent of

2835-489: The Royal York Hotel. The building design went through several drafts before its final draft, "H plan," was adopted. The plan saw the development of a towering central element, to distinguish itself from the buildings of the nearby Eaton's Annex . The building's towering design also enabled most rooms and public spaces to face either the downtown core of the city or the Toronto waterfront and Lake Ontario . Completed in 1929,

2916-434: The Royal York property from Ivanhoé Cambridge in 2014. As the venture's managing partner KingSett acquired a 60 percent share of the Royal York property, whereas InnVest acquired a 20 percent share of the property. Ivanhoé Cambridge maintained a 20 percent stake in the property's ownership. Following the sale of the hotel, its new owners announced a C$ 50-million renovation of the hotel. Several notable guests have stayed at

2997-763: The Royal York. The hotel frequently serves as a three-to-four-month home for members of the film industry or newcomers to the adjacent financial core. The Royal York is also used as a host hotel for the Toronto International Film Festival , making it a popular residence during the film festival . Celebrity guests who have visited the hotel include Andrew Lloyd Webber , Ashley and Mary Kate Olsen , Jennifer Aniston , Jennifer Garner , Justin Bieber , Leonardo DiCaprio , Matt Damon , and Susan Sarandon . The hotel keeps records of its guests' preferences in order to best accommodate them. Employees of

3078-685: The ancient Greek Phoenix . The Bible mentions the Ziz in Psalms 50:11. This is also similar to a cherub . The cherub, or sphinx, was very popular in Phoenician iconography. In ancient Crete, griffins became very popular, and were portrayed in various media. A similar creature is the Minoan Genius . In the Hindu religion, Garuda is a large bird-like creature that serves as a mount ( vahana ) of

3159-463: The ant into his description of griffins. Later, Pliny the Elder became the first to explicitly state the griffins as having wings and long ears. In one of the two passages, Pliny also located the "griffons" in Æthiopia . According to Adrienne Mayor , Pliny also wrote, "griffins were said to lay eggs in burrows on the ground and these nests contained gold nuggets ". Apollonius of Tyana , who

3240-599: The board of directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway. After the luncheon, the Governor-General registered as the first guest of the hotel. During the afternoon, guides showed guests around the hotel. The day finished off with an opening ball at 9 PM (with over 2300 people attending ). Several politicians and other notable people from the US and Canada attended the opening of the hotel. The opening of

3321-410: The building also incorporated an Art Deco setback and Romanesque-inspired decor. The balanced design of the building (before the addition of the east wing) was achieved through the application of semi- neoclassical motifs, and groups of arcaded windows. The interior of the building was largely created in an Edwardian architectural style . Its interior features a number of crystal chandeliers, and

Fairmont Royal York - Misplaced Pages Continue

3402-400: The cauldron Griffins. Benson's emphasis is that the Greeks attached a stylized "anorganic" topknot or an "inorganic" plug on the griffin's head (due to lack of information), while in contrast, a known oriental example (stone protomes from Nimrud ) is simple but more "plausible" (naturalistic), resembling a forelock. A cluster of "warts" between the eyes are also mentioned. One conjecture

3483-531: The chariots for its rider, the weather god. The "lion-griffin" on Akkadian seals are also shown as fire-belching, and shaggy (at the neck) in particular examples. The bronzeworks of Luristan , the North and North West region of Iran in the Iron Age , include examples of Achaemenid art depicting both the "bird-griffin" and "lion-griffin" designs, such as are found on horse-bits . Bernard Goldman maintains

3564-830: The country and in certain national parks. In Hungary, Arthur Meinig built numerous country houses in the Loire Valley style, the earliest being Andrássy Castle in Tiszadob , 1885–1890, and the grandest being Károlyi Castle in Nagykároly ( Carei ), 1893–1895. The style began to fade after the turn of the 20th century, and it was largely absent from new construction by the 1930s. Many of the Châteauesque-style buildings in Canada were built by railway companies, and their respective hotel divisions. They include Canadian National Railway and Canadian National Hotels , Canadian Pacific Railway and Canadian Pacific Hotels , and

3645-473: The deity Vishnu . It is also the name for the constellation Aquila . Local lore on the gryps or griffin was gathered by Aristeas of Proconnesus, a Greek who traveled to the Altai region between Mongolia and NW China in the 7th century BC. Although Aristeas's original poem was lost, the gryps lore preserved in secondhand accounts by the playwright Aeschylus (ca. 460 BC), and later his contemporary, Herodotus

3726-750: The east, and south of the Financial District. The hotel building forms a part of the Union Station Heritage Conservation District, a historic district surrounding Union Station. The creation of the historic district was through the Ontario Heritage Act , and was enacted by Toronto City Council in July 2006. Given its overlap with the Financial District, the historic district is an eclectic collection of buildings, with structures dating from

3807-623: The front legs. Because the lion was traditionally considered the king of the beasts, and the eagle the king of the birds, by the Middle Ages, the griffin was thought to be an especially powerful and majestic creature. Since classical antiquity, griffins were known for guarding treasures and priceless possessions. In Greek and Roman texts, griffins and Arimaspians were associated with gold deposits of Central Asia. The earliest classical writings derive from Aristeas (7th cent. BC), preserved by Herodotus and Aeschylus (mid 5th century BC), but

3888-520: The god Apollo due to "syncretism between the two gods". At the Temple of Hera at Samos , a griffin-themed bronze "wine-cup" or "cauldron" had been installed, according to Herodotus. The vessel was attached griffin heads around the rim (like the protomes , described above): it was an Argolic or Argive krater , according to the text, standing on a tripod shaped like colossal figures. The notion that griffins lay stones or agate instead of eggs

3969-536: The gold which the griffins collected from various areas in the periphery (presumably including the Armaspi's territorial stream, the stream of Pluto "rolling with gold"). The equestrian Arimaspi would ride off with the loot, and the griffins would give pursuit. Aeschylus likened the gryps to "silent hounds of Zeus" That they are called dogs or hounds here has led to the conjecture that Aeschylus considered them wingless or flightless. Whereas Ctesias , had located

4050-401: The griffin's neck, carven on some of the Greek protomes. The tendril motif emerged at the beginning of the first millennium, BC., in various parts of the Orient. The "double spiral of hair running downwards from the base of the ear" is said to be a hallmark of Iranian (Uratrian) art. The Etruscan cauldron-griffins (e.g., from Barberini tomb  [ it ] , figure right ) also bear

4131-477: The griffins in India, and more explicitly classed them as beaked, four-legged birds. Herodotus also mentions elsewhere that there are gold-collecting ants in Kashmir , India, and this has been interpreted by modern scholars as "doublets or garbled versions" of the lore of gold-hoarding griffins. It appears that the accounts of griffins given by Pliny had been admixed with the lore of these gold-guarding ants of India, and later Aelian also inserted attributes of

SECTION 50

#1732780418150

4212-402: The historian. Herodotus explains (via Aristeas) that the gold-guarding griffin supposedly dwelled further north from the one-eyed Arimaspi people who robbed the gold from the fabulous creatures. Aristeas is said to have been informed through the Issedones people neighboring region to the Arimaspi, in the northern extremes (of Central Asia). Aeschylus also concurs that the Arimaspi robbed

4293-414: The hotel are forbidden from carrying cell phones, tweeting or sharing information on social media about the guests at the hotel. A number of heads of state , diplomats, and other foreign dignitaries have also stayed at the Royal York. During the 2010 G20 Toronto summit , the hotel housed eleven heads of state and heads of government . Heads of state that have stayed at the hotel include Nicolas Sarkozy ,

4374-405: The hotel commenced in 1957, and was completed in 1959. The new east wing expansion was designed by the architecture firm Ross, Patterson, Townsend, & Fish, in association with Charles B. Dolphin . When the Royal York first opened, the hotel included 1,048 guest rooms and suites . When the hotel first opened, it featured a telephone switchboard longer than 18 metres (60 ft). As of 2014,

4455-408: The hotel expanded the number of its guest rooms and suites to 1,363. Types of guest rooms include Signature or Luxury, along with an array of eight types of suites. In addition to lodgings, the hotel has several event spaces. The hotel features an entire floor of function rooms, primarily used for conferences. A notable room at the hotel includes the Ballroom, which features an oil-painted ceiling from

4536-406: The hotel was front-page news in the Montreal Gazette on 12 June 1929. The hotel had 1,840 square metres (19,800 sq ft) of Canadian linoleum flooring upon opening. From 1930 to 1935, a radio station operated from the hotel. Its call letters were CPRY (for "Canadian Pacific Royal York"). Broadcasting from the Imperial Room, CPRY programs were heard across the country. On 7 September 1949,

4617-416: The hotel with a new east wing commenced in 1957 and was completed in 1959. The hotel underwent an extensive renovation program in 1972 and 1973 to modernize its image. Called the Royal York Revelation, the program was overseen by the architects Webb Zerafa Menkes Housden (who also designed the Royal Bank plaza next to the hotel). The renovation cut a hole in the main-floor lobby for a spiral staircase, covered

4698-449: The hotel with direct access to Union Station. The tunnel connecting the hotel to Union Station was later connected with the larger PATH underground city , a series of tunnels that connects various buildings in Downtown Toronto. In 1987, the city adopted the role of the coordinating agency for the tunnel network. The Royal York Hotel was not the first hotel built on the property, with the first hotel being built in 1843, known originally as

4779-445: The hotel with the Royal Bank Plaza and Union Station form part of Toronto's PATH underground city system. The Royal York Hotel sits at 100 Front Street West at the southern end of the Financial District , a business district in Downtown Toronto . The hotel property is bounded by Piper Street to the north, and York Street to the west, whereas its eastern portion is bounded by Royal Bank Plaza , an office complex that serves as

4860-402: The hotel's opening. The Concert Hall is another event space at the hotel that is outfitted with a Casavant Frères pipe organ . With five manuals and one-hundred-and-seven stops, it was the largest pipe organ in Canada. Another notable event space within the hotel is the Imperial Room , which was once used as a nightclub from the 1940s to the 1990s. The space featured a stage at the north end of

4941-429: The identifiable attested "accounts" presented in scholarship are largely not literary, but artistic, or numismatic . The griffin was naturally linked to Apollo, given the existence of the cultus of Hyperborean Apollo , with a cult center at the Greek colony of Olbia on the Black Sea . And even the main Temple of Apollo at Delphi featured a statue of the god flanked by griffins, or so it can be presumed based on

SECTION 60

#1732780418150

5022-401: The image of a griffin attacking a horse. Other Scythian artifacts show griffins attacking horses, stags, and goats. Griffins are typically shown attacking horses, deer, and humans in Greek art. Nomads were said to steal griffin-guarded gold according to Scythian oral traditions reported by Greek and Roman travelers. Several ancient mythological creatures are similar to the griffin. These include

5103-405: The kingdom of Macedon or a personal emblem of Antipater , one of Alexander 's successors. A golden frontal half of a griffin-like animal from the Ziwiye hoard (near Saqqez city) in Kurdistan Province , Iran resembles the western protomes in style. They were of Urartian workmanship (neither Assyrian or Scythian), though the hoard itself may have represented a Scythian burial. The animal

5184-443: The later lore that griffins deposited agate stone among the eggs in their nest. Pliny placed the griffins in Æthiopia , and Ctesias (5th century BC) in greater India . Scholars have observed that legends about the gold-digging ants of India may have contaminated griffin lore. In the Christian era, Isidore of Seville (7th century AD) wrote that griffins were a great enemy of horses. This notion may have readily developed from

5265-562: The lion's ears, but are often elongated (more like a horse 's), and are sometimes feathered. The griffin of Greece, as depicted in cast bronze cauldron protomes (cf. below), has a squat face with short beaks that are open agape as if screaming, with the tongue showing. There is also a "top-knob" on its head or between the brows. There may also be so-called "tendrils", or curled "spiral-locks" depicted, presumably representing either hair/mane or feather/crest locks dangling down. Single- or double-streaked tendrils hang down both sides and behind

5346-650: The lobby of the hotel was converted into a temporary field hospital following a fire on the cruise ship SS Noronic . Docked in the Toronto harbour , the disaster on the Noronic killed 118 people. From the 1940s to the 1990s, the hotel operated a nightclub known as the Imperial Room. It attracted top musicians and performers to the hotel from the 1940s to the 1990s, including Anne Murray , Buddy Rich , Count Basie , Doug Henning , Duke Ellington , Eartha Kitt , Ella Fitzgerald , Louis Armstrong , Marlene Dietrich , Pearl Bailey , Peggy Lee , Rich Little , Tina Turner , Tony Bennett , and Woody Herman . The Imperial Room

5427-431: The marble pillars in the lobby with wood panelling, hung modern wall lamps and a chandelier, and replaced rugs with carpet. The clock standing at the centre of the spiral staircase was donated by the Canadian royal family . From 1988 until 1993, the Royal York underwent a $ 100-million restoration. In 2001, the company which owns the hotel, Canadian Pacific Hotels, was reorganized into Fairmont Hotels and Resorts , adopting

5508-421: The modern Persian language , the griffin has come to be called šērdāl ( Persian : شیردال ), meaning 'lion-eagle'. However, the practice of referring to ancient Iranian griffin objects or monuments as sherdal , is not followed by other current archaeological scholarship (e.g., here ). Possible Old or Middle Iranian names for the creature have been discussed. Middle Persian Sēnmurw in Sasanian culture

5589-407: The name of the American company it had purchased in 1999. As a result of the company's re-brand, the Royal York was renamed the "Fairmont Royal York." In 2007 the Royal York, along with a number of other Fairmont properties, were sold to Ivanhoé Cambridge , although Fairmont continues to manage the hotel. The official welcome and reception for the leaders of the 2010 G20 Toronto summit was held at

5670-428: The operational headquarters of the Royal Bank of Canada . Union Station , the city's main intermodal transportation hub, is located south of the hotel, across Front Street West. The Royal York was not the first hotel built on the site. The first hotel was built in 1843 and was originally known as the Ontario Terrace. It consisted of four brick houses and was later occupied by Knox College , a seminary . The former hotel

5751-560: The physical descriptions are not very explicit. Thus even though they are sharp-beaked, their being likened to "unbarking hounds of Zeus" has led to the speculation they were seen as wingless. Pliny the Elder (1st century) was the first to explicitly state that griffins were winged and long eared. But Apollonius of Tyana wrote that griffins did not have true bird wings, but only membranous webbed feet that only gave them capability of short-distanced flight. Writers after Aelian (3rd century AD) did not add new material to griffin lore, except for

5832-781: The plain cauldrons imported from the Near East. Detractors (notably K. R. Maxwell-Hyslop ) believe that (early examples of ) the griffin-ornamented cauldron, in its entirely, were crafted in the East, though excavated finds from the Orient are scarce. In Central Asia , the griffin image was included in Scythian "animal style" artifacts of the 6th–4th centuries BC, but no writings explain their meaning. The Golden Pectoral from Tovsta Mohyla , interred in Scythian king's burial site, perhaps commissioned to Greek goldsmiths , who engraved

5913-445: The position that Luristan examples must be counted as developments of the "lion-griffin" type, even when it exhibits "stylization .. approaching the beak of a bird". The Luristan griffin-like creatures resemble and perhaps are descended from Assyrian creatures, possibly influenced by Mitannian animals, or perhaps there had been parallel development in both Assyrian and Elamite cultures. Bird-headed mammal images appeared in art of

5994-405: The representation struck on the tetradrachm coinage of Attica. Apollo rode a griffin to Hyperboria each winter, leaving Delphi, or so it was believed. Apollo riding griffin is known from multiple examples of red-figure pottery . And Apollo hitched griffins to his chariot according to Claudian . Dionysus was also depicted on a griffin-chariot or mounting griffin; the motif was borrowed from

6075-526: The room, a sunken floor with tables and a dance floor in the middle, and raised booths at the other end of the room. The room is presently used as a meeting and event space, most often by the Empire Club of Canada . A number of rooms at the Royal York are also occupied by restaurants and other food-based services. The Royal York's kitchen was Canada's largest hotel kitchen when the Royal York first opened, capable of producing over 15,000 French bread rolls

6156-576: The same text). Middle Persian Paškuč is also attested in Manichaean magical texts (Manichaean Middle Persian: pškwc ), and this must have meant a "griffin or a monster like a griffin" according to W. B. Henning . The griffin was given names which were descriptive epithets, such as tštš or tesh-tesh meaning "Tearer[-in-pieces]" inscribed on a griffin image found in a tomb at Deir El Bersha ; and sfr / srf "fiery one", attested at Beni Hasan . The descriptive epithet "Tearer"

6237-469: The tradition that horseback-riding Arimaspians raided the griffin gold. The derivation of this word remains uncertain. It could be related to the Greek word γρυπός (grypos), meaning 'curved', or 'hooked'. Greek γρύφ (gryph) from γρύφ 'hook-nosed' is suggested. It could also have been an Anatolian loan word derived from a Semitic language; compare the Hebrew word for cherub כרוב kərúv . In

6318-447: Was a fabulous composite creature, and Russian archaeologist Boris A. Litvinskij  [ ru ] argued for the possibility that the application of this term may extend to the griffin. The term Sēnmurw is recognized as the etymological ancestor of simurgh , which is generally regarded as a mythological bird (rather than a composite) in later medieval Persian literature, though some argue that this bird may have originated from

6399-408: Was also where Jim Carrey made his comedic stage debut. The nightclub was later converted to an event space. The Royal York became a centre of political controversy during the 1955 Toronto municipal election , when it was revealed that the incumbent mayor, Allan A. Lamport , had spent taxpayers' money maintaining a private suite at the hotel for private meetings and cocktail parties. Work to enlarge

6480-519: Was later demolished to make way for the Royal York. Located at the southern end of the Financial District, near Bay Street , the hotel is situated within Canada's financial centre . Its southerly location within the Financial District also places the hotel near several downtown neighbourhoods. Southwest of the Financial District is the Entertainment District , whereas the neighbourhoods of St. Lawrence and South Core are located to

6561-604: Was nearly coeval with Pliny, gave a somewhat unique account of the griffin, claiming them to be lion-sized, and having no true wings, and instead had paws "webbed with red membranes", that gave them ability to makes leaps of flight of only a short distance. Pomponius Mela (fl. AD 43) wrote in his Book ii. 6: In Europe, constantly falling snow makes those places contiguous with the Riphaean Mountains .. so impassable that, in addition, they prevent those who deliberately travel here from seeing anything. After that comes

#149850