Meet Eriovixia gryffindori, a fantastic beast discovered in our very own Muggle world and named after a character in the Harry Potter book series, The Washington Post reports. The new spider species resembles the Sorting Hat—a wide-brimmed, brown-tinged, floppy, triangular hat that once belonged to Godric Gryffindor, a founder of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardy. (For the not-so-diehard Potterheads out there: The magical hat places first-year witches and wizards into one of four houses each named after a founder of the school.) The researchers found the critter in Western Ghats mountains, a biodiversity hotspot along India’s western coast. Even J. K. Rowling, the “wordsmith extraordinaire,” as the scientists called her in their paper published in the Indian Journal of Arachnology chimed in on the finding via Twitter: “I’m truly honored! Congratulations on discovering another fantastic beast!” she wrote.
