Griffith
Griffith is a male anime and manga character who features in Berserk.
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Biography
Griffith (Japanese: グリフィス, Hepburn: Gurifisu) was a male human of humble birth who was stricken with poverty to the point that he cold not even afford a slice of bread. In that time, he played with his fellow street urchins as they procured junk and other trinkets which they claimed as their victories. It as on one such afternoon that he gazed at the sun-coated castle of the city where he had a desire to have his own kingdom and an ambition that drove him i his life. When he was a child, a fortune teller gave him an unusual crimson pendant called a Behelit, also known as the Egg of the King. He who wore it was destined to rule the world, at the cost of his flesh and blood.
Over the years, Griffith spent a lot of time building up a band of mercenaries, and made the Band of the Hawk the most feared army in Midland. His second in command was a female warrior named Caska, whom he saved years earlier from a life as a concubine for a noble. Griffith was determined to do whatever it took to make the Hawks the strongest army in the country, and even prostituted himself to Lord Gennon of Chuder for money to buy more weapons and equipment.
One day, when the Hawks were hired to protect a castle, Griffith observed a young mercenary in the enemy party whom Griffith wanted to be a Hawk. After the battle was over, the Hawks captured this young warrior, named Guts, and Griffith made him an offer to join the Hawks. Guts refused, wanting to settle this with swords: the deal being if Guts killed Griffith, he'd walk away with his life, but if Griffith won the fight, he would do with Guts what he would. Griffith won the fight, and now Guts belonged to him, and to the Hawks. Griffith quickly made Guts the commander of the Hawk's raiders, and despite himself, Griffith grew to respect Guts more and more, and made him his confidant.
Through the next three years, the Hawks joined the war between the Midland and Chuder empires on the side of Midland, where Griffith was soon knighted by the King of Midland himself. Princess Charlotte of Midland quickly took an interest in Griffith, which was frowned upon by many in the court. In their eyes, he was rising too fast in rank for one not of noble blood. The King's brother, Julius, soon attempted to have Griffith assassinated. The plot failed, but Griffith now knew that Yurius was an enemy and needed to be removed. He sent Guts on a mission to assassinate Yurius, and while the mission was successful, Guts accidently killed Yurius's son (who was in line to marry Charlotte and become the next King of Midland). Guts returned wounded to the castle where he and Caska overheard Griffith making a speech to the Princess about how his comrades were not friends, but merely those who die for his dream; the man who would be his friend would be an equal, someone whom would defend his own dream at any cost, even against himself. It was then that Guts slowly came to the decision to leave, but only after the war was over.
Griffith quickly realized that he had other enemies in the court, the leader of them being Minister Foss. He quickly came up with a plan to deal with them, but first he had to march to war. When all the other armies failed, the Hawks succeeded, and Griffith personally slew Gennon, now the Governor of the Castle Doldrey. The Hawks returned to Midland as heroes; Griffith was given the rank of the White Phoenix General, and complete command over Midland's armies, while the rest of the Hawks were knighted. It was here at the party that Griffith was poisoned and appeared to die. However, he was already aware of the plot due to blackmailing Minister Faus by kidnapping his daughter. Griffith faked his death so that all the conspirators would gather together. Having found his prey, he had them burned alive. Griffith then returned Faus's daughter to him, and had Guts kill the bandits he hired to kidnap her.
Griffith returned; Guts then decided to leave the Hawks, but Griffith took it as a personal betrayal, refusing to allow Guts to leave unless he won a duel. Guts did not want to duel, but Griffith would not have it. Guts won the duel in one stroke, and Griffith collapsed in disbelief, his pride shattered; Guts then left. Griffith couldn't accept his first defeat; his mind shattered, and he snuck into Princess Charlotte's bedroom that night where he forced himself upon her. Unfortunately for him, he was spotted, and arrested for high treason.
Griffith was imprisoned in the lowest cell of the Tower of Rebirth, where he was to be kept alive and tortured for four years. A year later, Guts returned to the fugitive Hawks where he and Caska led a mission to rescue Griffith, with help from Charlotte's servants. What they found in that cell was a mere shadow of what Griffith once was; he had spent the last year being tortured and mutilated, including having his tongue cut out. They quickly fled the Tower, and when the other Hawks saw what Griffith had become, all remaining morale vanished. The Band of the Hawks was truly dead. Observing the growing relationship between Guts and Caska, Griffith saw it as a personal betrayal. Summoning what strength he had left, he took the reins of the horses pulling the wagon and fled, vowing to himself his dream was not dead yet. However, the wagon crashed, and Griffith was thrown into a shallow pond. Griffith's mind truly shattered there, and after a bitter laugh he attempted to kill himself; however, he couldn't bring himself to do it. In the water, he found his Behelit, which had been taken from him and thrown into a storm drain by the dungeon master. Suddenly the eyes on the thing began to bleed, and the Behelit opened a portal to the realm of the God Hand. All in the vicinity, Griffith, and Guts and company were pulled in, where they were surrounded by hordes of demons and the four members of the God Hand. The God Hand revealed to Griffith his destiny, that he was to become the fifth and final member of the God Hand, which was why he was given the Behelit so long ago. Maddened by his pain, his unfulfilled amibition, and feelings of betrayal, Griffith agreed. He would be a king as he always wanted, and in return he would sacrifice the Hawks to the demons. The transformation began, as one by one, all the Hawks were killed, devoured, or ripped to pieces by the demons. Only Guts and Caska managed to survive. It was then that Griffith emerged, reborn as the winged demon Femto, and he cruelly and brutally took his revenge on his former two closest allies. Griffith had fulfilled his destiny.
Overview
Personality and attributes
Over time, he came to be known by a number of epithets that included the White Falcon (白い鷹), the Falcon of Light (光の鷹), the Falcon of Darkness (闇の鷹), the Blessed King of Longing (渇望の福王) and as The Absolute (絶対者).
He was loved and respected by his subordinates, and feared by all his enemies, more than anything else, Griffith wanted to have his own kingdom.
As Femto, he was only concerned with realizing his dream, and was had no sense of morality with him looking to go to any length as he strives toward his goals.
Powers and abilities
Originally, Griffith was born an ordinary human being with no special abilities. However, he displayed a keen mind and charisma about him.
He displayed a degree of skill in hand-to-hand combat prowess allowing him to sufficiently pin an opponent into a submissive position and dislocate their arm.
A capable swordsmen, Griffith was capable of piercing his foes with such precision that he could dispatch multiple enemies with merely one stab from his sword. With his skill, he could easily puncture vitals of an opponent if he chose to do so. When fighting foes with denser, larger swords, Griffith used a skillful parrying technique whereby he used his opponent's sword weight against them. This led to him deflecting the larger blade down the side of his narrow sabre to create openings for offensive strikes.
Such was their skill that they came to be renowned across the continent for having never lost to his Tudor opponents
In his youth, he was given the Crimson Beherit which was instrumental in his transformation into being a member of the God Hand. As a member of the God Hand, Femto was able to perceive the flow of causality to an extent unrivaled by all but his fellow demon sovereigns. With such perception and the ability to exert his will upon the world, he is able to precisely use cause and effect to realize any result he so desires. He is not omniscient, however, and cannot predict absolutely everything.
He had the ability to commune with the souls of the dead, and could manifest their lost consciousnesses to provide them one last opportunity to bid farewell to the world.
It was through his charisma that he could gather followers to his cause where they came to be charmed by Griffith. These people believed that as long as they stood by Griffith's side that they would see great things.
Notes
- Griffith was created by Kentaro Miura where he featured in the setting of the Berserk universe.
- In an interview, Miura explained that Griffith's antagonism was not planned from the start and that, "First of all, if Guts is angry, there is going to have to be an object of that anger. So I asked myself what people get angry at, and, well, something you see a lot of is the murderer of one's parents, but as I already said, I was someone who friendship mattered a lot to, so the idea of making the target of Guts's anger a friend, or at least a man of the same general age, naturally came to mind."
In other media
Television
Films
Video games
- In Berserk and the Band of the Hawk, Griffith appeared as a playable character in the setting of the video game.
Appearances
- Berserk:
