Hippocampe

This name derives from the Ancient Greek “ippókampos (ἱππόκαμπος),” composed of two elements: “híppos ‎(ῐ̔́ππος)” (horse, cavalry, horseman) plus “kámpos (κάμπος)” (open area of the flat, plain, field). In turn, the name means “grasslands horse, a horse of the plains.” Very strange “ippókampos” means “horse monster, sea-horse,” because the second element “Kámpos,” means “open area of the flat, plain, field,” which should instead be “kêtos ‎(κῆτος)” which means in fact “whale, sea monster, the abyss.” Hippocamp is a mythological creature. Knights in Hellenistic and Roman imagery, however, Poseidon (or Roman Neptune) often drives a sea-chariot drawn by hippocampi. Thus Hippocamps sport with this god in both ancient depictions and much more modern ones, such as in the waters of the 18th-century Trevi fountain in Rome surveyed by Neptune from his niche above.