Bigby (Greyhawk)
| Game information | |
|---|---|
| Homeland | Veluna (formerly Onnwal) |
| Gender | Male |
| Race | Human |
| Class | Wizard |
| Alignment | Neutral |
| Setting | World of Greyhawk |
Bigby is an archmage in the fictional World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game. Before the Greyhawk Wars, Bigby made his home in Scant, capital of Onnwal. In the current setting, he can often be found in Mitrik, Veluna. His personal symbol is an open palm behind a large, stylized bumblebee.
Bigby was created by Rob Kuntz as a low-level non-player character evil wizard in the early dungeons of Greyhawk in 1973. Gary Gygax's character, the wizard Mordenkainen, encountered Bigby. The two wizards engaged in combat; Mordenkainen managed to subdue Bigby using a charm spell, and forced Bigby to become his servant. Kuntz ruled that Bigby would be Mordenkainen's servant as long as he remained under the charm spell, but until Gygax, through roleplaying, had won Bigby's loyalty, the evil wizard would remain a non-player character under Kuntz's control. After a long time and several adventures, Mordenkainen managed to convince Bigby to leave his evil ways behind, and Kuntz ruled that it was safe to remove the charm spell, since Bigby had changed from an enemy to a loyal henchman; therefore Gygax could use Bigby as a player character. For a time after this, Kuntz ruled that all the names of Mordenkainen's future henchmen had to rhyme with Bigby. This resulted in Zigby the dwarf; Rigby the cleric; Sigby Griggbyson the fighter; Bigby's apprentice, Nigby; and Digby, who eventually replaced Bigby as Mordenkainen's new apprentice.
Thereafter, Gygax developed Bigby into a powerful wizard second only to Mordenkainen, and eventually Bigby became one of the original members of Gygax's Circle of Eight, a group of adventurers made up of eight of Gygax's own characters.
When Gygax wrote TSR's AD&D Players Handbook, he borrowed Bigby's name to describe a series of "hand" spells (Bigby's crushing hand, Bigby's grasping hand, etc.). This custom continued on in later versions of D&D, with over two dozen "hand" spells eventually ascribed to Bigby.
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