D&D Cat Names

Q: What do you name a D&D cat?

Three registers cover most tables. The night lane names the register cats keep anyway: Nocturne, Nyx, Hex. The familiar lane names the shape, Strix for the owl, Mustela for the weasel. And the virtue lane, lent from the published tiefling convention, names a promise: Candor, Serenity. The canon rows, Guenhwyvar and Tara, are there for proof that the tradition has famous members.

Q: Can I name my tabaxi character here?

No: tabaxi are cat-folk characters, not pets. Character names follow ancestry conventions, and the D&D name generator owns those tables. This page names companions and familiars, the animals at the party's edge. The border is the point.

Grimalkin is the archaic cat word itself. Witches' cats in the old plays answered to it, and it still works at any table. This table holds 39 names: the night register, the familiar shapes, the canon cats, and the ship's-cat lane.

Prefer the tool? Open them in the generator. Every name comes with a receipt.

What are D&D cat names?

39 names, eight lanes, one rule. The scholar lane cites literary cats by their sources. The night lane is the register cats keep. The canon lane names novel and game cats of record. The familiar lane names the published spirit shapes. The virtue lane lends the tiefling convention. The cellar lane is rope and tar. The invented lane builds and says so.

Grouped by lane. The root column is the receipt column.

D&D cat names with meanings, roots and lanes
Name	Meaning	Root	Lane
The scholar cats: literary cat names, sources cited
Grimalkin	the archaic cat word; witches’ cats in the old plays	literary word	scholar name
Murr	the talking tomcat of Hoffmann’s novel	literary canon	scholar name
Tybalt	the rat-catcher jest from Romeo and Juliet	literary canon	scholar name
Pangur	the monk’s cat of the ninth-century Irish poem	literary canon	scholar name
Cipher	a message you cannot read yet, and she knows it	real word	scholar name
The night and moon lane: the register cats actually keep
Nocturne	the night piece, musical	real word	night name
Hex	a small curse, neatly tied	real word	night name
Corvina	raven-dark, the Latin shade	Latin root	night name
Vesper	the evening bell, the evening star	real word	night name
Nyx	night, in Greek	Greek root	night name
Selûne	the Realms moon goddess, riffed for a cat (canon-adjacent)	Realms lore, flagged	night name
Umbriel	a moon of Uranus, and Pope’s melancholy sprite	real word	night name
The canon lane: named cats of novels and licensed games
Guenhwyvar	canon: the shadow panther who comes when called, from the Salvatore novels	novel canon	canon name
Tara	canon: the tressym companion of Baldur’s Gate 3	licensed game canon	canon name
The familiar shapes lane: named from the published spirit forms
Strix	the owl genus; the owl familiar	Latin root, shape-named	familiar name
Pipistrel	from the pipistrelle bat; the bat familiar	shape-named build	familiar name
Mustela	the weasel and otter genus; the weasel familiar	Latin root, shape-named	familiar name
The virtue lane: the tiefling convention, lent to a companion
Candor	says what is true, at volume	virtue name, tiefling convention lent	virtue name
Serenity	the unbothered one, professionally	virtue name, tiefling convention lent	virtue name
Amity	friendship, formal and binding	virtue name, tiefling convention lent	virtue name
Concord	the peace that holds	virtue name, tiefling convention lent	virtue name
Tender	gentle, on purpose	virtue name, tiefling convention lent	virtue name
The cellar and cargo lane: ship’s-cat vocabulary, rope and tar
Bilge	the lowest place with water in it	ship word	cargo name
Pitch	the tar that keeps a hull honest	ship word	cargo name
Barnacle	the stowaway that stays	ship word	cargo name
Scrimshaw	carved bone, idle-hands art	ship word	cargo name
Tackle	the rigging, the working line	ship word	cargo name
Winch	does the heavy lifting, twice her weight	ship word	cargo name
Ballast	keeps you steady below decks	ship word	cargo name
Hawser	the thick line that holds the ship	ship word	cargo name
The invented lane: built here, labeled invented
Zithra	drow-style build, invented here	invented build	invented name
Meerka	invented, the desert register	invented build	invented name
Skitters	the motion word, minted as a name	invented build	invented name
Nephra	invented, the arcane register	invented build	invented name
Vesk	invented, the short build	invented build	invented name
Tissa	invented, the soft close	invented build	invented name
The tavern lane: the common room’s resident
Grog	the watered ration; the harbor cat	tavern word	tavern name
Keg	small barrel, small cat, same energy	tavern word	tavern name
Tallow	the candle fat; the lamplight cat	tavern word	tavern name

The familiar shapes

The most citable pet-naming table in D&D is a spell. Find familiar summons a spirit in one of fourteen animal forms, and the list is published, plain, and perfect for naming: pick the shape, name the shape. The table's familiar lane does exactly that, Strix from the owl, Mustela from the weasel:

The published find-familiar spirit forms and the lane each opens
Spirit form	The lane it opens
Cat	the obvious one, worn proudly
Bat	the night lane, sonar edition
Owl	wisdom theater, and it hunts
Weasel	the long thin burglar
Raven	the Poe register, talking back
Spider	the weaver in the corner
Rat	streetwise, unbothered
Shrew	tiny, furious, effective
Frog	the pond register, damp
Crab	sideways attitude, armored
Fish (quipper)	the quiet tank lane
Hawk	the watchful lane, airborne
Lizard	sun-basking, sharp-eyed
Octopus	the clever escapee

The rules layer behind companions of every kind, familiars, mounts, sidekicks, is tabulated on the D&D pet names umbrella page.

Canon cats and the border

The famous cats have receipts, and the border is clean. Guenhwyvar is the shadow panther of the Drizzt novels, arriving when the figurine is called. Tara is the tressym of Baldur's Gate 3, and the tressym itself is Realms lore: the winged cat of the North. On the monster side, the displacer beast is the game's famous cat-shaped menace, and tabaxi are cat-folk characters, so their names belong to the character tools. Companions here, characters there.

For the real-cat rules, coat logic and the bright -ee sound, the how to name a pet guide still applies between sessions.

The companion family

The companion lists travel together. The umbrella carries the rules receipts, the dog page carries the tavern and warband registers, and the general fantasy register holds the morphology lane:

D&D pet names: the companion umbrella, find-familiar and find-steed included.
D&D dog names: the tavern hearth, the warband, the virtue convention.
Fantasy pet names: the invented-build register, labeled per row.

D&D cat names questions, answered

What do you name a D&D cat?

Three registers cover most tables. The night lane names the register cats keep anyway: Nocturne, Nyx, Hex. The familiar lane names the shape, Strix for the owl, Mustela for the weasel. And the virtue lane, lent from the published tiefling convention, names a promise: Candor, Serenity. The canon rows, Guenhwyvar and Tara, are there for proof that the tradition has famous members.

Is Guenhwyvar a canon D&D cat?

Yes: the shadow panther of the Drizzt novels, summoned by an onyx figurine, one of the most famous companions in all of D&D fiction. Tara is canon too, from the licensed Baldur's Gate 3. Both rows carry their source lines, because a canon claim without a receipt is just noise.

Can I name my tabaxi character here?

No: tabaxi are cat-folk characters, not pets. Character names follow ancestry conventions, and the D&D name generator owns those tables. This page names companions and familiars, the animals at the party's edge. The border is the point.

Where this data comes from. The find-familiar spirit-form list follows the published fifth-edition spell. Guenhwyvar follows the Salvatore novels; Tara and the tressym follow Baldur's Gate 3 (licensed game) and Realms lore; Selûne is flagged canon-adjacent, a goddess's name riffed, not claimed. Literary rows (Grimalkin, Murr, Tybalt, Pangur) cite their texts. Invented builds are labeled invented. Where every name's receipt comes from →