Newt Scamander is the fictional author credited on J.K. Rowling’s book Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
The 2001 companion book is designed as a Hogwarts textbook about magical creatures. Within the fictional world, it is written by Newt Scamander, whose full name is Newton Artemis Fido Scamander.
Rowling later developed Scamander into the protagonist of the Fantastic Beasts film series. In those films he is a magizoologist, a specialist in magical creatures, and the story follows his travels outside Britain, beginning in New York in 1926.
The character therefore links a playful schoolbook prop with a major cinematic storyline. Newt is not one of Harry Potter’s school contemporaries: he was born in 1897 and attended Hogwarts years before Harry’s time.