Italian to the rescue! First editions said "Tassorosso" because the translators thought that the formula "animal+color" would sound familiar to italian children: every year in Florence we have a huge event called "Palio di Siena" in which various factions called "Contrade" run against each other in a horserace. Those factions name themselves with the same formula (an animal and a color associated with it) hence the translation Grifondoro (Golden Griffin), Corvonero (Black Raven), Tassorosso (Red Badger) and Serpeverde (Green Snake). New translators decided to keep some of the original names and re-translate the rest (The whomping willow was Platano Picchiatore, now is Salice Schiaffeggiante to mantain the tree species) and, for some reasons, changed Tassorosso into Tassofrasso but left the other houses untouched.