When I was a child, I read the book True Monster Stories by Terry Deary, and I found it fascinating and terrifying in equal measure. Everything seemed so weird and wonderful, and it’s remained in my memory ever since. This book influenced this article, and I hope you find these creatures from legend as curious as I do.
The Unicorn
The unicorn is one of the most beautiful and peaceful mythical creatures. She is portrayed as a horse with a large spiral horn protruding from her forehead, quietly walking through the woods. Apparently, there is a unicorn cave painting found in the Hall of the Bulls at the Palaeolithic Lascaux Cave, dating back to 17,000 BC. An animal with a single horn has been depicted on the soapstone stamp seals of the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilization from 2,000 BC. Unicorns were spoken about in ancient Greek literature; they believed the creatures genuinely existed in India. The unicorn horn supposedly held magical properties that could heal numerous physical ailments, and it was said that the creature was often captured for her horn. Leonardo da Vinci even wrote about them in one of his notebooks ‘The unicorn, through its intemperance and not knowing how to control itself, for the love, it bears to fair maidens forget its ferocity and wildness; and laying aside all fear it will go up to a seated damsel and go to sleep in her lap, and thus the hunters take it’. One of the most apparent origins for the unicorn is the rhino; you can see how the description of a large, four-legged animal with a single horn could turn into the image of what we now recognise as the unicorn. There is also the narwhal; could people have seen one moving and mistaken it for a unicorn running through the water?
The Basilisk
A creature who’s solidified in mythology thanks to Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the Basilisk is a strange creature hatched by a cockerel from the egg of the serpent. He is often described as a serpent king, depicted as a giant snake with huge venomous teeth, the ability to breathe fire and the ability to kill you by just looking into your eyes. Pliny the Elder wrote about the Basilisk in his Natural History around 79AD: ‘There is the same power also in the serpent called the Basilisk. It is produced in the province of Cyrene, being not more than twelve fingers in length. It has a white spot on the head, strongly resembling a sort of a diadem. When it hisses, all the other serpents fly from it, and it does not advance its body, like the others, by a succession of folds but moves along upright and erect upon the middle. It destroys all shrubs, not only by its contact, but those even that it has breathed upon; it burns up all the grass, too, and breaks the stones, so tremendous is its noxious influence. It was formerly a general belief that if a man on horseback killed one of these animals with a spear, the poison would run up the weapon and kill not only the rider but the horse, as well. To this dreadful monster, the effluvium of the weasel is fatal, a thing that has been tried with success, for kings have often desired to see its body when killed; so true is it that it has pleased Nature that there should be nothing without its antidote. The animal is thrown into the hole of the basilisk, which is easily known from the soil around it being infected. The weasel destroys the basilisk by its odour but dies itself in this struggle of nature against its own self.’. Yes, you read that correctly. This terrifying creature can be defeated by…a weasel. The Basilisk is thought to have originated from cobras. Cobras are giant snakes (some reaching 18 feet); some can spit venom, and some have a crown-like symbol on their head. Mongooses can kill them – is that where the legend of the weasel weakness comes from? And, of course, don’t let us forget the anaconda, the largest of which (so far) was 28 feet long…
The Hydra
The Hydra is a water serpent with numerous heads that lives in the swamps of Lerna, near Argos in Greece. She is the offspring of Typhon (the god of storms) and Echidna (the mother of all monsters), and she guards one of the entrances to the Underworld. The mere scent of her blood could kill you if one of her numerous heads (which some stories say can be regenerated) doesn’t get to you first. Hercules eventually killed Hydra during his Twelve Labours. The Hydra actually does exist, but not as it’s depicted in mythology. Hydra is a genus of tiny, freshwater fish organisms native to tropical regions, and impressively, they appear to be immortal and show no signs of ageing at all. There is also the possibility that Hydra was based on a real serpent born with polycephaly, a condition that causes an animal to be born with two or even three heads. It is more likely to happen in warmer temperatures, and the animals tend to be completely healthy. Apart from the extra heads, of course…
King Kong and Giant Apes
The age-old story: giant ape is kidnapped, giant ape is paraded around as ‘The Eighth Wonder of the World’, giant ape falls in love with human woman and ends up on top of The Empire State Building. There have long been stories of giant apes and ape-type creatures, including Big Foot and the Yeti. Most people dismiss these stories, and thanks to some rather dubious sightings and photos, you can understand why. But once upon a time, giant apes roamed the land. They were the Gigantopithecus. These fantastic creatures stood 10 feet tall and could weigh up to 1,100 pounds. They thrived for 6-9 million years in tropical forests in Southern China. As you can imagine, these guys could eat a massive amount of food. Then, sadly, around 100,000 years ago, there was the beginning of the last of the Pleistocene ice ages; this caused many forest areas to turn into savanna landscapes. Subsequently, the food supply ran short, and the Gigantopithecus couldn’t survive. Although the Gigantopithecus is now believed to be closely related to the modern orangutang, it was once thought to be Hominin…
Giants
Giants are known for being of human appearance but, well, giant versions. There are stories going back centuries; the Bible refers to the Nephilim (mysterious beings or people in the Hebrew Bible that are large and strong; usually translated as ‘giant’) and the famous story of David and Goliath. References appear worldwide in folklore; in Bulgarian mythology, giants called Ispolini lived before the appearance of modern humans (and were, for some reason, afraid of blackberries…). Baltic mythology tells of the giantess, Neringa, who played on the beach and formed the Curonian Spit (a 98-kilometre long, thin, curved sand-dune spit that separates the Curonian Lagoon from the Baltic Sea coast). Greek mythology sees giants as the children of Uranus and Gaia (does this make them related to the Cyclops). In Native American history, there is a tribe of red-haired cannibalistic giants; there were even remains supposedly found by miners in 1911 in Nevada’s Lovelock Cave. In Norse mythology, giants were the enemies of the gods, and it was said that they would ascend to Asgard to fight the gods until the world was obliterated, even though some gods and giants were related (typical family gathering). Sometimes giants are portrayed as aggressive, sometimes as rather dumb, and sometimes as extremely friendly (bless you, Roald Dahl). Real ‘giant’ people have existed throughout history, although a problem with the pituitary gland usually causes it. Robert Wadlow was the tallest man to have ever lived, standing 8’ 11” tall, and Andre the Giant, the famous wrestler, was 7’ 4”. A skeleton was found in 1991 in Rome from the 3rd century AD, measuring 6’ 8”; that’s tall for this day and age but was gigantic for a time when the average height was 5’ 6”. Was the legend of the giant an exaggeration of the appearance of these people? Or something more?
The Cyclops (Trigger warning – miscarriage)
The Cyclops has appeared in mythology for thousands of years; the name means circle eyes, or round eyes, from the ancient Greek kuklos (circle) and ops (eye) and the creature is famed for its singular eye in the middle of its forehead. In Hesiod’s Theogony (a poem by Hesiod describing the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods composed 700-730 BC), the cyclopes are three brothers: Brontes, Steropes and Arges, who are the sons of Uranus (god of the sky) and Gaia (the goddess of the Earth), and they created the thunderbolt for Zeus. In Homer’s famous epic, The Odyssey, the cyclopes appear as a group of shepherds, and Odysseus personally meets Polyphemus, the son of Poseidon. 5th-century historian Hellanicus described the cyclopes as the wall builders of Mycenae (the last phase of the Bronze Age in Ancient Greece). There are various possible origins for the mythology of the Cyclops. Palaeontologist Othenio Abel thought that the fossils of the Pleistocene dwarf elephant may have been responsible; there was a large cavity where the trunk would have been, and it may have been misinterpreted as a singular giant eye socket. Although it’s a reasonable suggestion, the mythology probably came from the real-life congenital disorder, cyclopia. Cyclopia affects 1 in 16,000 animals and 1 in 200 miscarried foetuses. Often, the nose is either not functional or there at all, and there is a singular eye in the centre. On the infrequent occasion that the foetus survives the pregnancy, the child usually only lives a few hours after birth. I have included a photo of a drawing of a child born with cyclopia; there are photos available on Google, but they are pretty upsetting, so I will leave that to your discretion…
Mermaids
Mermaids are usually depicted as beautiful humans on the top half, with a huge fishtail from the waist down. In some mythology, they are dangerous, seductive creatures, luring sailors to their inevitable death on the rocks; in other stories, they are portrayed as peaceful, friendly creatures. The sea creatures were first mentioned in Assyria (a Mesopotamian kingdom, an area now known as the Middle East) in 1,000 BC. Atargatis, the goddess, had fallen in love with a mortal shepherd and was devastated when she accidentally killed him (as you do). Overcome with shame and sadness, she jumped into a lake and attempted to transform into a fish. The waters refused to hide her divine beauty and only allowed her to transform the bottom half of her body, and she became the first mermaid. The folklore of mermaids is international; every culture seems to have its own mermaid story. There also seem to be many ‘real-life’ sightings’ from all over the world. In 1493, Christopher Columbus claimed to see three mermaids, although he wrote that they were not as beautiful as he thought they would be. In 1967, a ferry filled with tourists saw a mermaid sitting on a beach near the Mayne Islands of British Columbia. In 1998, dive master Jeff Leicher claimed he photographed the Kaiwi Point Mermaid and many others who were present agreed it was indeed a mermaid. In August 2009, numerous people reported seeing a mermaid in Haifa Bay (Northern Israel). You can find a video of this here. In 2021, Samuel Sipepa Nkoma, the water resources minister for Zimbabwe, reported that work on two reservoirs had to be stopped, as the workers said mermaids had warned them away. Manatees and dugongs are often thought to be what sailors of history had seen; after months at sea, could it simply have been a trick of the eyes?
The Loch Ness Monster
Nessie, as she is affectionately known, has been rumoured to live in Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands for many years. She is described as large, with a long neck and possibly humps on her back. Sightings of her go all the way back in time; the first written report appeared in the Life of St. Columbia by Adomnan in the 6th century AD. Nessie started receiving mainstream attention in 1933 when Aldie and John Mackay described seeing a colossal creature: ‘The creature disported itself, rolling and plunging for fully a minute, its body resembling that of a whale, and the water cascading and churning like a simmering cauldron. Soon, however, it disappeared in a boiling mass of foam. Both onlookers confessed that there was something uncanny about the whole thing, for they realised that here was no ordinary denizen of the depths because, apart from its enormous size, the beast, in taking the final plunge, sent out waves that were big enough to have been caused by a passing steamer.’ In the same year, George Spicer and his wife described ‘a most extraordinary form of animal’ that had crossed the road in front of their car. He told newspapers it was ‘the nearest approach to a dragon or pre-historic animal that I have ever seen in my life’. In 2007, Gordon Holmes recorded ‘this jet-black thing, about 14 metres long, moving fairly fast in the water’. Marine biologist Adrian Shine described it as ‘the best footage [he had] ever seen’.
There are a few possible explanations for Nessie. Oarfish are gigantic, growing up to 32 feet in length; there is the argument that they are saltwater creatures and Loch Ness is freshwater, but very little is known about these creatures. Could they have adapted? Nessie could be a large eel; they usually grow to about a metre in length, but there are giant eels in existence. My favourite theory, although DNA testing of the water tends to dismiss it, is that Nessie is a Plesiosaur, a marine reptile thought to have gone extinct 65.5 million years ago. However, the coelacanth was supposed to have gone extinct at the same time but was rediscovered in 1938…
The Kraken
The Kraken is one of the most legendary monsters in folklore, solidified in memory in works from Moby Dick to Pirates of the Caribbean (and possibly the inspiration for H. P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu). Supposedly existing off the coast of Norway and Greenland, the name comes from the Old Norwegian history work, Konungs Skuggsja, describing it as 'A fish that is still unmentioned, which it is scarcely advisable to speak about on account of its size because it will seem to most people incredible’. In some of the earlier descriptions, the Kraken was described as almost crab-like with pincers, but throughout the 18th century, the description primarily became something similar to a giant octopus-type creature with huge tentacles that could drag a ship to the depths of the sea. It was said the Kraken was so big you could mistake it for an island, and it would cause a vortex in the ocean, sinking anything in its wake. Carl Linnaeus even included the Kraken in the first Edition of Systema Naturae (a book including the classification of living creatures) in 1735. In 1853, a massive cephalopod washed up on a Danish beach, and naturalist Japetus Steenstrup identified it as a giant squid. Since more research has taken place, it is believed, according to recent reports, that the Colossal Squid can grow up to 66 feet in length. This could explain the giant tentacles that they thought could sink a boat. One of the ‘forewarnings’ that the Kraken was arriving was the ‘darkening of the water’. Could the squid’s ink cause this? Or a huge, unexplained mass?
The Thunderbird
The Thunderbird intrigued me; a creature originally portrayed as almost reptilian until becoming more bird-like in later years, a titan creature with giant wings that can pick up whales with its talons. One of the stories that stuck in my mind was that of Ruth Lowe. Ruth Lowe lived in Alton, Illinois, and one day in 1977, she heard an awful scream from outside the house. She rushed out and witnessed two giant birds chasing her 10-year-old son, Marlon; one sank his claws into the 56-pound child’s shirt and lifted him into the air. He carried him for 35 feet before Ruth successfully managed to fight the bird off. She later told the police: ‘It had a white ring around its half-foot-long neck. The rest of the body was very black. The bird’s bill was six inches in length and hooked at the end. The claws on the feet were arranged with three fronts, one in the back. Each wing, less the body, was four feet at the very least. The entire length of the bird’s body, from beak to tail feather, was approximately four- and one-half feet.’ She was not the first person to have seen the legendary Thunderbird. The Cahokia, a Native American tribe, spoke about the bird often; the bird would alternate between helping the tribe and preying on them. Army colonel Walter F Siegmund described his experience with the creatures: ‘I thought there was something wrong with my eyesight. But it was most definitely a bird and not a glider or a jet plane. It appeared to be flying Northeast… and from the movements of the object and its size, I figured it had to be a bird of tremendous size.’ There is a chance that the Thunderbird may have been a turkey vulture; they have a wingspan of between 70” and 72” and live in the area. There are suggestions that it could be an Andean condor, an endangered bird with a wingspan of up to 10 feet wide, which is more in keeping with the size of the legend. However, this bird is not known to live in Illinois…
These are just a few of the mythical creatures that have been written about over time. But are they really mythical? Let us take mermaids: the sea is vast, and I doubt we will ever honestly know what lives in the deepest depths. We evolved to walk on land; what if some Hominin species evolved with gills and fins? There are many tales of the unicorn being hunted for its ‘magical’ horn; if the horn was being used as medicine, could this be why no skeletons of unicorns have been discovered? Humans are known for hunting species into extinction; is this what happened to the legendary unicorn? The idea of the reptilian Thunderbird held my attention; as I mentioned before, the coelacanth was thought to have been extinct for millions of years. Could the Thunderbird be a throwback? A survivor from the times when dinosaurs roamed the earth? I like to think that there is more than a bit of truth in the age-old stories of these wonderful animals, and I will undoubtedly be writing more about other fantastic beasts. As always, let me know what you think in the comments, thanks for reading, take care of yourselves, and I will see you next time.
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