Mysterious Creatures : A Guide to Cryptozoology

Kirgilyakh River, Magadan Region (40,000–
26,000 years old); a mummified baby mammoth,
less than three months old, found in
1988; and the Jarkov mammoth, discovered in
1997 near the Bolchaya Balakhnya River,
Taymyr Autonomous Province, and excavated
nearly intact in 1999 by Bernard Buigues
(20,000 years old). The Heilongjiang Province
of China contains dozens of mammoth finds.
In the Crimea and the Caucasus, mammoths
became extinct about 30,000–20,000 years ago;
on the Russian plain, they were still present about
13,000 years ago. Based on radiocarbon dating,
the latest mammoth remains found in Western
Europe (northern France, Switzerland, and Great
Britain) also date to 13,000–12,000 years ago.
Radiocarbon dating of teeth, tusks, and bones
of dwarf mammoths found on Wrangel Island,
Chukot Autonomous Province, between 1989
and 1991 proved that some mammoths survived
into historical times, until about 2,000 b.c. With
a shoulder height of only 6 feet and weighing
only 4,400 pounds, these isolated animals constitute
a distinct subspecies (M. p. vrangeliensis).
Sources: “Observations de physique et histoire
naturelle de l’Empereur Kang-hi,” in Mémoires
concernant l’histoire, les sciences, les arts, les moeurs,
les usages, &c, des Chinois: Par les missionnaires de
Pékin (Paris: Nyon, 1776–1791), vol. 4, p. 481;
Mikhail Adams, “Relation d’un voyage à la mer
glaciale et découverte des restes d’un
mammouth,” Journal du Nord 32, suppl. (1807):
633–640, 621–628 (pages misnumbered);
Edward Newman, “The Mammoth Still in the
Land of the Living,” Zoologist, ser. 2, 8 (1873):
3731–3733; “Chinese Accounts of the
Mammoth,” American Naturalist 24 (1890):
847–850; Waldemar Jochelson, “Some Notes on
the Traditions of the Natives of North-Eastern
Siberia about the Mammoth,” American
Naturalist 43 (1909): 48–50; I. P. Tolmachoff,
“The Carcasses of the Mammoth and
Rhinoceros Found in the Frozen Ground in
Siberia,” Transactions of the American
Philosophical Society, new ser. 23, pt. 1 (1929):
1–74; Eugen W. Pfizenmayer, Siberian Man and
Mammoth (London: Blackie and Sons, 1939);
Marcel Marmet, “A la recherche des traces des
derniers mammouths,” Science et Vie 77 (January
312 MAMBA MUTU
1950): 10–12; Bernard Heuvelmans, On the
Track of Unknown Animals (New York: Hill and
Wang, 1958), pp. 330–353; Nikolai K.
Vereshchagin and V. M. Mikhel’son,
Magadanskii mamontenok: Mammuthus
primigenius (Blumenbach) (Leningrad: Nauka,
1981); N. K. Vereshchagin and G. F.
Baryshnikov, “Quaternary Mammalian
Extinctions in Northern Eurasia,” in Paul S.
Martin and Richard G. Klein, eds., Quaternary
Extinctions: A Prehistoric Revolution (Tucson:
University of Arizona Press, 1984), pp.
483–516; Gary Haynes, Mammoths, Mastodonts,
and Elephants: Biology, Behavior, and the Fossil
Record (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1991); S. L. Vartanyan, Kh. A. Arslanov, T. V.
Tertychnaya, and S. B. Chernov, “Radiocarbon
Dating Evidence for Mammoths on Wrangel
Island, Arctic Ocean, until 2000 b.c.,”
Radiocarbon 37 (1995): 1–6; Raising the
Mammoth (video) (Discovery Channel, 2000);
Land of the Mammoth (video) (Discovery
Channel, 2001); Richard Stone, Mammoth: The
Resurrection of an Ice Age Giant (Cambridge,
Mass.: Perseus, 2001).
Mamba Mutu
Merbeing of Central Africa.
Etymology: From the Swahili (Bantu) mamba
mtu (“crocodile man”).
Variant name: Mamba muntu.
Physical description: Half human, half fish.
Behavior: Sucks human blood and eats brains.
Distribution: Lake Tanganyika and Lukuga
River, Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Possible explanations:
(1) Isolated population of the West African
manatee (Trichechus senegalensis), though
these animals are herbivorous.
(2) An unknown species of giant otter with
a flat skull, suggested by zoologist Carlos
Bonet.
Sources: Carlos Bonet, “Le mamba mutu: Un
carnivore aquatique dans le lac Tanganyika?”
Cryptozoologia, no. 10 (January 1995): 1–5;
Karl Shuker, “Bloodsucking Mermaids and
Vampire Fishes,” Strange Magazine, no. 15
(Spring 1995): 32–33.