Mysterious Creatures : A Guide to Cryptozoology

The BASILISK, a semimythical bird-like lizard. (© 2002
ArtToday.com, Inc., an IMSI Company)
killed by a weasel. Seeing its own reflected image
can also prove fatal.
Distribution: Cyrenaica Province, Libya; Europe.
Significant sightings: A Basilisk killed many
people in Rome, Italy, in the mid-ninth century
until Pope Leo IV destroyed it with prayer.
Another Basilisk was discovered in a well in
Vienna, Austria, in June 1212.
In 1587, two children were killed by a
Basilisk in Warsaw, Poland, while they were
playing in an abandoned cellar. A servant who
found them was also struck dead. Authorities finally
sent in a condemned prisoner, outfitted
with a leather suit and mirrors. The man
emerged with a snake that officials judged to be
a genuine Basilisk.
When the parish church of Renwick, Cumbria,
England, was torn down in 1733, a huge,
bat-winged creature angrily flapped at the workmen.
One of them, John Tallantire, killed it
with a tree branch, earning him and his descendants
an exemption from fees to the manor.
Possible explanations:
(1) The Egyptian cobra (Naja haje) is yellowish-brown
and becomes blue-black with
age. Found in North Africa and Arabia, it
can grow to 8 feet, though its more typical
length is 5–6 feet. It is not a spitting cobra,
but its venom can be deadly. This species
was probably the famous asp that bit
Cleopatra, and it is depicted on the crowns
of the Egyptian pharaohs. The cobra’s hood
might conceivably be compared to a rooster’s
crest when erect. African cobras do not have
hood markings.
(2) The King cobra (Ophiophagus hannah) is
the largest of the venomous snakes. It is not
a spitting snake, and its venom is less toxic
than other cobras, but it injects much more
venom per bite—6–7 milliliters, enough to
kill an elephant or twenty people. The king
cobra also has an unnerving ability to move
forward while in a threatening, strike posture.
It has a black head with four white
crossbars. Body color varies from olive-green
to black. Though it can attain a length of 19
feet, it is not aggressive and is often adopted
as a village pet. It hunts other snakes in the
daytime and is the only snake known to
construct a nest. Its range is from India to
the Philippines. The use of Mongooses
(Family Herpestidae) in catching snakes in
India may explain the reference to weasels as
enemies of Basilisks.
(3) The Indian cobra (Naja naja) is a spitting
cobra. The venom is spit out in a shower and
directed toward the eyes of the victim, which
can cause blindness or death. This trait may
have given rise to the legend of the Basilisk’s
paralyzing stare. It can accurately hit a target
as much as 10 feet away in a lunging spit.
On its hood, it has two black-and-white
spots connected by a curved line.
(4) The Horned viper (Cerastes cerastes) of
North Africa and Arabia has a pair of horns
over its eyes. The eleventh-century Arab
physician Avicenna was one of the first to
suggest this snake as a Basilisk candidate.
(5) David Heppell has suggested that
beached Giant squids (Architeuthis sp.) may
have contributed to Basilisk lore.
(6) The Tatzelwurm probably accounts for
some Basilisk characteristics.
(7) The crest is similar to the Crowing
Crested Cobra of East and Central Africa.
(8) The roosterlike Cockatrice might be de-
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