Manticore

Manticore - The History of Four-footed Beasts

Author: Edward Topsell

I've seen some creepy smiles in my time, but this is the creepiest yet. The creepiest of all creepy smiles belongs to a charming beast called the manticore. As you can see, the manticore has the body of a lion, a man's head with rows of shark-like teeth, and a tail covered in poisonous quills capable of being shot from a good distance away. The beast also has a voice like a trumpet, the ability to leap great distances, and the energy to keep going like the Energizer Bunny. Any unfortunate human captured by the manticore was consumed entirely, including bones, clothing, and items being carried. In some later stories, the manticore would query its intended meal with riddles before killing. To tell you the truth, if I saw a manicore, I wouldn't need to wait for the flying quills or riddles. I'd be dead without them! The manicore's name means man-eater. It's a good name and states the case.

 

Manticore - Bedeian Library

This poor manicore looks more buck-toothed than shark-toothed.

It's "man-eater" name orginated from the Middle Persian martya, "human, mortal being" and xwar, "to eat".  Understandibly, the manticore was considered the most deadly creature in Asia. Though the myth was of Persian origin, the manticore was believed to reside in India and Indonesia. It was mantained manticores were hunted on elephants in India while the creatures were young and without stings. The beast entered European mythology by way of Ctesias, a Greek doctor working at the Persian court of King Artaxerxes II during the fourth century BC. Pausanias, in Description of Greece, said:

The beast described by Ctesias in his Indian history, which says is called martichoras by the Indians and "man-eater" by the Greeks, I am inclined to think is a lion.  

What did our friend Pliny the Elder think?

   

Pliny the Elder

Unlike Pausanias, Pliny the Elder swallowed the manticore myth hook, line and sinker. In other words, he swallowed it whole. Quoting Ctesias he wrote:

The mantichora has the face and ears of a human with grey eyes, a triple row of teeth that meet like the teeth in a comb, a lions body of a blood-red color, and a voice like a pan-pipe blended with a trumpet. It stings with its tail like a scorpion. It is very fast and has a special appetite for human flesh.

Like Fox Mulder of the X-Files, Pliny the Elder wanted to believe. 

Manticore - Museum Meermanns

In medieval Europe, the manticore symbolized tyranny, envy and the devil. It was evil personified. As late as the 1930's, peasants of Spain thought the creature signified bad omens. It was a beast that kept going, and going and going! 

So if you hear of manticores in your neighborhood, grab the closest elephant and dispatch them while they're young. They're not nice to have around.

The Roc

The Roc is a mythological Arabic and Persian bird so large it could capture and eat elephants. Appearing in 1001 Arabian Tales, it became popular in the Sinbad the Sailor story when  unknowingly saving Sinbad from a shipwreak.

I like this picture, but not as well as the first. 

 Sinbad, finding himself in the Roc's nest accompanying an egg as large as"148 hens eggs," needed to find a way out as quickly and unintrusively as possible. Carefully tying himself to the Roc's leg with his turban, Sinbad flew off hanging on for dear life. The bird flew so high the Earth vanished from sight. Finally, Sinbad escaped when the Roc returned to Earth and flew by an island. That was one high flying bird! 

   

This looks larger than 148 hens eggs.

The origin of the Roc can be found in the mythological Indian story about a fight between the half-human, half-eagle Garuda (who loved to snack on snakes), and the serpent Naga. According to German historian Rudolf Wittkower, Naga is a word that means both snake and elephant. Since the elephant has a long snake-like trunk, this makes sense.

Garuda was so huge, he could block out the sun.

There's another story about Garuda flying off with an elephant and tortoise caught engaging in a massive fight. This story is found in both the Sanskrit Mahabharata and the Ramayana. After carrying the squabblers away, Garuda ate the malcontents. I have no idea why the elephant and tortoise were fighting. In Indian myth, the world rests on the backs of four elephants, who in turn, are all standing on the back of a tortoise. The whole crowd slowly travel through various examples of chaos. You'd think with such cooperation transporting the world, elephants and tortoises would get along better. Perhaps familiarity breeds contempt.  

  It's possible the Roc myth was encouraged by skeletons of the Aepyornis. Extinct since the 17th century, "Elephant birds" reached a height of over 10 feet and weighed nearly half a ton. These massive, though obviously flightless, birds may have been perceived as Aepyornis chicks. If that's the chick, I wouldn't want to meet the parents! The ostrich is another feasible baby Roc inspirer. 

     

An Aepyornis egg compared to a chicken egg.

I'll end this post with a quote about the Roc by Marco Polo (1254-1324). Polo was a merchant from the Venetian Republic who wrote extensively about Central Asia and China. 

Marco Polo saw many colorful things.

"It was for all the world like an eagle, but one indeed of enormous size, so big in fact that its quills were twelve paces long and thick in proportion. And it was so strong that it will sieze an elephant in its talons and carry him high into the air and drop him so that he is smashed to pieces; having so killed him, the bird swoops down on him and eats him at his leisure." 

The Roc was a tempermental bird best not to make angry. Keep this in mind if you ever encounter an unusually large egg. The huge Roc was known for destroying ships in revenge if its egg was tampered with. Confine yourself to chicken eggs for your breakfast meal.