Mythical Creatures

The Mystery of the Unicorn : The Unicorn is one of the most mysterious of all animals. It has been glorified in folk tales, songs, poems, and stories for centuries; and it remains one of the great "unsolved mysteries" of the world. Despite the widely held belief in its existence, it has not been seen in centuries ; and the popular Eastern image from Chinese folklore is very different from the familiar Western image of a white horse-like creature. The only consistent fact is that a Unicorn has a single horn in the middle of its forehead. For true believers, the fact that it no longer exists only adds to the mystique; placing it in the same realm as the dinosaurs, the mammoth, and possibly such unknown creatures as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster. Others believe the Unicorn still exists in remote regions and can be discovered only by those of exceptional virtue and honesty. In the meantime, we can marvel at its beauty and pay tribute to its unique place in the culture and history of the world.

The Eastern Unicorn: The Unicorn has existed in Chinese mythology for thousands of years. It appears in many different forms, but the most familiar is a beast with the body of a deer, the tail of an ox, the hooves of a horse, and a single short horn growing out of the middle of its forehead. The hair on its back is five-colored to represent the five sacred Chinese colors: red, yellow, blue, white, and black. The hair on its belly is yellow. In some accounts, it has green scales like a dragon. The Chinese Unicorn is known as Kilin (pronounced chee-lin), which is a combination of both Ki, the male Unicorn, and Lin, the female Unicorn. It is careful not to tread on even the tiniest living thing and will eat only plant life that is no longer living. It lives for 1,000 years. The Kilin is said to spring from the earth and is revered as one of the four superior animals of good omen (together with the phoenix, the dragon, and the tortoise) that foretell future events and represent the basic elements of life...

The mermaid and merman legends begin with the worship of gods as have many mythologies. This information has been divided into three different categories to help save time in your browsing and to establish simple guidelines to see different periods in the mythology of mermaids. The earliest representations and descriptions of these now well known creatures can be traced back as far as the eighth century BC. .

The three stages of mermaid mythology:  Merfolk as Gods :- a look at the birth of the mermaid mythology and how it began as pagan water deities and supernatural female water beings. Merfolk and Christianity :- the role of the mermaid mythology changed significantly with the growth of the Chirstian Church, this is a look at how and why the myth survived when so many other pagan deities didn't and what the new role of the mermaid was. Merfolk and the Rise of Science:- for a long time the mermaid was believed to have existed even by educated men, with the rise of science and the Enlightenment the tides turned back to try and disprove the existence of such a creature as the mermaid. This being done the role of mermaids changed yet again.

Merfolk as Gods: The Babylonians were known to worship a sea-god called Oannes, or Ea. Oannes was reputed to have risen from the Erythrean Sea and taught to man the arts and sciences. In the Louvre today can be seen an eighth century wall-scene depicting Oannes as a merman, with the fish-like tail and the upper body of a man. The Syrians and the Philistines were also known to have worshipped a Semitic mermaid moon-goddess. The Syrians called her Atargatis while the Philistines knew her as Derceto. It is not unusual or surprising that this moon-goddess was depicted as a mermaid as the tides ebbed and flowed with the moon then as it does now and this was incorporated into the god-like personifications that we find in their art and the ancient literature. Atargatis is one of the first recorded mermaids and the legend says that her child Semiramis was a normal human and because of this Atargatis was ashamed and killed her lover. Abandoning the infant she became wholly a fish...

Written by Megan Balanck

Introduction: Are dragons and serpents merely fabrications of the boundless human imagination, or do they represent something of great spiritual significance for all cultures?
Many are the fabulous beasts created in the stories by human kind. For thousands of years, we have told of fantastic creatures of supernatural powers, some of the forces of good and others of the forces of evil. But of all these sensational monsters, none has slithered into as many of man's legends than dragons and serpents.

Dragons and serpents vary in description according to culture, although many striking features are retained throughout the written, oral and artistic traditions of the world. They are usually depicted as gigantic snake-like reptiles, with a long, sinuous body armoured in either green, blue or red scales. The head is typically massive, with a broad mouth full of enormous, sharp teeth and a long, forked tongue. The snout is long and sometimes horned; the eyes are usually very large and cold. Often, these creatures possess long ears and a frilled neck, resembling either a crest of feathers or webbed skin. The body itself is usually decorated with an array of small, triangular spines extending from the head down the back to the long, barbed tail. Dragons normally posses four, short limbs with long claws, although some serpents have no legs at all. In some cultures, dragons are also equipped with enormous, bat-like wings; in others, they have the ability to breathe fire. They can live in mountains, caves, seas, lakes and even the heavens.

The Dragon of the Orient: Just as their appearances differ from culture to culture, dragons and serpents represent many contrasting ideas for different groups of people. Dragons are perhaps most well recognised in Chinese tradition. The Chinese recognised the dragon as one of the four sacred creatures to contain all elements of yin and yang - dark and light - in addition to the Phoenix, the Unicorn and the Turtle. The Chief of all scaly creatures, the dragon symbolised wisdom, strength, goodness and the element Water.

From time to time, if you're paying attention to such things or just happen to be in the right place at the right time, you may hear a story that is weird even by weirdness standards. Some years ago, on a pleasant summer evening over a campfire at a state park in South Dakota, a ranger told me that a couple camping there had once made a very strange complaint. They reported, to all appearances seriously, that a strange animal had come tearing into their recreational vehicle and done extensive damage before fleeing. It looked, they said, like something half human and half horse. The ranger didn't tell me if they used the word 'centaur,' butthen he hadn't talked with them personally.

This was just a story that had circulated for some time among park employees. No names and specific dates were attached to it. It was really no more than a local legend. There was no way to know if it was or was not based on an actual claim or incident of some sort. Nonetheless, it was undeniably interesting, and it was good for a chilling sensation down the spine. Too Strange to Believe? Once in a great while stories like this rise into print. Buried somewhere in my files is a short article from a small British Fortean magazine recounting rumors of centaur sightings in rural England. I don't recall that anything was particularly documented or compelling, but if people can see merbeings, asthey used to think they could, I suppose sightings (however one chooses to define that word) of centaurs are at least theoretically possible. If one separates experience from event, which I believe is often the wise course when one hears extraordinary personal claims, centaurs may be experienced, that is, may seem real in memory and testimony, if unprovable elsewhere.In the same way, reports of fairy encounters may seem compelling when they come from persons who to every appearance are sincere and sane, but they ought not to persuade us that we share the world with such entities. Some things seem to be there only as long as you are experiencing them, when they have the resonance even if not the substance of reality, and then they're gone,waiting to. ...