Legends and names referring to a special type of unicorn or mysterious beast with one horn, as opposed to the delicate imaginary unicorns of Europe based on narwhal horns, are scattered across the former range of Elasmotherium from China to Eastern Europe. They have been noted there since the first known literature of the Middle
If giraffes and zebras could mate, their offspring would look like an Okapi. This strange looking creature has striped legs like a zebra but the face of a giraffe. Its neck is much shorter than a giraffe, but like its cousin, it has an extremely long tongue, which can reach lengths of up to 12
For centuries, westerners heard tales of a giant ape living in the jungles of Africa. The creature was called “enge-ena” by locals, and was rumored to be larger and stronger than a man. But it wasn’t until 1847, when an American missionary managed to procure a skull and some bones of the creature that science
Giant squids can grow up to 43 feet in length and may have been one of the inspirations behind the kraken, a many-armed sea monster in Norwegian myth. In September 2005, Japanese researchers baited and filmed a live specimen in its natural ocean habitat for the first time. The creature struggled for four hours before finally
In 1938, a South African museum curator was sorting through the local fishermen’s daily catch and looking for unusual creatures when she spotted a coelacanth, an ancient fish thought to be extinct for millions of years and known only through fossils. As with many cryptids, the coelacanth was well known to local inhabitants, who called the
Also known as the Tasmanian tiger or wolf, the thylacine was a large meat-eating marsupial that lived in Australia. It had a long, stiff tail, dark stripes on its back and rump, and a pouch similar to other marsupials like the koala and kangaroo. It was driven to extinction by human activity and the introduction
