In cryptozoology and
sometimes in cryptobotany, a cryptid (from the Greek κρύπτω, krypto, meaning
"hide") is a creature or plant whose existence has been suggested but
is not recognized by scientific consensus.
One of my three favorite holidays is almost upon us,
Halloween, a day that can be traced by to the Celts and their festival of
Samhain. A day and night that straddles both the end of summer and the beginning
of winter. This symbolical linked the life of humanity and the cold death that
awaits all of us. The night they celebrated Samhain was a time when the veil
between the Otherworld and our world blurred and the haunts and spirits of both
the dead and creatures that reside in the Otherworld were allowed to enter
ours. It became a time when the Druids, Bards and Ovates seemingly were able to
foretell the future.
Over the course of centuries the Celtic day merged with the
Roman holidays of Feralia, a day in late October when the Romans traditionally
commemorated the passing of the dead. And also the holiday that celebrated
Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees.
However Pope Boniface IV dedicated the Pantheon in Rome in
honor of all Christian martyrs and the Catholic feast of All Martyrs Day was
established in the Western church. Then Pope
Gregory III expanded the festival to include all saints as well as all martyrs,
and moved the observance from May 13 to November 1.
So Halloween has been mixed and merged from three different
perspectives, but all are tied to the harvest and a celebration of the dead and
spirits of the Otherworld.
I can hear you, “Well that’s great, thanks for the brief
lesson, but what does that have to do with Cryptids?”
I am glad you asked. I
exchanged some emails with a friend of mine who enjoys horror and informed me
that he was going to the haunted house at Pennhurst. Pennhurst was originally known as the Eastern
Pennsylvania State Institution for the Feeble-Minded and Epileptic. A place
that has been on various paranormal television shows, where experts and hunters
seek the ghost of the departed.
Every year more and more people go to haunted houses, not
the stages shows designed to frighten with actors in costume. No people go to allegedly
haunted locations to hunt ghosts and monsters. People flock to abandoned prisons
and insane asylums seeking ghosts and shadow people, or head out to the Pine
Barrens in New Jersey to hunt the Jersey Devil. This is a physical creature that, as a writer
and amateur scientist, I can better understand and study.
The Jersey Devil, a mysterious creature whose origins are attributed
to a certain Mrs. Leeds, a resident of Estellville, New Jersey who was distraught when she learned
she was expecting for the thirteenth time. Yes, she had twelve children already
and the prospect of another child was daunting to say the least. In disgust, she howled, "Let it be the
devil!"
According to the legends once the child was birth it was indeed
a baby devil. With a large horses head,
bat wings, huge arms and wicked clawed hands. The creature had glowing eyes, with
which it spotted the mid-wife, slashing her to death, then immediately it gave
a screech, unfolded its wings and flew out the window and into the adjacent
swamp. Pretty spooky.
In 1938, the Jersey Devil was designated as the country’s
only state demon; the Jersey Devil is described as a mixture of animal
parts. It is a kangaroo-like creature
with the face of a horse, the head of a dog, large bat-like wings, horns and a
tail. For more than 250 years now this mysterious creature is said to stalk
through the marshes of Southern New Jersey and emerges periodically to rampage
through the towns and cities.
As a writer I love it. There are so many delicious elements
to craft a story around, to explore and develop. However as an amateur scientist
there are a lot of holes in the story, and the creature itself. I admit that
people over the last two centuries have reported some dubious sighting of the
creature. But what are they really
seeing. If it is a creature such as described, it surely would be an aberration.
A biological dead end since it would be in theory the only one of its species.
If it managed to survive over the centuries, I would expect there to be some
growth of the creature. However it retains a certain size, never growing
larger.
Now it is possible witnesses are seeing something new and
unique, or they may be simply seeing a normal creature and are misidentifying it.
I am not passing judgment one way or the other, but I am looking at it as a
writer. And I have questions that I need
answered in order to craft my creature.
What would the Jersey Devil live on? Does it have human intelligence
or animal? Since it is a flyer, does it travel to warmer environs during the
winters? This leads me to the only other sighting of something similar to the
Jersey Devil, the mysterious Mothman of Point Pleasant, West Virginia. Is there
a connection?
According to eye-witness reports, the creature stands between
five and seven feet tall, was wider than a man and shuffles on human-like legs.
The large red eyes are set near the top of the shoulders and it has bat-like
wings that glided, rather than flaps, as it flies. It appears to be able to
ascend straight up “like a helicopter”. Witnesses also describe its murky skin
as being either gray or brown and it emits a humming sound when it flies. The
Mothman is incapable of speech and gives off a screeching sound
The Mothman is also said to have either been the cause of or
a warning to the 700-foot bridge linking Point Pleasant to Ohio collapsing while
filled with rush hour traffic on December 15, 1967. Dozens of vehicles plunged
into the frigid waters of the Ohio River and 46 people lost their lives in the tragedy.
Are these the same creature?
I don’t know. In science you never say something is impossible, so it is
possible they are the same creature or related creatures. Or perhaps they are simply misidentified
creatures, grown into fearsome monsters by the human mind created by the primal
fear that we have of the dark? As a
writer, I love these stories. They give me a better understanding of what
people fear.
