Unicorns, China
In Chinese mythology, the unicorn, first mentioned in the 5th century BC, had a voice like the ringing of a thousand bells, radiated an exquisite color, avoided fighting at any cost, and moved silently. It had one horn almost four meters long. Unicorns have played a central role in the country's mythology. Since the first mention in documents, the mysterious one-horned creature, the kilin, as the Chinese called them, has appeared in a number of works of the country. One of the emperors even assured that he caught a live unicorn in 122 BC.
Kilin is considered the embodiment of great power and wisdom, which manifests itself only in special times. According to legend, a unicorn will appear only when a great leader is to be born or die, or when the ruler was just and kind and ruled in peaceful and prosperous times.
Bigfoot, or Sasquatch, North America
The oldest mention of Bigfoot dates back to 986 BC. And there are still eyewitnesses who claim to be in North America. This enigmatic ape has been featured throughout the continent for the past two hundred years. Despite frequent visits, scholars reject its existence, claiming that Bigfoot is only part of folklore. Most of the reports about Bigfoot come from the residents of Oregon, so if you really want to be convinced of the truth of the legend, you can settle there, hoping to see the mythical creature with your own eyes.
Yeti, Himalayas
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There has not yet been a single convincing evidence that the Yetes exist, but people are observing the creature everywhere in the Himalayas - in Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, India. We met him in Mongolia, in the ski resorts of Spain. The stories of the Yeti are so ingrained in Himalayan folklore that real scientific research is carried out again and again to find out the truth about the bear man. Many respected climbers, such as Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, have claimed to have seen large and inexplicable footprints in the snow.
DNA tests on hair samples from two unidentified animals found in the Himalayas showed one hundred percent match with samples from an ancient polar bear jawbone found in Svalbard, Norway. These creatures could be a hybrid of a polar bear and a brown bear, which may explain why humans saw the Yeti stand upright.
Vampires, Romania
The fictional vampire character from Stoker's novel Dracula has a real prototype. It was the Romanian ruler Vlad III Tepes, who was quite bloodthirsty and severely punished his enemies. Transylvania is also not a fictional, but a very real place, distinguished by its special picturesqueness. The famous Bran Castle is now a tourist attraction in Transylvania, and although the author of the 1897 Gothic novel Dracula, Bram Stoker never visited Romania, he made the building the home of the book's protagonist. This marked the beginning of the formation of the region as the vampire capital of the world.
Vlad's sadistic reprisal against enemies was a very clever method of psychological warfare against powerful opponents. For example, when the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II invaded Wallachia, the Tepes region, he found nothing but the rotting remains of Ottoman prisoners strung on stakes. So Vlad frightened off the enemy, significantly outnumbering him.
Some historians claim that Vlad himself drank human blood, their interpretations are clearly erroneous. However, there is one 15th century German poem that describes how Tepes washed his hands in the blood of his victims before eating them.
Loch Ness Monster, Scotland
The local news reporter Inverness Courier started the story of Nessie in 1933. For several weeks, the creature was the main character of all the news in the world, and still interest in him has not faded. Many people have traveled and are traveling to Loch Ness to try to photograph the monster, or even capture it.
At some point, interest in Nessie became excessive, because the Secretary of State of Scotland instructed the local police to prevent attacks on the creature. There are a few photographs taken with telephoto lenses where there is little to see. There is no exact evidence of the existence of the monster.
Red Dragon, Wales
Any fan of "Game of Thrones" is fond of these creatures, so he reads the legends about them with interest. Take, for example, Welsh folklore, where the red dragon played a key role and made it to the country's flag.
According to one legend, the dragon was the fighting standard of King Arthur and other ancient Celtic leaders in the late 5th and early 6th centuries. According to another fascinating legend, a red dragon fought with a white one, their cries were so loud that the animals died, and the plants stopped bearing fruit. The king of the time decided to dig a hole in the center of Britain, fill it with honey and cover it with a cloth. The dragons drank the mead and fell into the pit. So they were buried in this place - wrapped in cloth. Several years later, King Vortigern attempted to build a castle at Dinas Emrys. Every night the walls and foundation of the castle collapsed for unknown reasons. The king's advisers explained that ending this requires a victim who grew up without a father. Wertigern's people returned with such a boy named Merlin (in the future, the famous wise wizard). Before he could be sacrificed, he said,that he knows the true reason for the collapse of the castle. According to him, there was a deep hole under it, in which two dragons lived, who fought every night.
The most interesting thing is that in 1945, Dinas Emrys was excavated by archaeologists who not only found an inexplicably deep basin, but also the ruins of a fortress dating back to the time of Vortigern. Frightened by the fact that on the walls of the fortress traces of repeated rebuilding were clearly visible.
Ningen, Antarctica
They say their length reaches from 20 to 30 meters. They have "humanoid" appendages, including arms and legs with five fingers. They were first noticed by people on Japanese ships in the 1990s in Antarctica. Then they described completely white humanoid creatures floating underwater. By the way, the Japanese word “ningen” means “person”. But in other reports, it was already about creatures with tentacles, fins, tails, like those of mermaids, slit mouths.
For a while, they even talked about the existence of videos in which the ningen were captured. Despite this, many are skeptical of their existence, arguing that people have probably seen other albino ocean inhabitants - whales or rays. Belugas and whales are the most likely candidates for misidentification, as they often swim to Antarctica.
Ekaterina Pastukhova