Few creatures have been more terrifying for centuries than the Basilisk. This monster has frightened people in Europe and North Africa for thousands of years.
Like many ancient monsters, it is a strange hybrid: a snake that hatches from an egg laid by a rooster and hatched by a toad.
For the first time, information about the Basilisk appears in Pliny the Elder in his "Natural History". He says that the creature has no more than twelve fingers in length, it has a white spot on its head that resembles a kind of diadem. When the Basilisk hisses, the snakes try to hide from him. And he does not move his body like ordinary snakes, displacing it in waves to the left and right, but rises in the middle, bends and thus moves. It breaks stones, burns grass with its breath, and has many other unusual properties.
Anomaly researcher and writer Mike Dash says that there were many lesser-known beliefs about the Basilisk.
So, it was believed that if a man on horseback kills a Basilisk with a spear, the poison will rise in arms and kill not only the warrior, but also his horse. But in nature, nothing can remain without an antidote.
For the Basilisk, the breath of the weasel turns out to be fatal, which has been proven many times, since many kings wanted to see the body of a dead monster. The way to hunt him is as follows: take a weasel and throw it into the Basilisk's hole. There, the smell of weasel kills the Basilisk, however, and the weasel itself dies in the process.
A similar story is told by Leonardo Da Vinci. He said that the monster is twelve fingers long, scares the snake with its whistle, resembles a snake, but moves differently. And the stones themselves crack from his breath.
One of the most remarkable sightings of the Basilisk was made in Warsaw in 1587. The basilisk was hiding in the wine cellar of the house, which was suspected of spreading the plague from there. The five-year-old daughter of the knife maker Macheropeus mysteriously disappeared along with another little girl. Mother and nanny tirelessly searched for her. When the nanny looked into the underground cellar of the house, which had been turned into ruins thirty years earlier, she saw the children lying motionless on the floor. They did not answer her calls, when the woman no longer had the strength to scream, she began to make her way down the stairs. Right in front of Macheropeus's wife, she suddenly fell to the floor and stopped moving. The woman decided not to go any further, but instead informed the townspeople about the strange incidents. Many then thoughtthat the air had become too dense in the basement and they could not breathe. But others were convinced that the Basilisk lurked underground.
Promotional video:
GUSAKOVA IRINA YURIEVNA