32 Mythical Creatures That Historians Believe Are Based in Reality

‘Albino deer are ethereal-looking and totally match the description of a unicorn’
32 Mythical Creatures That Historians Believe Are Based in Reality
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Sadly, for all of us, but especially lonely middle schoolers, dragons and unicorns aren’t real. There’s no chance that either is going to pull up to the window of your math class and carry you far away from the bullies and to a land of wonder. I can tell you this from personal experience, as someone who had a dragon on more of my childhood wardrobe than is recommended for social interaction.

Some creatures of legend, though, might be at least based in truth. We might not have Smaug perfectly as described, but we do have some ideas on what inspired him. In a thread on Reddit, historians and biologists shared their theories on mythical creatures that really existed, just in a slightly less fantastic, but misunderstood form.

hetep-di-isfet 6y ago Archaeologist here. There's a really interesting ancient Egyptian story called the Shipwrecked Sailor in which a man is washed ashore a beautiful island and is apprehended briefly by an enormous serpent. In the story, the serpent tells him that there used to be hundreds of others like him but a falling star wiped them all out. I think it's unlikely that the Egyptians had knowledge of dinosaurs, but there's a site called Wadi Hitan that has thousands of ancient whale skeletons from the Eocene. I think it's possible they could have seen these skeletons and mistaken them
smygartofflor 6y ago Beowulf, who is featured in one of the most important texts written in Old English, may very well have been real. The epic details what people Beowulf belonged to (the Geats, who resided in modern Götaland), and IIRC, battles which have taken place according to historians (particularly between the Geats and the Swedes). Most intriguing to me are the facts that the location of Beowulf's burial mound is included in the epic - and that there is what looks like a hill at that location in modern Sweden that has never been excavated.
another-social-freak . 6y ago Changlings (babies switched out by faries) were probably an early explanation for birth defects.
background voices 6y ago The Luska, giant octopus. It supposedly lives in the blue holes of the coast of Florida and the amount of food and temperature of water both support the theory of an octopus living long enough to grow way larger than we expect based on our current records
Daily_Dose13 . 6y ago I've heard of a hypothesis that states the Ragnarok myth actually describes an impact event. The Midgard snake could be an object entering the atmosphere.
raendum 6y ago Many myths about sea serpents probably stem from oarfishes. They look like sea serpents, are absolutely huge, live in almost every ocean and sometimes wash ashore. I got all that information from a River Monsters episode though. So take it with a grain of salt.
jamesianm . 6y ago I regularly get to see pods of humpback whales at the beach where I surf. Most of the time, all you see is their backs as they partially surface from the water. Occasionally, one of them breaches mouth-first, so you see a giant mouth emerge from the water. Other times, you see a giant tail emerge. If you were watching them and had no idea what a whale was, or that you were looking at multiple of them, I could easily imagine mistaking multiple whale backs as the coils of a colossal snake. I strongly suspect
Axelrad77 6y ago Edited 6y ago Arthur From the legendary people side of things, King Arthur was certainly someone who actually existed, albeit in a much different form than modern audiences would be familiar with. The earliest mentions of him are as a historical British king who lived during the 5th Century - he's in a king list, he's mentioned as winning a series of decisive battles against the Saxons, and his excellent swordsmanship is referenced once. And that's about it.
RimeSkeem 6y ago Very simple mythological creatures like black dogs were probably exaggerated stories of encountering wild dogs in the dead of night. They're often described as having glowing eyes which isn't an unusual effect when torchlight is reflected in dogs' or cats' eyes. The black dog spirits/myths of the British Isles are also likely the Grimm Professor Trelawny was talking about in The Prisoner of Azkaban.
LameOCallahan 6y ago There are many diseases that the origin of the 'Vampire/Vampyr' myth can be traced back to however I think rabies fits it the most. In the olden days, people would tie those suspected of it to trees, in about three days time the disease would drastically change them. Extreme light sensitivity, paleness, aggression, excessive drooling. They could/would try to attack you and have bouts of either extreme slow fatigue or even adrenaline. Also, Rabies can be passed form person to person through a bite, not just an infected animal.
NerdGuy13 . 6y ago A roc could have been real. It was most likely inspired by the elephant bird of Madagascar. An elephant bird was like a big-ass ostrich about 9 feet high. They didn't go extinct until the 16th or 17th century.
Hattix 6y ago The cyclopes of Greek mythology. Go Google up an elephant skull. There's this huge hole right in the middle of it looking to all the world like a single eye. Now add this to the knowledge that the Cretan dwarf mammoth left subfossil bones on Crete easily discoverable, was one metre at the shoulder, and could be more or less assembled into a giant humanoid.
carleslaorden 6y ago The Kraken. The mythological and terrifying creature that lived on the Nordic seas. The legend never clearified if it was a giant squid or anything else, but its the most accurate thing. The legend may have been created by people divising the bodies of Giant Squids, 16m long, and they supposed it was a deadly monster. The Kraken was born.
6y ago The Norwegians invented high carbon steel when they were making swords they would out the bones of predators into the molten metal which added carbon. The fact that they didn't grasp the scientific concept made it even more metal.
AvatarTreeFiddy 6y ago The Mãori people of New Zealand have long told stories of the Pouakai, a monstrous bird that was big enough to hunt and eat humans. Many believe that these stories are referring to the Haast's Eagle. It was the largest species of eagle ever to have lived on Earth, with weights of around 30 lbs and wingspans almost reaching 10 feet. It lived on New Zealand's South Island and primarily hunted the flightless moa bird, which weighed around 500 lbs. Given the large size of its main prey, it's likely that the eagle may have also targeted
WyoGirl79 . 6y ago Chupacabra. It has to be some poor sick animal with mange. Mange is highly contagious so if a pack of coyotes or wild dogs got it they would all have a weird ass appearance and attack other animals out of hunger.
PlagueDilopho 6y ago Edited 6y ago Sorry that I'm not-so-well versed on the human history side of this, but hundreds of years ago, the scottish warriors had myths about their ancestors being giant, brutish warriors. It turns out, what happened is that the scots found fossils of prehistoric bears- which, especially to someone who doesn't understand anatomy as well as modern man, look surprisingly humanoid. They didn't know about prehistoric life, so they assumed these were their ancestors and gave them traditional burials with custom armour and weapons to honour them. You can imagine how the palaeontologists felt when they
6y ago The Wendigo probably existed, just not as a creature. People in the far north who survived a brutal winter by eating a family member had a psychological escape hatch for the guilt and horror by convincing themselves they were transforming into a ravenous, murderous beast. Theyd continue killing and eating in a hysteric delusion that they had no control over it. Wendigo hunters would then have to come and kill them and perform a shamanic ritual to assure the rest of the tribe that the taint wouldn't spread.
elcasaurus . 6y ago There's a small population of albino deer in my area and they are beautiful. Definitely ethereal looking and totally match the European description of a unicorn.
BonMotleyBeaucoup 6y ago The Piasa Bird and the river panther ( ( Mishibijiw ) There was probably some species of large eel- like species that existed in the Mississippi River that has long gone extinct. There are too many concurrent myths describing similar-ish creatures from different places and cultures along the rivers in the North America.
crashlanding87 6y ago I'm actually a biologist, but this has nothing to do with that lol. My family is from Saudi Arabia. Back in the 40s, some tribal people still lived in these ancient caves on cliff sides, often in ravines, like they'd done for thousands of years. My uncle grew up in a town near one of those tribes - they had their own dialect of Arabic, and kept to themselves unless they needed something (usually medicine or something like that). Apparently his whole town thought the cliff people were Jinni - mythological fire spirits who can take human form - and so would never
drquakers 6y ago The Yeti. Recently they sequenced some DNA from so called Yeti evidence, they pretty much all turned out to be bears, some extinct, some still around. To me the most interesting one was the cross breed of the black bear and the polar bear.
7LeagueBoots 6y ago When I was working in the Amazon I was told of a creature called a Chullanchaqui. They make gardens in the forest, generally of all one species of plant and if you encounter them you are supposed to walk around them. If you must pass through you ask permission, walk through quickly, and don't touch anything. If you don't obey this the Chullanchaqui will attack you. Well, those forest gardens are the large hives of leaf-cutter ants and if you spend any time inside them or disturb the vegetation in them the ants will come out and
saintofbacchus 6y ago Edited 6y ago Alright as a historian, giants. They exist in some form over many cultures in history. My favorite story is about a Native American tribe that told the story of the giants that killed them to near extinction generations upon generations ago and how they were a horrible beast and quite large- all the characteristics of giant. Truth be told, and this is probably true of most legends/accounts of giants that it's just a height relative thing. A majority of a population was quite small back in the day- besides being easier to hide and
. 6y ago I feel this post is very similar to one a few weeks ago but w/e my comment is the same: Camelopard. Described as having the print of a leopard, with this body with a camel but an elongated neck and two mini backwards horns. Nowadays referred to as a Giraffe. many thought it was mythical in certain parts of the world.
All over the world, from Siberia to Australia, the Himalayas to Ohio, mankind has told stories of tall, bipedal apes that live in the forests. The First Nations of the Pacific Northwest call them the Sasquatch, the Nepalese call them Yeti, but today most people refer to them as Bigfoot. There was an entire line of humanoids called the robust Australopithecenes that evolved right alongside us. They were about nine feet fall, extremely muscular, hairy, omnivorous, and importantly lacked the big brain that we got. Because they mostly fed on things like roots, they were mostly arboreal upright apes that
Notgoodwiththeshaft . 6y ago Edited 6y ago Unicorns. It's just a rhinoceros. Now here me out, if anyone has seen any medieval drawings of real animals, like the elephant etc. When the Europeans described the rhino, and some of them had to draw it, they drew a horse with a horn, and voila!, the unicorn is born.
Tytration . 6y ago I thibk unfortunate people in the past with hair disorders where hair covers their body are the root cause of people thinking up the idea of warewolves. This, mixed with the likely solitary lifestyle they had because people found them scary, led to people thinking that they were less than human and it wasn't long before someone said they were an animal, or at least half animal.
. 6y ago Edited 6y ago The Banshee was never real. But lots of Irish parents came up with a story about a screaming woman that kept their kids terrified, and in their beds. The banshee's woeful wail meant kids had to stay in bed, or get stolen away. This story was told so that the parents in question could have sex. Loud sex. Because the kids would have heard their** mom's amorous moans and interpreted them as a ghostly call from beyond the grave. **(aka your)
gabiroba101 6y ago The believe on the existence of dragons started in Slovenia, where a cave animal, Proteus, which is a blind species of salamander, would be washed out from the caves to the surface during flooding periods. People used to believe they were baby dragons and their dragon mother would live inside the caves.
sweenydy 6y ago There are certain genus' of moths that switch from nectar to blood when nectar becomes rare. Species are known from eastern Europe. The moths don't have a needle like mouth like mosquitos. Instead they literally saw through the skin and drink the flowing blood. They are mainly active at night and due to their method, leave a hole where they drank blood. Humans are not an uncommon host. Perhaps some vampire stories have some of the roots in there.
a 6y ago If we accept that it actually existed, I believe that Goliath, of David & Goliath fame - might actually have been real - or at least, that it's possible he might have. Human gigantism is a well-known genetic mutation. The tallest KNOWN man in history was Robert P. Wadlow, who was 8ft 11in. It's perfectly possible that in pre-history, there was someone who was even taller, whose name is lost to the sands of time.

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