Job had his problems, one of them being his talkative friends who knew all the answers. . They came to grief when they mentioned the monsters towards the end of the poem. I think I can help them. When they found themselves confused about the creatures nobody would want to meet on a dark and stormy night they might bear in mind the crocopotamos. He was a cross between a crocodile and a hippopotamus. Together they make humans tremble. Come to think of it, they make me tremble – and I am their only begetter.
Medieval man was fascinated as well as repelled by predatory animals. The result was a number of bestiaries. In them we find legendary creatures as well as those having a credible existence. We meet the griffin, the roc, the phoenix, the unicorn, the kraken, the centaur, the mermaid, the dragon.
There was every incentive to invent these creatures. For one thing they had never seen one but a combination of animals they had seen was a reasonable guess about what might be ouit there in the undergrowth or the ocean. They also liked some time off after the severe investigation by Aristotle and others. This disallowed guess-work and countenanced only observation, anticipating the methods of the Enlightenment.
For those interested in legendary creatures there will be books and sightings to engage their interest. There will be no prizes for those whose appetite wanes. Our imaginations need material to work on. The Christian era has given birth not to weird and wonderful animals but to paintings, poems and plays with characters so compelling that they all but outdo the real thing. We have Bunyan, Tolkien, Lewis and others who have embodied this principle. And we have Milton. Milton brought the angels to life and introduced some scale into our thinking.
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