Rare Monsters

   The Ziz is a giant bird from Jewish mythology. It also appeared in earlier versions of the bible, but has since been edited out. The Ziz was one of the archetypal animals, like the Leviathan and Behemoth. As Leviathan was the king of the sea creatures and Behemoth the king of the beasts, Ziz was king of the birds. The Ziz was said to look like a gryphon. Its exact appearance beyond that is left vague, other than its great size, which is discussed in two stories. One story said there were some sailors who saw a giant bird standing in the water when they were out at sea. The water was only ankle deep on the bird, and it was so massive its head towered into the heavens. The sailors assumed the water must be shallow there where the bird stood, so they planned on bringing their ship ashore and swim in the water. God called out to the sailors and told them, “Do not stop there. That bird is the mighty Ziz, who towers above all beings. The water there is so deep once a carp...

Mesopotamia is a collection of some of the oldest civilizations on Earth. Written records date back 6000 years. Because of this some of the earliest examples of dragons can be found here. While the dragons of ancient Sumeria, Acadia, Babylon and Assyria may seam strange today, they were the origin of many of the tropes we associate with dragons even until today; things such as dragons being types of snakes, even though they have legs and wings; being venomous to the point of having poison blood, being winged, having seven heads; and having the limb combination of four legs and a set of wings (at least for one dragon). Although Mesopotamia did not distinguish dragons from other monsters, and would have listed them along side less reptilian beasts, such as giant birds and scorpion men. Because the Mesopotamian civilizations are so old very little information remains on each dragon. Compounding this problem is the fact that Mesopotamia was not one one civilizations but a culturally simila...