Cockatrice

Cerastus sp. A genus of wizardly fauna formerly only associated with Europe and Asia, but now also present on other continents.

Ancient and medieval peoples living in the range of the original cockatrice species were sufficiently confused about the origins of the beast that they concocted some truly bizarre stories to account for its genesis. The most popular of these, common all over Europe, was that the cockatrice hatched from a rooster's egg which had been incubated under a toad. One ancient chronicler preserves this account of the cockatrice's genesis and appearance:

"For they say that when a Cocke groweth old, he layeth a certaine egge without any shell, instead whereof it is covered with a very thicke skinne, which is able to withstand the greatest force of an easie blow or fall. They saye, moreover, that this egge is layd onely in the Summer time, about the beginning of the Dogge-dayes (between early July and early September), being not so long as a Hens Egge, but round and orbiculer:...sometimes of a yellowish muddy color... and afterward sat upon by a Snake or Toad, bringeth forth the Cockatrice, being halfe a foot in length, the hinder part like a snake, the former part like a Cocke, because of a treble comb on his forehead."

This image of the creature is one that persists to this day in Europe, and can be seen in various coats of arms there, particularly the arms of the city of Basel, in Switzerland.

Despite European mythological conventions, the cockatrice is not to be mistaken for the basilisk, which is another creature entirely -- an artificial construct routinely closely associated with the Lone Power.

(See also: Constructed life forms: