In Ivan T. Sanderson’s 1960 Saturday Evening Post article, “Riddle of the Frozen Giants,” he wrote of his catastrophic astronomical theory to explain the frozen mammoths and frozen wooly rhinos. Sanderson was laughed at for his thoughts. But was he right, after all? Sanderson’s claims were frequently debunked because, among other items, mammoths were supposedly said to have rotten before they froze. But were some of his basics grounded, instead, in good data and logic? Ivan T. Sanderson (above), Charles Hapgood, and Immanuel Velikovsky may be on their way to finally being partially vindicated by a small research announcement, which [...]
Croft’s New Glyptodont
The extinct armored mammals known as “glyptodonts” are an intriguing group of giant armadillos. They are found as replicas easily from Schleich (above) labeled simply as Glyptodon, and from Safari (below), as Doedicurus. Bernard Heuvelmans writes in On the Track of Unknown Animals of the discoveries of glyptodont carapaces being used as shelters or for tombs of Pleistocene humans in South America. He notes that great controversy surrounds whether such demonstrates that the humans were there earlier than expected, or the glyptodonts survived later than they were thought to be extinct. The obvious notion that the humans of 15,000 years [...]
Dwarf Hippo Fossils Discovered
Paleontologists have unearthed an estimated 80 dwarf hippo’ fossils in recent digs at the site just outside the resort of Ayia Napa on Cyprus’ southeastern coast. The dwarf hippopotamuses were herbivores, like their modern cousins, but were only about 2 1/2 feet (0.76 m) tall and 4 feet long (1.21 m). Unlike modern hippos, whose upturned nostrils seem designed for swimming, “Cypriot hippos” had low-slung nostrils better suited to foraging on land. Scientists said the fossils show the Cypriot hippos had legs and feet adapted to land, enabling them to stand on their hind legs to reach tree branches. Experts [...]
Hobbits Foe Teuku Jacob Has Died
I have learned, belatedly, of the death a month ago of the major critic of the separate uniqueness of the Homo floresiensis species. Professor Teuku Jacob (December 6, 1929 – October 17, 2007) of the Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta, Java, has died. One of the main arguments from Homo floresiensis debunker Teuku Jacob had been that the little people were merely representatives of the local people and/or microcephalics in the local population. Jacob came under fire during the debate for his mishandling of the fossils when they were loaned to him. Professor Teuku Jacob not only allegedly destroyed some [...]
Doctoral Pupil & Darren Discover Dino
A dino in the dungeon? This is more big news from the forgotten basements one finds in museums, the hidden vaults and dingy dungeons that delight those that look in them. What was discovered?: Merely a brand new dinosaur. It will forever be known as Xenoposeidon proneneukos Taylor & Naish, 2007. Congratulations to our buddy Darren Naish and his student. Doctoral pupil Mike Taylor (above and below with the fossil specimen) and Darren Naish, Ph. D., have identified this dinosaur bone in the National History Museum of London’s collection as belonging to a new family of sauropod dinosaur. Darren Naish, [...]
No Mystery In These Photos
Over the last two days, I’ve been getting inquiries about the identification of two objects in some recent photographs. One supposedly “cryptid” that has been shown to me is this animal (below) being featured in the Russian media. Said to be a “Prehistoric Fish,” it reportedly was “found in Russia, during construction near an underground river in Chelyabinsk city. The workers killed it and these are the remains.” Apparently, someone is having a little fun with pictures and sizing. This animal is actually a small species, the Triops (notostracans), the so-called tadpole shrimp or shield shrimp. While an aggressive predator, [...]
Two Ancient Apes Discovered
Above, one of the most famed of the ancient apes, Proconsul africanus (Dryopithecus). A 10 million-year-old jawbone and teeth discovered in Kenya may represent a new species very close to the last common ancestor of gorillas, chimpanzees and humans, according to a study published in the U.S. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on November 12, 2007. Researchers from the Primate Research Institute of the Kyoto University in Japan found the jawbone, along with 11 teeth in volcanic mud flow deposits in the Nakali region of Kenya, in 2005. The last time a hominoid fossil of this period was [...]
Replica Cryptia: Giant Ground Sloths
Photographs of the replicas under examination, in most cases, are generously shared by Dave Plenn of The Dinosaur Farm, who retains all copyrights to the images. Today, at Replica Cryptia, the representations examined are those of the Giant Ground Sloth or Megatherium. In recent years, replicas of this species of Amazonian megafauna have become significant in the search for the Mapinguary. The Mapinguary has been discussed cryptozoologically since the 1950s-1960s, for instance, by Frank W. Lane in Nature Parade, by Bernard Heuvelmans in On the Track of Unknown Animals), and by Ivan T. Sanderson in Abominable Snowmen: Legend Come to [...]
Megalania
Does a Komodo Dragon-type monitor roam the fringes of the Outback of Australia? Is there a surviving population of a huge species of the family Varanidae in Oz? Rex Gilroy thinks so, and he rolls the name off his tongue with ease, Megalania, the man eating giant lizard:
Cryptid: Code Beyond Cryptozoology
The Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts held their Twenty-First Annual Conference in Portland, Maine, on November 1-4, 2007. It was called SLSA ’07: CODE. The conference was intellectually stimulating and extremely academic. One paper read told of ground-breaking implications for cryptozoology, as the term “cryptid” explodes beyond the boundaries of our field. But more of that later. Professor Susan McHugh, from her university website. I was humbled to be an invited guest of one of the conference organizers, the University of New England’s Susan McHugh, the author of Dog (Reaktion, 2004). McHugh is someone well aware of cryptozoology [...]
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