SPHINX

SPHINX

"There are unpleasant tales of the Sphinx before Khephren—but whatever its elder features were, the monarch replaced them with his own that men might look at the colossus without fear."

"The Great Sphinx! God!—that idle question I asked myself on that sun-blest morning before . . . what huge and loathsome abnormality was the Sphinx originally carven to represent? Accursed is the sight, be it in dream or not, that revealed to me the supreme horror—the Unknown God of the Dead, which licks its colossal chops in the unsuspected abyss, fed hideous morsels by soulless absurdities that should not exist. The five-headed monster that emerged . . . that five-headed monster as large as a hippopotamus . . . the five-headed monster—and that of which it is the merest fore paw. . . ."

H.P. Lovecraft & Harry Houdini, Under the Pyramids 

"The Sphinx was described as having the body and legs of a lion, with the wings of an eagle and its foreparts being the head and torso of a beautiful young woman."

Carol Rose, Giants, Monsters & Dragons

GENIE/DJINN

GENIE/DJINN

"The Genie that haunts the moonbeams spake to the Demon of the Valley, saying, 'I am old, and forget much. Tell me the deeds and aspect and name of them who built these things of Stone.' And the Demon replied, 'I am Memory, and am wise in lore of the past, but I too am old. These beings were like the waters of the river Than, not to be understood. Their deeds I recall not, for they were but of the moment. Their aspect I recall dimly, it was like to that of the little apes in the trees. Their name I recall clearly, for it rhymed with that of the river. These beings of yesterday were called Man.'"
H.P. Lovecraft, Memory 

"They mostly take the shape of a gigantic human but may be invisible or take other shapes, such as that of a vast and grotesque beast."  

 "Their deception may be detected because they will have vertical eyes and the feet of a goat or a camel."

 Carol Rose, Giants Monsters and Dragons

"Surely, I shall fill Hell with jinns and men all together." 

The Noble Qur'an, Huud 11:119

CHIMAERA

CHIMAERA 

"You recall that Pickman’s forte was faces. I don’t believe anybody since Goya could put so much of sheer hell into a set of features or a twist of expression. And before Goya you have to go back to the mediaeval chaps who did the gargoyles and chimaeras on Notre Dame and Mont Saint-Michel."  

H.P. Lovecraft, Pickman's Model  

“Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimaeras—dire stories of Celaeno and the Harpies—may reproduce themselves in the brain of superstition—but they were there before. They are transcripts, types—the archetypes are in us, and eternal."  

Charles Lamb, Witches and Other Night-Fears (H.P. Lovecraft, The Dunwich Horror)   

"First he sent him away with orders to kill the Khimaira none might approach; a thing of immortal make, not human, lion-fronted and snake behind, a goat in the middle, and snorting out the breath of the terrible flame of bright fire." 

Homer, The Iliad  

Her heads were three: one was that of a glare-eyed lion, one of a goat, and the third of a snake, a powerful drakon." 

Hesiod, Theogony 

SHAMIR

SHAMIR

"And when We decreed death for him, nothing showed his death to them save a creeping creature of the earth which gnawed away his staff. And when he fell, the jinn saw clearly how, if they had known the Unseen, they would not have continued in despised toil."

The Quran 34:14

"Allah tells us how Sulayman, peace be upon him, died and how Allah concealed his death from the Jinn who were subjugated to him to do hard labor. He remained leaning on his stick, which was his staff, as Ibn `Abbas may Allah be pleased with him, Mujahid, Al-Hasan, Qatadah and others said. He stayed like that for a long time, nearly a year. When a creature of the earth, which was a kind of worm, ate through the stick, it became weak and fell to the ground. Then it became apparent that he had died a long time before. It also became clear to Jinn and men alike that the Jinn do not know the Unseen as they (the Jinn) used to imagine and tried to deceive people."

Ibn Kathir, The Death Of Sulayman

"They told him schamir was a worm of the size of a barley corn, but so powerful that the hardest flint could not resist him."

"Solomon cut the stones of the temple with the blood of a little worm called thamir, which when sprinkled on the marble, made it easy to split. And the way in which Solomon obtained the worm was this. He had an ostrich, whose chick he put in a glass bottle. Seeing this, the ostrich ran to the desert, and brought the worm, and with its blood fractured the vessel."

Sabine Baring-Gould, Curious Myths Of the Middle Ages

 "In Arabic tradition Solomon, under instructions from Gabriel, has recourse to a worm when he desires to bore through a pearl, and to a white worm when he wishes to thread the onyx."

The Jewish Encyclopedia

BURAQ

 

BURAQ

"Buraq was a riding beast smaller than a mule and larger than an ass, having a face like that of a human being and ears like those of an elephant; its mane was like the mane of a horse; its neck and tail like those of a camel; its breast like the breast of a mule; its feet like the feet of an ox or, according to one tradition, like those of a camel; its hooves were like the hooves of an ox. Its breast looked just like a ruby and its hair resembled white armour, shining brightly by reason of its exceeding purity. On its flanks it had two wings which hid its legs. The swiftness of this riding beast was such that in a single stride it could reach as far as eye could see."

Muhammad Khwandamir, Habib As-Sijar Vol. I Part III

SI'LAH

SI’LAH

"The si‘lah is a variant of the ghul. This djinn is often referred to in the feminine. She resides in jungles and thickets and lays in ambush for her victims. She is described as a wicked and sadistic djinn who tortures her prey, plays games with him, and makes him dance before consuming him."

"The si’luwa is a variant of the s’ilah from Iraq. She is a water demon or water spirit that inhabits the rivers, streams, and canals of Mesopotamia. She has the shape of a woman and is covered in long hair, has pendulous breasts that hang down to her knees, and in some accounts, she is described as having a fishtail instead of legs. She both sets traps for and hunts humans to eat and also seeks human lovers. Local beliefs state that the si’luwa is the product of the intermingling of humans with river demons."
Adam Ali, Demons, Djinns, and Devils of the Medieval Islamic World

ROC

ROC 

"This is the name of an enormous bird, also known as the Rukh, in the legends of Arabia and Middle Eastern countries around the Persian Gulf. The Roc is described as a vast bird that resembled an enormous eagle or vulture, although some accounts say that it is part lion. It was said to have horns on its head and to have such a  huge wingspan and talons that it could grasp an elephant easily and transport it back as food for its young."

Carol Rose, Giants, Monsters and Dragons

DĪV

DĪV

“Dīv in Iranian folktales may act as villains, sorcerers, ogres, fools, or helpers of the protagonist. They may be summoned for help when a bit of their hair, which has been left with the hero for this purpose, is put into the fire. Demons of the folktales may be many headed and come in different colors: white, yellow, and black. They have a tendency to alternate long periods of wakefulness and sleep, each lasting several days, and to become sleepy in sunlight. Typically this unfortunate habit proves to be their undoing. They are capable of magic and transformation.”  Mahmoud Omidsalar, Encyclopaedia Iranica

MANTICORE

MANTICORE

"The martichora was allegedly a blue-eyed, human-faced wild beast, the size of the largest lion, with cinnabar-red fur. It has three rows of teeth, feet and claws like lions. It also had a scorpion-like tail with a (main) terminal sting that measured over 1 cubit, plus two rows of auxiliary stings, each a Greek foot long. The sting was instantly fatal. The stings could be fired sideways, forward, or backward, by orienting the tail accordingly, up to a 1 plethron distance range, and these stings regenerated afterwards. Only the elephant was immune to the poison. And it overcomes every beast except the lion."

Photius, Myriobiblon

GHADDAR

GHADDAR

"Al-Qazwini mentions this djinn briefly and states that its kind inhabits Yemen and the coastal regions of Egypt. It lures its victims to itself and then assaults them. The outcome of this assault could be mild or severe. Lebling states that this demon either tortures its victims viciously or just terrifies them. Al-Qazwini is more explicit, he says that this djinn is either satisfied by terrifying its victim into a state of shock."

"A more extreme outcome of an encounter with the ghaddar, according to al-Qazwini, is that this monster sexually assaults its victims and that there is seldom any hope for survivors of such an assault because the ghaddar has a phallus like a bull’s horn that can kill a human. This djinn must have a terrifying appearance, unfortunately as-Qazwini does not describe any of its physical characteristics other than its phallus."

Adam Ali, Demons, Djinns, and Devils of the Medieval Islamic World