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Revision as of 17:33, 27 January 2011 by Beastmaster (talk | contribs)

The Peryton is a fabulous animal which combines physical features of a stag and a bird. The beast is said to originate from the lost continent of Atlantis and played an instrumental role in the fall of Rome.

Peryton.jpg

Description/Morphology

Often depicted as a winged deer, the peryton was said to have the head, neck, legs and antlers of a stag, combined with the plumage, wings and body of a large bird. Other times it is depicted as a bird with a stag's head or alternately with the front of a deer and the back of an eagle. The feathers were either green or light blue in color. Some legends tell that the shadow of a peryton, instead of being that of a winged deer, was the shadow of a man. This led many scholars of the day to assume that these creatures were the spiritual manifestations of travelers who had perished far from the shores of home, away from the protection of their gods. Other explanations for their origin claim that they are the reincarnated souls of murderers, the remnants of Atlanteans who escaped the island's destruction, or the vengeful spirits of drowned sailors. However, the last three are almost certainly modern inventions and have no connection with the original story around the creature. While the creature appears harmless, perytons are hunters of humans, swooping down on victims and tearing them up before washing its feathers in the blood of the mangled corpse. After this is done, the peryton's shadow will change to the shadow of a winged deer and the animal will fly away, forbidden to kill again, as only one victim is needed to regain favor.


Behavior

One alleged account, which was chronicled by an unnamed rabbi in Fez during the 16th century, states that the Roman general Publius Cornelius Scipio encountered these beasts near the Strait of Gibraltar sometime between 237 and 183 BC, while on his way to Carthage. According to this rabbinic historian, Scipio and his soldiers were attacked by a flock of these animals, who seemed impervious to their weapons.

The perytons descended upon the ships, attacking the sailors, tearing them up with their fangs, hooves, and antlers, and wallowing in their blood before retreating into the skies. However, after completing this gruesome ritual, a peryton's shadow would again match its own body, and it would be free to fly away and live the rest of its life in peace. Each peryton had to kill one man before its soul would be set at ease, and this probably limited the slaughter. The outcome of the battle was unrecorded.

Besides attacking people, perytons have been recorded as feeding on dry sand.

History/Beliefs

The earliest verifiable account of the peryton occurs in Jorge Luis Borges' Book of Imaginary Beings, in which he refers to a now-lost medieval manuscript as a source. Both the word and the monster are completely unknown in sources from classical antiquity, its etymology is untraceable, and it is quite possible that Borges may have created the peryton himself.

Art/Fiction

A peryton closely matching Borges's original description is a minor villain in The Cinnabar Box, a fantasy novel by Ilil Arbel. Uniquely, this incarnation of the monster can use and understand human speech.

The peryton is often used as a type of stock enemy creature in games such as Star Ocean, Dungeons and Dragons, Final Fantasy and the Shadowrun role-playing game.

In the The Book of the New Sun series by Gene Wolfe, a constellation is named after the peryton.

In a Scrooge McDuck comic, "Mythological Menagerie," Donald Duck uses cardboard wings to disguise a normal deer as a peryton to trick Huey, Dewey, and Louie.

A herd of perytons with golden fur and antlers laced with poison attack the main characters in the book Fablehaven: Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary while fleeing a dragon.

A murderous peryton named Orfeo is a major villain in the fantasy novel Whiskey and Water by Elizabeth Bear.

Swarms of cat-sized perytons are natural enemies of the unicorns in Peter S. Beagle's fantasy novel The Unicorn Sonata.

Quote

The Sibyl of Erythraea, it is said, foretold that the city of Rome would finally be destroyed by the Perytons. In the year A.D. 642 the record of the Sibyl's prophecies was consumed in the great conflagration of Alexandria; the grammarians who undertook the task of restoring certain charred fragments of the nine volumes apparently never came upon the special prophecy concerning the fate of Rome. In time it was deemed necessary to find a source that would throw greater light upon this dimly remembered tradition. After many vicissitudes it was learned that in the sixteenth century a rabbi from Fez (in all likelihood Jakob Ben Chaim) had left behind a historical treatise in which he quoted the now lost work of a Greek scholiast, which included certain historical facts about the Perytons obviously taken from the oracles before the Library of Alexandria was burned by Omar. The name of the learned Greek has not

come down to us, but his fragments run:

"The Perytons had their original dwelling in Atlantis and are half deer, half bird. They have the deer's head and legs. As for its body, it is perfectly avian, with corresponding wings and plumage. . . . Its strangest trait is that, when the sun strikes it, instead of casting a shadow of its own body, it casts the shadow of a man. From this, some conclude that the Perytons are the spirits of wayfarers who have died far from their homes and from the care of their gods. . . . . and have been surprised eating dry earth . . . flying in flocks and have been seen at a dizzying height above the Columns of Hercules. . . . they [Perytons] are mortal foes of the human race; when they succeed in killing a man, their shadow is that of their own body and they win back the favor of their gods. . . . and those who crossed the seas with Scipio to conquer Carthage came close to failure, for during the passage a formation of Perytons swooped down on the ships, killing and mangling many. . . . Although our weapons have no effect against it, the animal-if such it be-can kill no more than a single man. . . . wallowing in the gore of its victims and then fleeing upward on its powerful wings. . . . in Ravenna, where they were last seen, telling of their plumage which they described as light blue in color, which greatly suprised me for all that is known of their dark green feathers.

Though these excerpts are sufficiently explicit, it is to be lamented that down to our own time no further intelligence about the Perytons has reached us. The rabbi's treatise, which preserved this description for us, had been on deposit until before the last World War in the library of the University of Dresden. It is painful to say that this document has also disappeared, and whether as a consequence of bombardment or of the earlier book burning of the Nazis, it is not known. Let us hope that one day another copy of the work may be discovered and again come to adorn the shelves of some library."

J.L. Borges "The Book of Imaginary Beings"