Mysterious Creatures 2 Volumes

Annotation. Features: - Over 1,000 entries- 60+ illustrations- Bibliographies for each entry- Appendix- Index.

A comprehensive guide to cryptozoology—the quest to identify animals that have not been officially catalogued by science and to place these unknown animals into their proper zoological categories. In this fascinating two-volume encyclopedia, author George M. Eberhart provides a comprehensive catalog of nearly 1,000 cryptids—unknown animals usually reported through eyewitness accounts and not yet described by science. Cryptids are the stuff of folklore, hoaxes, and genuine scientific breakthroughs. There are 400 now-classified cryptids once considered either extinct or pure fantasy. The cryptozoologist's job is to strip away the myth, misidentification, and mystery—and separate fact from fiction. Mysterious Creatures covers everything from dinosaurs and the emala-ntouka, an elephant-killing dinosaur-like animal of central Africa, to searches for the Loch Ness monster, Bigfoot, and other cryptozoological hoaxes. Entries about specific animals include the derivation or meaning of each cryptid's name, its scientific name, variant names, a physical description, behavior, description of tracks, habitat, significant sightings, present status, and possible explanations. Illustrations and photographs accompany many entries. The book also includes resources and references for further information.

In the hi-tech, industrialised world of the 21st Century, monsters still loom large. Far from being relegated to the realm of myth and legend, mysterious creatures seem to be alive and well today. In this, the first of two volumes, acclaimed researcher George M. Eberhart provides a comprehensive list of the creatures that roam our monster-haunted planet. Covering 'N-Z', Volume Two tackles some well-known beasts as well as more esoteric creatures few will have heard of.

This volume, covering entries A-M, presents reported cryptids from around the world, with each entry tracing the history of sightings and offering details of possible identifications of these creatures.

Volume 1 originally published: Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO, 2001.

"Welcome to volume 2 of Mysterious Creatures: Cryptid Encounters. For those of who you don't know, Mysterious Creatures is a Facebook page and group and also a Youtube channel. The encounters that I share with you in these books are the real life encounters shared in the Mysterious Creatures Facebook group by the members. We currently have 176k members and this is increasing by about 1k per day, so as you can imagine we get a lot of encounter stories shared every day. We get encounter stories with just about everything you can imagine from bigfoot to dogman, ghosts, demons, ufo's, orbs, shadow people, mermaids and so on. If you're a believer in cryptids then you will enjoy this book and if you are not then maybe this book will open your mind to the possibility that there are mysterious creatures out there"--Back cover.

Cryptozoology is best understood as the study of animals which, in the eyes of Western science, are extinct, unclassified or unrecognised. In consequence, and in part because of its selective methods and lack of epistemological rigour, cryptozoology is often dismissed as a pseudo-science. However, there is a growing recognition that social science can benefit from engaging with it, for as as social scientists are very well aware, ’scientific’ categorisation and explanation represents just one of a myriad of systems used by humans to enable them to classify and make sense of the world around them. In many cultural contexts, myth, folk classification and lived experience challenge the ’truth’ expounded by scientists. With a reflexive, anthropological approach and drawing on rich empirical and ethnographic studies from around the world, this volume engages with the theoretical and methodological issues raised by reported sightings of unrecognised animals. Bringing into sharp focus the anthropological value and challenges for methodology posed by beliefs about unclassified creatures, Anthropology and Cryptozoology: Exploring encounters with mysterious creatures will be of interest to anthropologists, sociologists and geographers working in the fields of research methods, anthrozoology, mythology and folklore and human-animal interaction.

Offers an A-Z guide to animals that have yet to be officially recognized in science, discussing where these animals live and why they remain a mystery.