LV426
02-09-2004, 02:37 AM
Among the legendary beasts of Ireland is something called the Dobhar-Chu (Gaelic for "water hound", a mysterious and dangerous creature said to dwell in some lakes. The very sight of one is rumored to cost a witness his or her life. These "water hounds" figure not in just oral tradition but also claimed in experiances from earlier centuries.
Bearing stark testimony to the water hound's bloodthirsty nature is a gravesite in Glanade, County Leitrim. The epitaph notes the death of a woman named Grace (the last name no longer discernible) on September 27th, 1772. On the tombstone is the carving of an unidentified animal with some features of an otter, run through with a spear. The woman is said to have been killed by a water hound as she was washing clothes in a nearby Glenade Lake.
http://www.rootsweb.com/~irlsli/im000085.jpg
When her husband found her bloody clothes with a water hound lying on them, he plunged a knife into the animal's heart. The creature made a whistling sounds, and another animal just like it appeared in the lake, swam swiftly toward the husband, and chased him and a friend, who flled on horseback. Eventually they turned on the creature and stabbed it to death before it could harm either of them.
This is a colorful local legends. As earlly as 1684 Roderivk O'Flaherty, author of a book of his Irish rambles, noted stories of an "Irish Crocodile" that witnesses often mistook, at least initially for an otter. The creature once attacked a man who managed to hit it on the head with a rock and then cut it with a knife, scaring it away.
"There is one rarity more, which we may term the Irish crocodile, whereof one, as yet living, about 10 years ago had sad experience. The man was passing the shore just by the waterside, and spyed far off the head of a beast swimming, which he took to be an otter, and took no more notice of it; but the beast it seems lifted up its head, to discer whereabouts the man was; then diving swam under the water till he struck ground: whereupon he ran out of the water suddenly and took the man by the elbow whereby the man stooped down, and the beast fastened his teeth in his pate, and dragged him into the water; where the man took hold of a stone by chance in his way, and calling to mind he had a knife in his jacket, took it out and gave a thrust of it to the beast, which thereupon got away from him into the lake. The water about him was all bloody, whether from the beast;s blood, or his own, or from both he knows not. It was the pitch of an ordinary greyhound, of a black slimey skin, without hair as he imagines. Old men acquanited with the lake do tell there is such a beast in it, and that a stout fellow with a wolf dog along with him met the like there once; which after a long struggling went away in spite of the man and his dog, and was a long time after found rotten in a rocky cave of the lake when the waters decreased. The like they say is seen in other lakes in Ireland, they call it doyarchu, i.e. water-dog, or anchu which is the same."
Similar beasts, O'Fllaherty wrote, had been observed in other Irish lakes. "They call it Doyarchu, i.e., water dog, or anchu, which is the same thing." One witness said it had the color "of an ordinary greyhound" and "black slimy skin, without hair."
Dave Walsh, an Irish lough (lake) monster investigator, visited the gravesite and investigated the Dobhar-Chu. He felt the identification of the Dobhar_chu with the failry shy otter(which can be found at lengths over five feet six inches [1.67 meters], including the tail) seems to be by default- no other known Irish water creature comes as close to rational zoological explanation. It's general resemblance to an otter not withstanding, it seems clear that it could not have been one of these shy, unaggressive animals.
The Dobhar-Chu does not seem to have been a Lake Monster in the (relatively speaking) conventional sense. Walsh asks whether we can accept the Dobhar-Chu as a hungry lake serpent that grows legs occasionally when it feels like eating.
No encounters with water hounds have been reported in a long time. If these creatures had any existence outside the imagination, it is hard to figure out what they could have been.
One other theory is that the Dobhar-Chu is actually a Labrythodont an extinct paleolithic giant amphibians related to salamanders.But could the Dobhar-Chu be a Labyrinthodont? All of the behaviors described (hunting from the water, dragging prey underwater to drown) is what would be expected from a Labyrinthodont. And the "black slimey skin, without hair" is definitely in favor of a Labyrinthodont. So is the "half wolf-dog, half fish" description.
In trying to rationalize the sightings of the Dobhar-Chu some of the locals tell the stories of the King of the Otters. This is an otter of immense size that lives in the lake and protects his people. For any who harm the water dog or his people shall suffer the wrath of the King of the otters and shall find their deaths at the bottom of the Lake.
So what lurks beneath the waters of the lakes of Glenade, an otter that protects his people, a giant salamander that has escaped extinction, or some other beast that man should fear as he gazes into the black waters of the Irish loughs?
Source: Crypto Zoology A-Z
Bearing stark testimony to the water hound's bloodthirsty nature is a gravesite in Glanade, County Leitrim. The epitaph notes the death of a woman named Grace (the last name no longer discernible) on September 27th, 1772. On the tombstone is the carving of an unidentified animal with some features of an otter, run through with a spear. The woman is said to have been killed by a water hound as she was washing clothes in a nearby Glenade Lake.
http://www.rootsweb.com/~irlsli/im000085.jpg
When her husband found her bloody clothes with a water hound lying on them, he plunged a knife into the animal's heart. The creature made a whistling sounds, and another animal just like it appeared in the lake, swam swiftly toward the husband, and chased him and a friend, who flled on horseback. Eventually they turned on the creature and stabbed it to death before it could harm either of them.
This is a colorful local legends. As earlly as 1684 Roderivk O'Flaherty, author of a book of his Irish rambles, noted stories of an "Irish Crocodile" that witnesses often mistook, at least initially for an otter. The creature once attacked a man who managed to hit it on the head with a rock and then cut it with a knife, scaring it away.
"There is one rarity more, which we may term the Irish crocodile, whereof one, as yet living, about 10 years ago had sad experience. The man was passing the shore just by the waterside, and spyed far off the head of a beast swimming, which he took to be an otter, and took no more notice of it; but the beast it seems lifted up its head, to discer whereabouts the man was; then diving swam under the water till he struck ground: whereupon he ran out of the water suddenly and took the man by the elbow whereby the man stooped down, and the beast fastened his teeth in his pate, and dragged him into the water; where the man took hold of a stone by chance in his way, and calling to mind he had a knife in his jacket, took it out and gave a thrust of it to the beast, which thereupon got away from him into the lake. The water about him was all bloody, whether from the beast;s blood, or his own, or from both he knows not. It was the pitch of an ordinary greyhound, of a black slimey skin, without hair as he imagines. Old men acquanited with the lake do tell there is such a beast in it, and that a stout fellow with a wolf dog along with him met the like there once; which after a long struggling went away in spite of the man and his dog, and was a long time after found rotten in a rocky cave of the lake when the waters decreased. The like they say is seen in other lakes in Ireland, they call it doyarchu, i.e. water-dog, or anchu which is the same."
Similar beasts, O'Fllaherty wrote, had been observed in other Irish lakes. "They call it Doyarchu, i.e., water dog, or anchu, which is the same thing." One witness said it had the color "of an ordinary greyhound" and "black slimy skin, without hair."
Dave Walsh, an Irish lough (lake) monster investigator, visited the gravesite and investigated the Dobhar-Chu. He felt the identification of the Dobhar_chu with the failry shy otter(which can be found at lengths over five feet six inches [1.67 meters], including the tail) seems to be by default- no other known Irish water creature comes as close to rational zoological explanation. It's general resemblance to an otter not withstanding, it seems clear that it could not have been one of these shy, unaggressive animals.
The Dobhar-Chu does not seem to have been a Lake Monster in the (relatively speaking) conventional sense. Walsh asks whether we can accept the Dobhar-Chu as a hungry lake serpent that grows legs occasionally when it feels like eating.
No encounters with water hounds have been reported in a long time. If these creatures had any existence outside the imagination, it is hard to figure out what they could have been.
One other theory is that the Dobhar-Chu is actually a Labrythodont an extinct paleolithic giant amphibians related to salamanders.But could the Dobhar-Chu be a Labyrinthodont? All of the behaviors described (hunting from the water, dragging prey underwater to drown) is what would be expected from a Labyrinthodont. And the "black slimey skin, without hair" is definitely in favor of a Labyrinthodont. So is the "half wolf-dog, half fish" description.
In trying to rationalize the sightings of the Dobhar-Chu some of the locals tell the stories of the King of the Otters. This is an otter of immense size that lives in the lake and protects his people. For any who harm the water dog or his people shall suffer the wrath of the King of the otters and shall find their deaths at the bottom of the Lake.
So what lurks beneath the waters of the lakes of Glenade, an otter that protects his people, a giant salamander that has escaped extinction, or some other beast that man should fear as he gazes into the black waters of the Irish loughs?
Source: Crypto Zoology A-Z