Читать книгу The Element Encyclopedia of Magical Creatures: The Ultimate A–Z of Fantastic Beings from Myth and Magic - John Matthews - Страница 330

According to the Roman naturalist, Pliny the Elder, this creature lived in the highland wastes of Ethiopia and the deserts of southern Egypt. It was described as a beast with an enormous head on a thin scrawny neck, making it droop its head downwards all the time, which was just as well since one glance from the Catoblepas meant instant death. It was said to have pink eyes set in the head of a pig and a thin black body. This description seems very much to echo that of the wildebeest or gnu. Gustave Flaubert made it one of the hellish animals that assailed poor St Anthony in his Tentation de St Antoine of 1874.