Читать книгу The Monster Book - Nick Redfern - Страница 11

For decades, the British Isles have played host to a decidedly mysterious and marauding beast. It has become known as the “Alien Big Cat,” or the ABC. Some cryptozoologists and monster hunters suggest the puzzle is an even older one, maybe even dating back centuries. Regardless of when, exactly, the controversy began, the fact is that pretty much every year, dozens upon dozens of reports surface of large cats roaming the wilder—and sometimes the not so wild—parts of Britain.

Very often, the cats are described as being huge, muscular and black in color. This has given rise to the term “black panther,” which is actually incorrect, but frequently used by both the public and the press. It would be far more correct to suggest the creatures are probably leopards and jaguars displaying significant melanism—a condition in which there is an excess of a black pigment known as melanin.

As for how such creatures have come to be seen across pretty much the entirety of the British Isles, the theories are as many as they are varied. Some researchers hold that the animals have escaped from private zoos and enclosures and are now living and thriving very nicely in the nation’s woods and forests. Others suggest that back in 1976, when the British Government significantly altered the rules and regulations governing the keeping of large, predatory animals, the owners of such cats—who couldn’t afford to pay the new fees—secretly released their pets into the wild. And today, so the theory goes, what people are seeing are the descendants of those large cats set free in the 1970s.

Alien big cats are typically described as being black, very large, and very muscular.

Other theories are far more controversial: one suggests the ABCs may have been with us since roughly 43 C.E., when invading Roman forces brought large cats to Britain in the form of mascots. Did some of those mascots escape and manage to survive and breed, largely undetected? Some say yes. Then there is the highly charged theory that Britain has in its midst an unidentified indigenous cat—one that science and zoology have yet to recognize or categorize.

Whatever the answer to the question of the origins of Britain’s ABCs, the fact is that their presence is pretty much accepted by the general public and the media—although largely not by the government, which prefers to play down the matter whenever and wherever possible. But they are not literal monsters: they’re simply regular animals, albeit seen in distinctly out of place environments, correct? Well … maybe not. They just might be monsters, after all.

Although many ABC researchers cringe and squirm when the matter is brought up, the fact is there are more than a few reports on record that place the ABCs in a category that is less flesh and blood-based and far more paranormally themed. There are cases of the ABCs vanishing—literally—before the eyes of astonished witnesses. People report large black cat encounters in old graveyards, within ancient stone circles, and even—on a few occasions—in association with UFO sightings. Whatever the truth of the matter, the ABCs of the U.K. aren’t going away any time soon.