Monster Wheel Spinner: 150 Mythical Creatures

Spin one of 150 creatures from 13 traditions and read where it comes from, what it looks like and the rule that beats it.

Monster Wheel Spinner: 150 Mythical Creatures

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Spin 1 · number 29

Lindworm

A giant serpent-dragon of northern and central European folklore. The Swedish kind has no limbs or wings, and heraldry calls it a dragon without wings. The head of the lindworm fountain in Klagenfurt was modelled on a woolly rhinoceros skull found in 1335.

Every spin uses the whole wheel.

150 creatures on the wheel.

Numbers on the wheel

  1. Amphisbaena
  2. Basilisk
  3. Centaur
  4. Cerberus
  5. Charybdis
  6. Chimera
  7. Cyclops
  8. Gorgon
  9. Harpy
  10. Hippocampus
  11. Hydra
  12. Minotaur
  13. Nemean Lion
  14. Pegasus
  15. Phoenix
  16. Scylla
  17. Siren
  18. Sphinx
  19. Stymphalian Bird
  20. Fenrir
  21. Jormungandr
  22. Sleipnir
  23. Nidhogg
  24. Ratatoskr
  25. Fafnir
  26. Draugr
  27. Kraken
  28. Troll
  29. Lindworm
  30. Krampus
  31. Banshee
  32. Kelpie
  33. Selkie
  34. Puca
  35. Dullahan
  36. Cat Sidhe
  37. Afanc
  38. Nuckelavee
  39. Redcap
  40. Black Shuck
  41. Lambton Worm
  42. Questing Beast
  43. Will-o'-the-Wisp
  44. Baba Yaga
  45. Domovoi
  46. Leshy
  47. Rusalka
  48. Vodyanoy
  49. Kikimora
  50. Firebird
  51. Alkonost
  52. Sirin
  53. Zmey Gorynych
  54. Dragon
  55. Wyvern
  56. Unicorn
  57. Griffin
  58. Hippogriff
  59. Cockatrice
  60. Bonnacon
  61. Yale
  62. Salamander
  63. Tarasque
  64. Ogre
  65. Werewolf
  66. Vampire
  67. Golem
  68. Kitsune
  69. Tanuki
  70. Kappa
  71. Tengu
  72. Oni
  73. Baku
  74. Nekomata
  75. Jorogumo
  76. Kamaitachi
  77. Kasa-obake
  78. Namazu
  79. Nurikabe
  80. Yamata no Orochi
  81. Yuki-onna
  82. Chinese Dragon
  83. Qilin
  84. Fenghuang
  85. Pixiu
  86. Nian
  87. Taotie
  88. Bai Ze
  89. Huli Jing
  90. Jiangshi
  91. Dokkaebi
  92. Imugi
  93. Naga
  94. Garuda
  95. Makara
  96. Rakshasa
  97. Yali
  98. Barong
  99. Bakunawa
  100. Manananggal
  101. Tikbalang
  102. Sarimanok
  103. Ammit
  104. Bennu
  105. Lamassu
  106. Mushussu
  107. Bahamut
  108. Roc
  109. Ghoul
  110. Karkadann
  111. Al-mi'raj
  112. Simurgh
  113. Manticore
  114. Behemoth
  115. Leviathan
  116. Ziz
  117. Adze
  118. Asanbosam
  119. Grootslang
  120. Impundulu
  121. Inkanyamba
  122. Kishi
  123. Mokele-mbembe
  124. Ninki Nanka
  125. Thunderbird
  126. Horned Serpent
  127. Underwater Panther
  128. Amarok
  129. Qalupalik
  130. Jackalope
  131. Jersey Devil
  132. Hodag
  133. Hidebehind
  134. Squonk
  135. Sasquatch
  136. Ahuizotl
  137. Camazotz
  138. Cadejo
  139. Chupacabra
  140. Alicanto
  141. Boitata
  142. Curupira
  143. Encantado
  144. Mapinguari
  145. Bunyip
  146. Yara-ma-yha-who
  147. Yowie
  148. Drop Bear
  149. Taniwha
  150. Tiddalik

Results

  1. 1. Lindworm

Tip: the space bar and the Enter key spin the wheel, and so does a tap on the wheel itself. Press again to skip to the result.

Next step Name who meets it, then tap Germanic and NorseSpin the species of whoever meets it

Monster Wheel Spinner: 150 Mythical Creatures: how it works

This monster wheel spinner holds 150 creatures from myth and folklore in 13 origins. Not every one is a monster: some are guardians, and their cards say so. Tap an origin and spin. The card says what the creature looks like and, when folklore gives one, the trick that beats it.

Pick an origin before you spin

All 150 on one wheel is a blur, so start with a group. Greek and Roman has 19 creatures, Japanese 14 and Slavic 10. One origin keeps a story's bestiary consistent: a world built on Slavic folklore gets a leshy in the forest and a vodyanoy under the mill, not a sphinx. Mix origins when contrast is the point: cross a tarasque with a baku for a drawing prompt.

Use the rule that comes with the creature

Folklore creatures come with rules, and the rule is the useful part. Bow to a kappa and it bows back, spilling the water that gives it strength. A nuckelavee cannot cross fresh running water. A cockatrice dies at a rooster's crow. Hand that rule to your character and the encounter becomes a puzzle, not just a fight.

Tips

  • Dragons differ. A wyvern has two legs, a lindworm has no wings and a Chinese dragon brings rain, so spin before you draw the default.
  • As a guessing game, read the card aloud without the name. First to name the creature spins next.
  • Short of a monster? Spin the wheel twice in Elimination mode and give the first creature's body the second one's weakness.

Questions and answers

Why does a card differ from the version I know?

The cards keep to what each creature's encyclopedia article supports, and details it did not support were left out. The vampire of folklore was bloated and ruddy, with no fangs; the pale aristocrat arrived with a story of 1819. Bahamut is a vast fish in medieval Arabic accounts, and the dragon of that name is a modern game invention.

Are all of these really monsters?

No. The thunderbird, the naga, Garuda, the Barong and the taniwha are respected or sacred in living traditions, and their cards say so. Learn the source and keep the respect. Left off are beings whose own communities ask outsiders not to use them, and sacred figures a short card could not do justice to. Jinn are on the species wheel as a people, not here.

How is this different from the species wheel?

The species wheel lists peoples a character can belong to, such as elves, androids and merfolk. This wheel lists what that character meets, rides or runs from. Some names are on both, such as the kitsune and the selkie, which folklore gives a human shape too.

More like this

Random tool Browse Character Wheels

All 150 creatures

Australia and the Pacific 6

  • Bunyip A water creature from the Aboriginal traditions of south-eastern Australia that lurks in swamps, billabongs, creeks and waterholes. Descriptions vary widely: some have a round head like a seal or a dog, others a long neck and a small head. The word comes from the Wemba-Wemba or Wergaia language of Victoria.
  • Drop Bear A joke Australians play on visitors: a large, meat-eating koala that drops out of the treetops on people walking below. Suggested protection includes forks in your hair and toothpaste behind your ears. The Australian Museum keeps a straight-faced entry for it, written for the silly season.
  • Taniwha Powerful beings of Māori tradition that live in deep river pools, dark caves or the sea, especially where the currents are dangerous. Many are respected kaitiaki, guardians of a people or a place; others are dangerous. At sea a taniwha may look like a whale or a large shark, and inland like a giant gecko or tuatara with spines along its back.
  • Tiddalik The frog of an Aboriginal Dreaming story, often attributed to the Gunaikurnai people of South Gippsland, Victoria. He woke up thirsty and drank all the fresh water. The other animals set out to make him laugh, and when the eel tied himself into comical shapes the water rushed back out to refill the lakes, swamps and rivers.
  • Yara-ma-yha-who A little red frog-like man from the Aboriginal traditions of south-eastern Australia, with a very big head, a toothless mouth and suckers on its hands and feet. It waits in a fig tree for someone to rest below, swallows them, drinks some water, naps and brings them back up a little shorter than before.
  • Yowie A tall, hairy, ape-like figure said to live in the Australian Outback, with origins in Aboriginal oral history. Reports put it between 2.1 and 3.6 metres tall. It is often compared to Bigfoot.

African 8

  • Adze A vampiric being in the folklore of the Ewe people of Togo and Ghana. In the wild it is a firefly that slips through keyholes; once caught, it turns human. The tales probably helped to explain mosquitoes and malaria.
  • Asanbosam A tree-dweller from the folklore of the Akan of Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire and Togo, also called Sasabonsam. It has iron teeth and long hair, and dangles its long legs from high branches to catch hunters passing below. Some versions make it bat-like, with wings about 20 feet across.
  • Grootslang Afrikaans for big snake. A serpent 40 to 50 feet long said to live in a deep cave in the Richtersveld of South Africa, a cave rumoured to be full of diamonds. An exploration found only bat guano. The elephant features are a 21st-century addition.
  • Impundulu The lightning bird of Zulu folklore: a black and white bird the size of a person that calls up thunder and lightning with its wings and talons. It is linked with the hamerkop, and is said to lay a large egg underground at the spot where lightning strikes.
  • Inkanyamba A huge serpent with a horse-like head that lives in the pool below Howick Falls in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Its anger is said to bring the seasonal storms, and it is most active in summer.
  • Kishi A many-headed being with long tangled hair in the folklore of the Ambundu of Angola; the plural is makishi. In the legend of Sudika-mbambi, one kishi chief grows a new head each time one is cut off.
  • Mokele-mbembe A water-dwelling being of the Congo River Basin, described as a reptile, a spirit or a living sauropod. Monster hunters took it up in the 20th century. No expedition has found any evidence.
  • Ninki Nanka A river and swamp dragon of the lower Gambia. One description gives it a crocodile's head on a donkey's body; another a giraffe-like neck, a horse's head and three horns. Its stare is deadly and its scales shine like mirrors, so folklore says to carry a mirror.

Central and South American 9

  • Ahuizotl A water creature of Aztec legend, described in the Florentine Codex: the size of a small dog, with small pointed ears, slick black fur, hands like a monkey's and one more hand on the end of its tail. It uses the tail hand to snatch people from the water's edge.
  • Alicanto A night bird of the Atacama Desert in Chilean folklore. It eats ore, and its wings glow gold or silver to match. The ore in its crop weighs it down so that it cannot fly. A miner who follows it unseen finds a rich vein; if it spots him, it dims its wings and slips away, or leads him to a cliff edge.
  • Boitata A fire serpent of Brazilian folklore whose Tupi name means thing of fire. It guards the fields against people who set them alight. In one legend it began as a great snake that could see in the dark, survived a flood in a cave and came to shine from head to tail.
  • Cadejo A spirit dog of Central American folklore: big and shaggy, with glowing eyes and goat-like hooves. Many tellings have two. The white cadejo protects people travelling at night, and the black one, dragging heavy chains, means them harm.
  • Camazotz A bat spirit of Maya mythology that serves the lords of the underworld. The name means death bat in K'iche'. In the Popol Vuh the Hero Twins spend a night in the House of Bats hidden inside their blowguns, and Camazotz strikes when Hunahpu peeks out to look for the dawn.
  • Chupacabra Spanish for goat-sucker. The first widely reported sightings came from Puerto Rico in 1995 and described an upright, reptile-like creature with spines down its back. Later reports from Mexico and the United States describe a hairless dog, and the animals examined were coyotes and other canids with severe mange.
  • Curupira A small forest spirit of the Tupi-Guarani speaking lands of Brazil, Paraguay and the Guianas. Its feet point backwards, so its tracks send trackers the wrong way, and it makes people who cut too much timber lose their way. Hunters leave it tobacco. The bright red hair is a later addition.
  • Encantado An Amazon river dolphin, the boto, that can take human form, usually at night. As a human it keeps its hat on to hide the blowhole, which does not change. It loves music and parties, and comes from the Encante, a rich land without pain or death.
  • Mapinguari A beast of the Brazilian Amazon: hairy, foul-smelling, as big as a person or bigger, with one eye and a gaping mouth in its belly. Some researchers have linked the stories to the extinct giant ground sloths, an idea other scientists have criticised.

Slavic 10

  • Alkonost A bird with a woman's head whose song makes listeners forget everything. She lays her eggs on the beach and rolls them into the sea, which stays calm until they hatch and then turns stormy. She is the joyful partner of the Sirin.
  • Baba Yaga She lives deep in the forest in a hut that stands on chicken legs, and flies in a wooden mortar with a pestle in her hand. In some tales she helps the hero and in others she gets in the way.
  • Domovoi The household spirit of a Slavic family: an old grey-haired man with flashing eyes. He protects the family, the children and the animals, and bad behaviour or bad language makes him angry. A family that moves house performs a ritual to invite him along.
  • Firebird A glowing bird from a faraway land. One feather can light a large room, and the quest usually begins when someone finds a lost tail feather. To its captor it is a blessing and a warning of trouble at once.
  • Kikimora A female house spirit who spins thread at night. In a well-kept house she looks after the chickens and the housework. In a badly kept one she whistles, breaks dishes and makes noises. A later swamp kikimora is married to the Leshy.
  • Leshy The ruler of the forest and its animals. He can stand as tall as a tree or as short as a blade of grass, and he leads wanderers astray. The way out is to put your clothes on inside out and swap your shoes to the wrong feet.
  • Rusalka A female water spirit. Before the 19th century she was tied to fertility and brought moisture to the fields in spring; later tales made her dangerous. In Rusalka week, in early June, rusalki leave the water to swing on birch and willow branches.
  • Sirin A woman's head on the body of a bird, usually an owl, and often equated with the Greek sirens. She sang to the saints about joys to come. People rang bells and fired cannon to scare her away.
  • Vodyanoy A male water spirit: an old man with a green beard, covered in weeds and slime. He likes to live near watermills. When angry he breaks dams and washes mills away, so millers bring him offerings.
  • Zmey Gorynych A dragon of Russian and Ukrainian legend with anything from three to twelve heads. The hero Dobrynya Nikitich rescues Princess Zabava from it.

South and Southeast Asia 10

  • Bakunawa A dragon-like serpent of Philippine tradition that causes eclipses. Bathala made seven moons and the bakunawa swallowed six. During an eclipse people clang pots and pans to make it give the moon back.
  • Barong In Balinese tradition the king of the spirits and leader of the hosts of good, the enemy of the demon queen Rangda. The Barong dance acts out their fight. He appears as a lion, a pig, a tiger, a dog or an elephant. A protector, not a monster.
  • Garuda A divine eagle-like bird, king of the birds and the mount of Vishnu, shown as a giant bird or as a winged man. He is the great rival of the serpents. Garuda is the national emblem of Thailand and of Indonesia.
  • Makara A sea creature with the front of a land animal, such as a deer or an elephant, and the tail of a fish. It is the mount of Ganga and of Varuna, and guards gateways and thresholds across South and Southeast Asia. In Hindu astrology it is the sign of Capricorn.
  • Manananggal A Philippine night flyer whose name comes from the Tagalog word for separate: it leaves its lower half behind and flies off on bat-like wings. Salt, garlic or ash on the half left standing stops it rejoining before sunrise.
  • Naga Semi-divine beings, half human and half serpent, venerated in Hinduism and Buddhism. They live in the underground realm of Patala, guard treasure and are tied to rivers, lakes, seas and wells. The naga Mucalinda sheltered the Buddha with his seven heads. Treat them as guardians, not monsters.
  • Rakshasa Shapeshifters and masters of illusion, usually hostile. Ravana, king of Lanka, with ten heads and twenty arms, is the most famous. Some are good, such as Vibhishana.
  • Sarimanok The legendary bird of the Maranao people of Mindanao, with colourful wings and tail and a fish in its beak or talons. It is said to bring good fortune. The name joins sari, assorted, and manok, bird.
  • Tikbalang A tall, bony Philippine creature with a horse's head and hooves, and legs so long that its knees rise above its head when it squats. It makes travellers come back to the same path again and again; wearing your shirt inside out breaks the trick. Rain while the sun shines means a tikbalang is getting married.
  • Yali A lion's head and body with an elephant's trunk and tusks, carved on the pillars of South Indian temples. It is said to be stronger than a lion, a tiger or an elephant, and it stands guard over the temple.

Norse and Germanic 11

  • Draugr An undead revenant of the Norse sagas. It often guards the treasure in its own burial mound, has more than human strength and can change its size.
  • Fafnir A dwarf who turned himself into a dragon to lie on his treasure. Sigurd killed him from a pit dug across his path, and a taste of the heart's blood let Sigurd understand the speech of birds.
  • Fenrir A wolf, the child of Loki and Angrboda. Two fetters failed to hold him. The dwarf-made Gleipnir did, tightening the more he struggled, and he bit off the god Tyr's right hand. He is foretold to kill Odin at Ragnarok.
  • Jormungandr The Midgard Serpent, a child of Loki. Odin threw it into the ocean, where it grew until it circled the world and bit its own tail. Thor is its great enemy: at Ragnarok he kills it, walks nine paces and falls.
  • Kraken A sea monster off the coast of Norway, so big that it was taken for a group of small islands. Pontoppidan made it famous in the 1750s, and sightings of giant squid probably lie behind it. Fishermen risked working above it because the catch there was so good.
  • Krampus A horned figure of Alpine tradition who walks with Saint Nicholas on the night of 5 December, Krampusnacht. He carries chains, a bundle of birch branches and a sack or basket on his back.
  • Lindworm A giant serpent-dragon of northern and central European folklore. The Swedish kind has no limbs or wings, and heraldry calls it a dragon without wings. The head of the lindworm fountain in Klagenfurt was modelled on a woolly rhinoceros skull found in 1335.
  • Nidhogg A dragon that gnaws from below at one of the three roots of the world tree Yggdrasil.
  • Ratatoskr A squirrel that runs up and down the world tree Yggdrasil, carrying envious words between the eagle at the top and the dragon Nidhogg at the roots. The name is read as drill-tooth.
  • Sleipnir Odin's grey horse with eight legs, the best of all horses. Its parents are the stallion Svadilfari and Loki, who had taken the shape of a mare.
  • Troll A being of Nordic folklore that lives in lonely rocks, mountains or caves. Trolls are very strong, slow and dim-witted, and rarely helpful. In some tales sunlight turns them to stone.

Chinese and Korean 11

  • Bai Ze A beast that knows everything about ghosts and spirits. For the Yellow Emperor it set out all 11,520 kinds, with notes, in a guide called the Bai Ze Tu. In Japan it is the Hakutaku, shown with an ox's body and extra eyes and horns.
  • Chinese Dragon The long. A snake-like body with four legs and, in most cases, no wings. It brings rain, rules rivers and seas, and stands for prosperity and good luck. The five-clawed dragon was reserved for the emperor in the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties.
  • Dokkaebi A Korean nature spirit, not a ghost: it forms when a thrown-away household object such as an old broom is possessed. It challenges travellers to a wrestling match, and the trick is to push from its right side. Its club summons things and its hat makes the wearer invisible.
  • Fenghuang The bird that reigns over all other birds. Feng was once the male and huang the female; the two merged into one female figure paired with the dragon. It is often called the Chinese phoenix, but the likeness is only on the surface.
  • Huli Jing The Chinese fox spirit, usually a shapeshifter, which may be kind or cruel. A nine-tailed fox already appears in the Classic of Mountains and Seas. Its counterparts are the Japanese kitsune and the Korean kumiho.
  • Imugi A python-like lesser dragon of Korea that lives in water or caves. By some accounts it must survive a thousand years, or catch an orb fallen from heaven, to become a true dragon. Seeing one is lucky.
  • Jiangshi A stiff reanimated corpse that moves by hopping, often called the hopping vampire. Hong Kong films dressed it in the robes of a Qing dynasty official. A paper talisman stuck to its forehead stops it, and it fears its own reflection and a rooster's call.
  • Nian A beast that comes out of the sea or the mountains at New Year to raid villages. It fears loud noise, fire and the colour red, the folk reason given for firecrackers and red lanterns. Its name means year. The earliest written versions date from the early 20th century.
  • Pixiu A winged lion with a dragon's head that eats only gold, silver and jewels. In the myth what goes in never comes out, which makes it a feng shui charm for keeping wealth. The kind with one antler gathers wealth; the kind with two wards off evil.
  • Qilin A hooved creature made up of several animals that appears when a sage or a great ruler arrives or dies. When Zheng He's fleet brought giraffes to Nanjing in 1414, they were taken for qilin.
  • Taotie A staring symmetrical face with raised eyes and no lower jaw, cast on the bronze ritual vessels of the Shang and Zhou dynasties. It is one of the Four Perils and is linked to gluttony.

North American 11

  • Amarok A gigantic wolf in Inuit tradition that hunts alone and stalks anyone foolish enough to hunt alone at night. In one tale it wrestles a stunted boy every day until he is strong enough to overcome three bears.
  • Hidebehind A lumberjack tall tale from the logging camps around the Great Lakes. It is so swift that it hides behind the nearest tree before anyone can look. Loggers blamed it when someone failed to come back to camp.
  • Hodag A beast of Rhinelander, Wisconsin, with a frog's head, a grinning elephant's face, huge claws, a dinosaur's back and spears on its tail. A local prankster showed a captured one at the county fair in 1896 and admitted the hoax when Smithsonian scientists announced a visit. It is now the city's official symbol.
  • Horned Serpent A horned water snake in many Native American oral histories, above all in the Southeastern Woodlands and around the Great Lakes, tied to rain, lightning and thunder. The Cherokee Uktena is as thick as a tree trunk, with a blazing crest like a diamond. The Muscogee say theirs is not a bad snake.
  • Jackalope A jackrabbit with antelope horns. In the 1930s two brothers in Douglas, Wyoming, fixed deer antlers to a jackrabbit and sold it to a local hotel. The town's chamber of commerce issues joke hunting licences for 31 June. Legend says a jackalope can copy a human voice and sing along with cowboys.
  • Jersey Devil A creature said to haunt the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey: a flying biped with a horse-like or goat-like head, leathery bat wings, horns, cloven hooves and a forked tail. One legend makes it the thirteenth child of a Mrs Leeds. Newspapers printed hundreds of claimed sightings in one week of January 1909.
  • Qalupalik A sea creature of Inuit tradition with green, slimy skin, long hair and long fingernails. It wears an amautik, the Inuit parka, hums to draw children toward the water and carries off those who wander too close. The story keeps children away from dangerous sea ice.
  • Sasquatch A large, hairy, ape-like figure said to live in the forests of North America, above all the Pacific Northwest. The word is believed to be an English form of sasq'ets, roughly hairy man. The nickname Bigfoot dates from 1958, when large footprints in northern California made the papers; those tracks were later put down to a hoax.
  • Squonk A shy creature of the hemlock forests of northern Pennsylvania, first written up in 1910. Its skin fits badly and is covered in warts and moles, so it weeps constantly. Hunters follow the trail of tears, but a cornered squonk may dissolve into tears altogether.
  • Thunderbird A bird spirit of great power in the traditions of many Native American peoples, from the Pacific Northwest to the Great Lakes and the Plains. Thunder is the beat of its wings and lightning the flash of its eyes. It governs the upper world and opposes the spirits under the water. A being to respect, not a monster.
  • Underwater Panther Mishipeshu, the Great Lynx of the Anishinaabe and other Great Lakes peoples: a big cat's body with horns, scales, a spiked back and a very long tail. It lives in the deepest water, raises storms and guards the copper of Lake Superior. It and the thunderbirds balance each other, water against sky.

Celtic and British Isles 13

  • Afanc A Welsh lake monster described as a crocodile, a beaver or a dwarf-like creature. In one tale the oxen of Hu Gadarn dragged it out of its lake, and out of the water it was powerless. Llyn yr Afanc near Betws-y-Coed is named after it.
  • Banshee A female spirit of Irish folklore whose wailing, called keening, warns that a member of the family is about to die. The name comes from bean sí, woman of the fairy mound, and she is attached to certain old Irish families.
  • Black Shuck A ghostly black dog with fiery eyes that roams East Anglia. The most famous report places it at the churches of Bungay and Blythburgh on 4 August 1577. The name comes from an Old English word for devil.
  • Cat Sidhe A fairy cat of the Scottish Highlands: all black with a white spot on its chest, and as big as a dog. Some said it was a witch who could turn into a cat nine times. A saucer of milk left out at Samhain was said to bring luck.
  • Dullahan A headless rider on a black horse who carries his own head, or the driver of the death coach. He stops at the door of someone whose death is near.
  • Kelpie A shape-shifting spirit of Scottish lochs and rivers, usually seen as a horse. In human form it keeps its hooves, or has water weed in its hair. Almost every sizeable body of water in Scotland has a kelpie story.
  • Lambton Worm A legend of County Durham. John Lambton skipped church to fish in the River Wear, caught a small eel-like thing and threw it down a well. It grew until it could coil seven times around a hill. He fought it in the river, in armour set with spearheads, so the current carried the pieces away.
  • Nuckelavee A horse-like demon from the sea in Orkney folklore, with a man's torso joined to the horse's back and no skin at all. It cannot cross fresh running water, and the Mither o' the Sea keeps it confined through the summer.
  • Puca An Irish shape-changer that brings good luck or bad. It can be a goat, a cat, a dog or a hare, but most often a sleek black horse with golden eyes that gives a wild ride and does no real harm. Reapers leave it the puca's share, and 1 November is its day.
  • Questing Beast A beast of Arthurian legend. Malory gives it a serpent's head, a leopard's body, a lion's haunches and a hart's feet, and the noise from its belly is like thirty couple of hounds on the hunt. King Pellinore hunted it, and Sir Palamedes after him.
  • Redcap A malevolent goblin that haunts ruined castles along the border of England and Scotland. It wears iron boots and a red cap and carries a pikestaff in its left hand. Words of Scripture drive it off, and it leaves one large tooth behind.
  • Selkie A seal that becomes human by taking off its skin, in tales mostly from Orkney and Shetland. In the best-known story a man steals and hides the skin, and the selkie returns to the sea the moment she finds it.
  • Will-o'-the-Wisp A ghost light seen over bogs, swamps and marshes. It looks like a flickering lamp, draws back when you walk toward it and leads travellers off the path. Its Latin name, ignis fatuus, means foolish fire.

Medieval and later Europe 14

  • Bonnacon A bull from the bestiaries with a horse's mane and horns that curl back on themselves, useless for fighting. Pliny places it in Paeonia. It defends itself by running away and spraying scorching dung behind it for up to three furlongs.
  • Cockatrice A two-legged dragon with a rooster's head, hatched from a cock's egg that a toad or a snake has sat on. It kills by touch, breath or glance. The weasel is immune, and the crow of a rooster or the sight of itself in a mirror finishes it.
  • Dragon The European dragon is scaly, horned and fire-breathing, with bat-like wings, and guards treasure in a cavern or castle. Saint George fights one, and a red one stands on the flag of Wales. Four-legged dragons are rare in art before the 15th century.
  • Golem A figure of clay or mud brought to life, from Jewish folklore. In the best-known story Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague makes one. The word emet on its forehead keeps it going; erase the first letter to leave met and it stops. It follows orders to the letter, which is where the trouble starts.
  • Griffin A lion's body with the head, wings and front talons of an eagle. Griffins guard gold and treasure. Griffin-like figures appear in Mesopotamian and Egyptian art from before 3000 BC.
  • Hippogriff The front half of an eagle on the back half of a horse. Ariosto invented it for his poem Orlando Furioso in 1516 as the foal of a mare and a griffin, a pairing that was proverbially impossible. It is extremely fast.
  • Ogre A large, hideous being that eats people, with a big head, a lot of hair and a strong body. The word spread through the French fairy tales of Perrault and Madame d'Aulnoy. Puss in Boots and Hop-o'-My-Thumb are the famous examples.
  • Salamander A lizard said to live through fire and put it out, though Pliny doubted it. Paracelsus made it the elemental of fire. The legend probably began with real salamanders crawling out of logs put on the fire.
  • Tarasque A beast of Provence that lived by the Rhône at Tarascon: a lion-like head, a turtle-like shell, six feet with bear-like claws and a serpent's tail. Saint Martha tamed it with holy water and a cross. The town parades an effigy on the last Sunday of June.
  • Unicorn A horse-like or goat-like animal with one spiralled horn that makes poisoned water safe to drink. Narwhal tusks were sold as unicorn horn, a trade Ole Worm exposed in 1638. The unicorn is a symbol of Scotland and supports the Scottish royal arms.
  • Vampire A being that feeds on blood. In folklore it was bloated and ruddy, with no fangs. The pale aristocrat arrived with Polidori's story of 1819 and with Dracula in 1897.
  • Werewolf A person who turns into a wolf, by choice or under a curse, in folklore from all over Europe. The weakness to silver comes from 19th-century German tales and later fiction, and the full moon as the trigger comes mostly from film.
  • Wyvern A dragon with two legs, two wings and a pointed tail, common in English heraldry. In British heraldry a dragon has four legs and a wyvern two. It rarely breathes fire.
  • Yale An antelope-like or goat-like beast with a boar's tusks and horns that can swivel in any direction. It comes from Pliny and became a royal heraldic beast: the Yale of Beaufort was one of the Queen's Beasts in 1953.

Japanese 14

  • Baku A creature that eats nightmares, with an elephant's trunk and tusks, a rhinoceros's ears, a cow's tail, a bear's body and a tiger's paws. A child who wakes from a bad dream calls it three times. A baku that is still hungry may eat hopes as well.
  • Jorogumo A spider that takes the shape of a beautiful woman. At Joren Falls in Izu she throws webs around a man's leg to drag him in. The name is also the everyday word for the Joro spider.
  • Kamaitachi A weasel with sickle claws that rides a whirlwind and leaves sharp, painless cuts, usually on the legs. In the Hida legend it is three gods working in turn: the first knocks you down, the second cuts and the third puts medicine on the wound.
  • Kappa A child-sized water creature with a turtle-like shell and a dish of water on top of its head. Spill the water and it weakens. It is obsessed with politeness, so bow deeply: it bows back and empties its own dish. It loves cucumbers and sumo wrestling.
  • Kasa-obake An old umbrella with one eye that hops about on a single leg, sometimes with a long tongue. It is sometimes counted among the household objects that come alive after about 100 years. A harmless trickster, known from pictures and card games more than from folk tales.
  • Kitsune A fox spirit with up to nine tails: the more tails, the older and more powerful the fox. It learns to take human form at about 100 years old. Foxes are the messengers of the deity Inari.
  • Namazu A giant catfish under the earth whose movement causes earthquakes. The god Takemikazuchi keeps it restrained.
  • Nekomata A cat yokai with two tails. One kind lives in the mountains; the other is a house cat that has grown old and changed. The one-tailed kind is called a bakeneko.
  • Nurikabe A wall that blocks people walking at night, in tales from Fukuoka and Oita in Kyushu. Hitting the top does nothing. Sweep a stick along the bottom and it goes away.
  • Oni A horned ogre with red, blue, black or yellow skin, a tiger-skin loincloth and an iron club. At Setsubun in February people throw roasted soybeans and shout a line that means demons out, good luck in.
  • Tanuki The raccoon dog of Japanese folklore, a comical shapeshifter that fools people and drums on its belly with a pom poko sound. Shigaraki pottery statues show it wearing a hat.
  • Tengu A spirit of the mountains and forests. Early tengu were bird-like, with beaks and wings; the long nose and red face date from the 14th century. They dress as mountain hermits and carry a feather fan that stirs up great winds. The tengu Sojobo taught the young Yoshitsune swordsmanship on Mount Kurama.
  • Yamata no Orochi A serpent with eight heads and eight tails, long enough to span eight valleys and eight hills. The god Susanoo set out eight vats of sake, waited until it slept and cut it apart. In its tail he found the sword Kusanagi, one of the three Imperial Regalia.
  • Yuki-onna The snow woman. She appears on snowy nights and in snowstorms: tall, with long black hair, very pale skin and often a white kimono. She floats over the snow and leaves no footprints. Lafcadio Hearn retold her story in Kwaidan.

Middle East, Egypt and Mesopotamia 14

  • Al-mi'raj A yellow hare with a single black horn, from a place in the Indian Ocean called Dragon Island. Every wild beast runs from it. The islanders gave one to Iskandar, the Alexander of legend, after he killed a dragon for them.
  • Ammit The Egyptian devourer of the dead: a crocodile's head, a lion's forequarters and a hippopotamus's hindquarters. She ate any heart that weighed more than the feather of Ma'at. She was never worshipped.
  • Bahamut In medieval Arabic accounts of how the world is built, a vast fish far below everything. On it stands a bull, on the bull a slab of gemstone, on the slab an angel, and the angel holds up the earth. The name comes from Behemoth. The dragon of that name is a modern game invention.
  • Behemoth The land beast of chapter 40 of the Book of Job: it eats grass, its bones are like tubes of bronze and its tail is like a cedar. Scholars most often match it with the hippopotamus. The word now means anything huge.
  • Bennu An Egyptian deity in bird form, painted in the New Kingdom as a grey heron with a two-feathered crest. It is linked with the Sun, creation and rebirth at Heliopolis, and may be the source of the Greek phoenix.
  • Ghoul A shapeshifter of pre-Islamic Arabian belief that haunts desert wastes, graveyards and empty places. The word entered English in 1786 through Beckford's novel Vathek.
  • Karkadann A fierce one-horned beast of the plains of India and Persia, based on the Indian rhinoceros. It drives off animals as big as an elephant. Its horn was used for knife handles and as a cure for poison.
  • Lamassu An Assyrian guardian with a human head, a bull's or a lion's body and a bird's wings. Colossal pairs stood at palace and city gates. Early ones have five legs, so they stand still from the front and stride from the side.
  • Leviathan The sea serpent of Job, the Psalms and Isaiah. Job 41 gives it fiery breath and scales that nothing can pierce. It continues an older Ugaritic sea monster called Lotan. In modern Hebrew the word means whale.
  • Manticore A Persian beast reported by the Greek writer Ctesias: a lion's body, a human face with three rows of teeth, and a scorpion's tail or a tail of venomous spines shot like arrows. Its Old Persian name means man-eater.
  • Mushussu The dragon on the Ishtar Gate of Babylon: a scaly body, a long neck and tail, a lion's front paws, an eagle's talons behind, two horns and a snake's tongue. It was the sacred animal of the god Marduk. The name means fierce snake or reddish snake.
  • Roc A bird of prey so large that it carries off elephants in its talons. On Sinbad's second voyage its egg looks like a great dome. Marco Polo repeated the elephant story, and later writers tied the bird to Madagascar.
  • Simurgh A kindly Persian bird big enough to carry an elephant or a whale, painted as a peacock with a dog's head and a lion's claws. It raised the infant Zal and gave him three golden feathers to burn if he ever needed help. In Attar's poem thirty birds go looking for it, a pun on si morgh, thirty birds.
  • Ziz A giant griffin-like bird of Jewish tradition whose wings can block out the sun. It rules the birds as Leviathan rules the fish. Its ankles rest on the earth and its head reaches the sky.

Greek and Roman 19

  • Amphisbaena A serpent with a head at each end, so it can set off in either direction. Greek writers said it sprang from drops of Medusa's blood that fell on the Libyan Desert.
  • Basilisk The king of snakes. Pliny describes a small serpent from Cyrene, no more than twelve fingers long, with a white mark like a crown on its head. Its gaze and its venom kill. The smell of a weasel kills it.
  • Centaur A human torso on the body and legs of a horse. The centaurs of the mountains of Thessaly were as wild as untamed horses, with the teacher Chiron as the great exception.
  • Cerberus The hound that guards the gates of the underworld so that the dead cannot leave. He usually has three heads, and a serpent for a tail. Fetching him was the last of Heracles' labours.
  • Charybdis A sea monster whose gulps of water make a deadly whirlpool. She sits within an arrow's range of Scylla, so a ship that steers away from one passes close to the other.
  • Chimera A fire-breathing beast from Lycia: a lion in front, a goat's head rising from its back and a tail that ends in a snake's head. Bellerophon killed it from the back of Pegasus.
  • Cyclops A one-eyed giant. Three cyclopes forged the lightning bolts of Zeus. Homer's are a tribe of man-eating shepherds, and Polyphemus is the one Odysseus meets.
  • Gorgon Three sisters with snakes for hair: Stheno, Euryale and Medusa. Anyone who looked at them turned to stone. Only Medusa was mortal, and Perseus defeated her by watching her reflection in his bronze shield.
  • Harpy A bird with a maiden's head. The name means snatchers: they stole King Phineus's food at every meal until the Boreads drove them off. They stand for storm winds.
  • Hippocampus The front of a horse and the tail of a fish. The name joins the Greek words for horse and sea monster. In Hellenistic and Roman art a team of them pulls Poseidon's sea chariot.
  • Hydra A many-headed water serpent in the lake of Lerna, with poisonous breath and blood. In later versions two heads grow back for each one cut off. Heracles beat it as his second labour, while his nephew Iolaus burned each stump.
  • Minotaur A bull's head on a man's body, born to Queen Pasiphaë and the Cretan Bull. It lived in the Labyrinth until Theseus killed it there.
  • Nemean Lion A lion whose skin no weapon could pierce, so Heracles strangled it. A model for any monster that needs a clever answer and not a sharper sword.
  • Pegasus A divine winged stallion, the child of Medusa and Poseidon. He sprang from Medusa's neck when Perseus beheaded her, and later carried Bellerophon against the Chimera.
  • Phoenix A golden-red firebird. Only one lives at a time. At the end of its life it burns, and a new phoenix rises from the ashes.
  • Scylla A monster on one side of a narrow strait, opposite Charybdis. She snatches six of Odysseus's sailors as his ship passes. Virgil linked the strait to Messina, and the Italian town of Scilla carries her name.
  • Siren In early Greek art, a large bird with a woman's head whose song draws sailors in. Odysseus plugged his crew's ears with beeswax and had himself tied to the mast. The fish tail only became standard in the Middle Ages.
  • Sphinx A woman's face, a lion's body and a bird's wings. She guarded the way into Thebes and asked every traveller a riddle; when Oedipus solved it she threw herself from her rock. Egyptian sphinxes are usually male, wingless and kindly.
  • Stymphalian Bird Birds with bronze beaks and metal feathers they could launch, living at Lake Stymphalia in Arcadia. For his sixth labour Heracles scared them into the air with a rattle from Athena and shot many of them down.

How this list was compiled: 150 creatures of myth and folklore, grouped by the tradition the stories come from. The list was chosen for this site, working from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legendary_creatures_by_type, the A to Z pages under https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_legendary_creatures, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Greek_mythological_creatures, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legendary_creatures_from_Japan and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fearsome_critters (all checked 2026-09-18). Every description is written for this site, and each fact in it was checked on 2026-09-18 against that creature's own English Wikipedia article (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ plus the name; a few sit under other titles, such as /wiki/Underwater_panther, /wiki/Lightning_bird, /wiki/Sasabonsam, /wiki/Bigfoot, /wiki/Kappa_(folklore) and /wiki/Ahuizotl_(mythology)). Details an article did not support were left out, so some cards are shorter than the popular version of the story. Left off on purpose: figures that are sacred, or whose use is restricted, in a living tradition, and figures too grim for a general party site. Spellings are the common English ones without accents (Puca for púca, Boitata for boitatá). Licence: own work