Flying Snake

Palestine, or the Holy land: from the earliest period to the present time

1837-By Michael Russell

 There is mention made in Holy Scripture of the fiery flying serpent a creature about whose existence and qualities naturalists have entertained a considerable difference of opinion It is now generally admitted that in Guinea Java and other countries where there is at once great heat and a marshy soil there exists a species of these animals which have the power of moving in the air or at least of passing from tree to tree Niebuhr relates that at Bazra also there is a sort of serpents called heie sursurie They commonly live on dates and as it would be troublesome to them to come down one high tree and creep up another they hang by the tail to the branch of one and by winging that about take advantage of its motion to leap to that of a second These the modern Arabs call flying serpents hcit thidre I do not know whether the ancient Arabs were acquainted with any other kind of flying serpent Near Batavia there are certain flying snakes or dragons as they are sometimes called They have four legs a long tail and their skin speckled with many spots their wings are not unlike those of a bat which they move in flying but otherwise keep them almost unperceived clc se to the body They fly nimbly but cannot hold out long so that they only shift from tree to tree at about twenty or thirty yards distance On the outside of the throat are two bladders which being extended when they fly serve them instead of a sail t

An essay on aërial navigation, with some observations on ships, by J.McS. 1844

Cicero in his work de Natura Deorum speaks of Ibis in Egypt destroying flying snakes volucres angues brought by the wind from the desert of Libya speaks also in the same passage of the Crocodile and the Ichneumon so that it was evident that he was ignorant of the natural history of Egypt He was of the most accomplished men of his age and if snakes were entirely fabulous it is difficult to that a man of his great acquirements could have into such a mistake There was intercourse by ships between Rome and Egypt at the time so that he opportunities of knowing a deal about Egypt If it admitted that Dragons existed in the historical period why not admit the existence of the Pterodactyle in same period and that this creature was brought occasionally into Egypt by the wind But it may be said that Pterodactyle resembled a lizard more than a snake this it may be answered that the ancients were not so precise as the moderns in the nomenclature of animals from its long n eck the Pterodactyle might have been a snake by ancient writers Tacitus appears to use words anguis and draco in the same sense in of a fabulous matter favor plebis acrior in loco preesagii acceptus est vulgabaturque infantia dracones in modum custodum fabulosa et miraculis assimulata nam ipse huadquaquam sui detractor unam omnino anguetn in cubiculo vision solitus est Taciti Annal Lib XI The Ibis by lacerating the membranous wings of the Pterodactyle in the air could cause it to fall curious bird the Dodo has become extinct in the historical period There is thus some reason to suppose that flying snake of the ancients was the Pterodactyle