Beast of Dean

The Beast of Dean is an animal said to live, or to have once lived, in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, England.[1] It was originally thought to resemble a wild boar (Sus scrofa), but abnormally large in size. At that time of its first sightings, wild boar were extinct in Britain.[2]

The Forest of Dean, the reported home of Beast of Dean

History

Farmers from the village of Parkend undertook an expedition to capture and kill the creature, in 1802 but found nothing. The animal they were hunting was reported to be a boar large enough to fell trees and hedges.

Beginning in the early 1990s, a number of Phantom cats were sighted in the Forest of Dean.[3] The identity of these "Black Panthers" was thrown into further confusion in 2002 when a large Wild Boar with black fur was killed in a collision along the A40 near the town of Over.[3]

In fiction

In the science-fiction television series Primeval, the Beast of Dean turns out to be a gorgonopsid that arrived in the present day through a wormhole leading to the Permian period.[4]

References
  1. Reed, Matthew and Naylor, Rhiannon and Lewis, Nick (2014) Feral big cats in rural Gloucestershire - reflecting on the possible presence of exotic animals in the English landscape.
  2. Goulding, M. 2001.Possible genetic sources of free‐living Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) in southern England. Mammal Review: 31
  3. Newton, M. 2005. Encyclopedia of Cryptozoology: a Global Guide. McFarland and Company Incorporated. London. p. 49
  4. Flett, Kathryn (11 February 2007). "Saturday night feast of big, big beasts". The Observer. Archived from the original on 19 February 2007.


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