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The Elusive Bunyip: Australia’s Chameleon Cryptid
Jan 30th in Cryptozoology by Andrew Nicholson
On a recent episode of The Gralien Report, host Micah Hanks asked me about that mythical Australian swamp monster, the Bunyip. Providing an adequate answer to the question of what the Bunyip is can be difficult, for there are almost as many descriptions of the elusive creature as there are sightings. If the Bunyip does indeed exist, it is Australia’s chameleon cryptid.
In 1847, the Australian Museum in Sydney displayed what was then claimed to be the skull of the elusive Bunyip. The “Bunyip skull” was on display at the museum for just two days before being quietly removed. But while controversy surrounded the authenticity of the museum’s latest exhibit, an article about the “Bunyip skull” in The Sydney Morning Herald prompted many readers to come forward to speak of their own sightings of the much-feared creature.
One such sighting occurred years earlier on the shores of Lake Bathurst in inland New South Wales by a Mr E. S. Hall in 1821. In a letter to the editor of The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, Hall described seeing an “extraordinary creature” while walking by the side of a marsh running into the lake.
