As further evidence to my post of earlier today, here's two more stories of big-cats roaming around Britain:
Story One and Story Two.
Interestingly, the latter case involves a creature seen prowling around a graveyard in a cemetery in the English county of Kent. Graveyards are regular haunts for strange beasts in the British Isles - the legendary phantom black dogs of centuries-past being a perfect case in point. And there have been several such encounters with big-cats at the German Cemetery in the woods of England's Cannock Chase.
Physical beasts, paranormal entities, or a curious and poorly understood blend of the two?
4 comments:
Striking how these mystery cats seem to appear within a relatively short window of time (including the lion sighting from Nottingham referenced by your other post). Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Britain now nearly 2 human generations removed from the legislation that prohibited keeping big cats as pets? Assuming that not all of these sightings are misidentifications or hoaxes and that escaped/released cats did not successfully breed on a country-wide scale (which would seem to be necessary to account for the reports), where is the "pipeline" for big cats being illegally transported into Britain? Seems that if such a thing existed, law enforcement would have made some "busts" or "stings" by now. Makes it hard to believe that these sightings are of flesh-and-blood critters, but from what I read they tend to behave like "real" animals (e.g., killing livestock, eating meat).
AWT:
You're absolutely right re these animals being at least 2 generations on.
There are several theories: the paranormal angle is the subject of Merrily Harpur's excellent book, "Mystery Big Cats," which is required reading for anyone who wants to get acqainted with the UK cat stories.
A similar (and related) line suggests they are a modern day manifestation of the old black sog legends.
A third is the standard flesh and blood angle re "'circus escapees;" "private zoo" escapees etc.
A fourth is that Britain is home to a population of indigenous Big Cat that hasn't been identified yet. This theory has been addressed deeply by researcher Di Francis.
But there are as many cases suggesting a paranormal angle to these cats as there is a flesh and blood angle.
Maybe "it" straddles both realms...
I definitely recommend a reading of Merrily's book though - it's a very good one.
Sorry guys but I disagree about Merrily Harpur's book, it's a tragedy it ever came to publication. I'm just being honest but my research of 18 has never once led me to believe these cats are a mystery at all. All the answers will be revealed in my MYSTERY ANIMALS OF KENT book, and on www.kentbigcats.blogspot.com but in my opion, all the time these cats are connected to demons, UFPs, ghosts blah blah, the research will forever be tainted. The Roman's and private menageries had a lot to answer for...couple that with the 1976 Dangerous Wild Animals Act...it's no big deal at all, the problem is too many so-called researchers are all too eager to class such animals as unexplained because they haven't a clue as to how to see one.
Cheers Neil,
Let me know when Jon publishes the book and I'll do a big review.
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