The first written reports of the snallygaster date to 1735 when German immigrants to Maryland talked of the “schneller geist” or fast ghost. The flying beast was alternately described as being like a bird, a dragon, a harpy, demon, or some combination of them all. It was only sighted at night and was unbelievably fast, so unsurprising reports disagreed. Most agreed that it had wings, a razor sharp beak with teeth, tentacles on the face, scales, a scream like a steamtrain whistle, and an extremely bad attitude.

Most sightings were in Maryland but snallygaster would sometimes fly to other states and terrorize the local people for as well. Usually it stole children and livestock but it would occasionally go after adults as well. In 1909 it had an hour-long confrontation with three men on a train platform who eventually managed to drive it away. Theodore Roosevelt was contacted to try and hunt it down but sightings died down for awhile and the former president went hunting for big game elsewhere.

In the 1920s some federal agents managed to get a good look at one as it had been attracted to a still and drunk so much moonshine it fell down dead, into the mash. The agents were rather surprised to find a monster in the mash, but they had a job to do so blew up the still and the monster in it.

The only real check on snallygaster is the Dewayyo. It has dark, spikey fur, stands like a man, but has a wolfish head. Occasionally it will chase locals if provoked, but its full fury is reserved for the snallygaster.

Dewayyo hatch out of clutches of snallygaster eggs from apparent duds that hatch much, much later. So they are born with the smell of snallygaster all around them and spend their whole life hunting down the beasts to have a bloody family reunion.

The tentacles on the face description of snallygaster made me think of the wattle on the turkey, so I designed the tentacles as if they were a more elaborate version of that.  The beak full of teeth definitely screamed “goose” to me, so the head, neck, and body structure are based more on that.  We had a watch goose when I was a kid and those are TERRIFYING when they actually chase you.

The rest of the body design I went with the more serpentine body to end up with something that looks rather like if a cockatrice came out of a goose egg rather than a chicken egg. Considering how unpleasant a cockatrice is, a goose based one would be that much more terrifying! (gandertrice?)

In researching this, there really was no reason given for the animosity between snallygaster and dewayyo, but I did see some versions that referred to dewayyo as hatching from snallygaster eggs. So I went for familial strife.  Maybe if Snallygaster had waited for him to hatch,   Dewayyo wouldn’t be so damn angry. WHY DID YOU ABANDON ME?

I went with that putrid yellow green color scheme for snallygaster’s plumage to sort of call up that ‘rotten egg’ theme between the two. what happens when the cockatrice’s egg goes rotten?  

Acrylic on masonite

Part of the Anomalous Animals of the Americas show

Many thanks to   rgibson for a redline to fix a wonky wing joint.