The Bunyip is an Australian legend that started with the Aborigines, and was subsequently spread among the white settlers. It’s been physically described as looking a thousand different ways – having everything from horse parts to tentacles.

At one point a skull of the creature was thought to be found, and when science at the time could not definitively identify it – it looked like the legends were all too true.

Here is a definition of the Bunyip as found in the Encyclopedia Mythica:

“A bellowing water monster from Aboriginal legend, believed to bring diseases. It lives at the bottom of the water holes, swamps, lakes and rivers of the Australian outback. The creature is roughly the size of a calf and requires calm water to live in. Unless its food sources are interfered with, the bunyip usually leaves human beings alone. However, if necessary it has the strength to pull a person down into the water and drown him. The name comes from an Aboriginal word meaning “devil” or “spirit”.”

Although no specific sighting or encounters with the creature seem to have been reported, there was still plenty of fuel to feed the fire. For instance, according to Skeptic World.com:

“In 1846 a peculiar skull was taken from the banks of Murrumbidgee River in New South Wales. In the first flush of excitement, several experts concluded that it was the skull of something unknown to science. In 1847 the so-called bunyip skull was put on exhibition in the Australian Museum (Sydney) for two days. Visitors flocked to see it and the Sydney Morning Herald said that it prompted many people to speak out about their ‘bunyip sightings’ “Almost everyone became immediately aware that he had heard ’strange sounds’ from the lagoons at night, or had seen ’something black’ in the water.”"

The skull was eventually called that of a deformed horse or calf, but public interest did not fade. Take the Bunyip of the Greta area, for instance. Long had locals claimed to hear a ‘loud booming sound’ coming from the swamp. When a search party would be dispatched, they always reported the same thing – nothing. Eventually the swamp was drained and the noise stopped. Some thought the creature had been killed by the death of it’s natural habitat, others thought it just moved.

Perhaps the most convincing piece of evidence that the Bunyip exists is the fact it was shown in a South Park episode playing the role of God (season 3). Camera footage like that is very hard to fake, and thus far, science has not been able to definitively prove it wrong.

Just you think about that for a minute.