The name is applied to the Mugger crocodile, the most common crocodile in India, and is descriptive of its aggressive feeding behavior. The English word 'mugger' evolved meaning one who sneaks up and attacks another. It is the origin of the word for crocodile 'mugger' (मगर) in Hindi. The "chu-srin", and also denotes a hybrid creature. Makara' is a Sanskrit word which means "sea dragon" or "water-monster" and in Tibetan language it is called If only these walls could talk, we might have a clue. Perhaps here in the humid, ancient jungles of Southeast Asia, where the climate has remained largely unchanged since the dinosaurs' days, giant reptiles lived on well into the human era - long enough to persist in the Khmer folk-memory. Or maybe the carving is evidence that dinosaurs really did live on until much later than previously thought. One theory has it that the image actually shows a cow or rhino with a palm tree in the background - the palm's fronds being easily mistaken for the fin-like blades running down a lizard back. Some maintain that the ancient KhmersĬould have unearthed a fossil and figured out what kind of creature it belonged to. Makara statues at the Candi Kalasan temples in Indonesia Several different theories have been advanced to explain its But many of the package tours are still ushered in and out without spotting the enigmatic dinosaur carving. The hand-sized carving of the Hindu-Buddhist Makara can be found in a quiet corner of the complex, a stone temple engulfed in jungle vegetation where the roots of centuries-old banyan trees snake through broken walls.Īfter parts of Tomb Raider were shot here, the temple got a PR lift and has become one of the site's top tourist draws. At Ta Prohm, near Angkor Wat and built by the epic builder king Jayavarman VII in the late 1100s, a small carving on a crumbling temple wall seems to show a dinosaur - a lizard, to be exact. It is generally depicted as half terrestrial animal, such as a crocodile, and in hind part as aquatic animal, in the tail part, as a fish tail or peacock's tail feathers. Makara (Sanskrit: मकर) is a sea-creature in Hindu mythology.
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India, Cambodia and Vietnam ( Southeast Asia However, they are likely just plant leaves in the background of an Asian rhinoceros. The "fins" on the creature's back resemble traditional depictions of Makara.
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What cryptid are you? Click to take the quiz.Ĭarving from 800 year old Khmer temple.