Cockatrice

That dangerous eye-killing cockatrice
  —Michael Drayton

A cockatrice is a mythical beast, essentially a two-legged dragon, wyvern, or serpent-like creature with a rooster's head and feet. Described by Laurence Breiner as "an ornament in the drama and poetry of the Elizabethans", it was featured prominently in English thought and myth for centuries.

Quotes

• Here with a cockatrice’ dead-killing eye
  He rouseth up himself, and makes a pause;
  While she, the picture of pure piety,
  Like a white hind under the gripe’s sharp claws,
  Pleads in a wilderness where are no laws,
    To the rough beast that knows no gentle right,
    Nor aught obeys but his foul appetite.
  • William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece (1594)

• O ill-dispersing wind of misery!
  O my accursed womb, the bed of death!
  A cockatrice hast thou hatch'd to the world,
  Whose unavoided eye is murderous.
  • William Shakespeare, Richard III, Act 4, Scene 1

• Hath Romeo slain himself? Say thou but 'Ay,'
  And that bare vowel 'I' shall poison more
  Than the death-darting eye of cockatrice.
  • William Shakespeare]], Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2

• ... Never threaten with your eyes!
  They are no cockatrices.
  • Nathan Field, The Honest Man's Fortune (1647), Scene 1
  • The Works of Beaumont and Fletcher, Vol. 2 (George Routledge & Sons, 1872)

• Three sorts of serpents do resemble thee:
    That dangerous eye-killing cockatrice,
    The enchanting siren, which doth so entice,
  The weeping crocodile—these vile pernicious three.
  • Michael Drayton, "Amour XXX", Idea's Mirror (1594)

• Where no sun shines through the live-long day,
    Because of the blue-wreathed mist,
  Where the cockatrice creeps her foul egg to lay,
    And the speckled snake has hissed:
  • Ann Taylor, "The Maniac’s Song" (July 1808)
  • Reported in: Doris Mary Armitage, The Taylors of Ongar (W. Heffer & Sons Ltd., 1939), p. 207

• Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
  Basilisk, and all that’s evil,
  Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
  Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor,
  Monkey, Ape, and twenty more;
  • Charles Lamb, "A Farewell to Tobacco"
  • The Reflector, 4 (1811); The Works of Charles Lamb, 2 vols. (London: Ollier, 1818)

• And the King said, “Behold and see, that which sprung from the egg of a cock, hatched by the deaf adder. The glance of its eye sufficeth to turn to stone any living thing that standeth before it. Were I but for one instant to loose my spells whereby I hold it in subjection, in that moment would end my life days and thine. So strong in properties of ill is this serpent which the ancient Enemy that dwelleth in darkness hath placed upon this earth, to be a bane unto the children of men, but an instrument of might in the hand of enchanters and sorcerers.”
  Therewith came forth that offspring of perdition from its hole, strutting erect on its two legs that were the legs of a cock; and a cock’s head it had, with rosy comb and wattles, but the face of it like no fowl’s face of middle-earth but rather a gorgon’s out of Hell. Black shining feathers grew on its neck, but the body of it was the body of a dragon with scales that glittered in the rays of the candles, and a scaly crest stood on its back; and its wings were like bats’ wings, and its tail the tail of an aspick with a sting in the end thereof, and from its beak its forked tongue flickered venomously. And the stature of the thing was a little above a cubit. Now because of the spells of King Gorice whereby he held it ensorcelled it might not cast its baneful glance upon him, nor upon Gro, but it walked back and forth in the candle light, averting its eyes from them. The feathers on its neck were fluffed up with anger and wondrous swiftly twirled its scaly tail, and it hissed ever more fiercely, irked by the bonds of the King’s enchantment; and the breath of it was noisome, and hung in sluggish wreaths about the chamber. So for a while it walked before them, and as it looked sidelong past him Gro beheld the light of its eyes that were as sick moons burning poisonously through a mist of greenish yellow in the dusk of night. And strong loathing seized him, so that his gorge rose to behold the thing, and his brow and the palms of his hands became clammy, and he said, “My Lord the King, I have looked steadfastly on this cockatrice and it affrighteth me no whit, but it is loathly in my sight, so that my gorge riseth because of it,” and with that he fell a-vomiting. And the King commanded that serpent back into its hole, whither it returned, hissing wrathfully.
  • E. R. Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros (1922), Ch. IV

• “Well, the Heads of the participating schools are always on the panel,” said Hermione, and everyone looked around at her, rather surprised, “because all three of them were injured during the Tournament of 1792, when a cockatrice the champions were supposed to be catching went on the rampage.”
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2000), Ch. 15

Bible

Wycliffe's Bible uses the word "cockatrice" to translate several different Hebrew words. This usage was followed by the King James Version, the word being used several times. The Revised Version—following the tradition established by Jerome's Vulgate basiliscus—renders the word as "basilisk", and the New International Version translates it as "viper".

• And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den.
  • Isaiah 11:8 (KJV)

• Rejoice not thou, whole Palestina, because the rod of him that smote thee is broken: for out of the serpent’s root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent.
  • Isaiah 14:29 (KJV)

• They hatch cockatrice’ eggs, and weave the spider’s web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth, and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper.
  • Isaiah 59:5 (KJV)

• For, behold, I will send serpents, cockatrices, among you, which will not be charmed, and they shall bite you, saith the LORD.
  • Jeremiah 8:17 (KJV)

Book of Mormon

• And the suckling child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’s den.
  • 2 Nephi 21:8, 30:14

• Rejoice not thou, whole Palestina, because the rod of him that smote thee is broken; for out of the serpent’s root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent.
  • 2 Nephi 24:29