#hydrarchos

In 1840, fossil showman Albert Koch bought up all the mastodon bones in one Missouri farmer’s field and built them into a fearsome, exaggerated specimen called a “Missourium”. Again in 1845, he bought up bones of the prehistoric whale Basilosaurus cetoides. Bones of the whale were often turned up by slaves working the fields in the south and were sometimes used to make furniture or the foundations of houses.  He built parts of six different whales into a massive sea serpent he called “Hydrargos sillimani”, or Hydrarchos, that was first exhibited in a New York salon.

Dale Pollard The Sahara desert is one of the driest places on the planet, but the fossils of large aquatic creatures were found buried beneath the sand. In the late 19th century, the paleontologist Othniel Charles Marsh made some interesting remarks regarding the remains of the Hydrarchos; a large serpentine monster found near Cairo, Egypt, by Albert Gaudry, in a place dubbed The Valley of…

Hydrarchos © deviantArt user ArnaTornwolf.

[Commissioned by @wannabedemonlord. The original was a chimera of whale skeletons and ammonites put together by a showman and marketed as the skeleton of a sea serpent. The commissioner requested that I make it an animal.]

Hydrarchos CR 13 N Animal This colossal creature appears to be somewhere between a snake and a whale. It has a single pair of broad, powerful fins, and a long muscular tail. Its body is covered in a fine layer of scales, and a low ridge grows along its back.

The hydrarchos is one of the largest animals in the sea. Although the most massive whales are heavier, none are as long as a hydrarchos, which can grow over 100 feet in length. They are an offshoot of the mosasaurs, and like them are enormous carnivorous marine reptiles. A hydrarchos preys almost entirely on whales and other enormous marine life, and even sea serpents may disappear down its gullet. As the hydrarchos takes predominately large prey, it usually ignores the comings and goings of humanoids in the water. They occasionally mistake ships for whales, however, and woe betide the whaling crew that launches harpoons at a hydrarchos on the surface.

As they require enormous amounts of food to maintain themselves, most hydrarchos are solitary except in the most productive waters. They are constrictors, wrapping their coils around a whale and crushing it to death, or simply forcing its head below water until the poor beast drowns. Mating is promiscuous and neither parent plays any role in raising the offspring—the young are born live and swim off immediately to find their own food. As a newborn hydrarchos is about the size of a full-grown man, they are top predators from the start.

Hydrarchos as Animal Companions Starting Statistics: Size Medium; Speed swim 40 ft.; AC +1 natural armor; Attack bite (1d6), tail slap (1d4); Ability Scores Str 13, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 6; Special Qualities low-light vision, hold breath, scent.

7th-Level Advancement: Size Large; AC +3 natural armor; Attack bite (1d8 plus grab), tail slap (1d6); Ability Scores Str +8, Dex –2, Con +4; Special Attacks constrict (1d8)

457: Hydrarchos

Dream big!

For anyone not in the know, Basilosaurus is an early whale that lived around 40 million years ago.  However, when it was first discovered in the early 1800s, it was assumed to have been a large aquatic reptile, similar to the plesiosaurs or mosasaurs.  Therefore, it was dubbed “Basilosaurus” - “king lizard”.  Several years later, the mistake was realized, and the name “Zeuglodon” - “yoked tooth” - was proposed as a replacement.  However, the name “Basilosaurus” takes precedence, and cannot be changed.

Basilosaurus was not an extremely well-known animal when it was thought to have been a reptile, and no paleoartistic reconstructions of a reptilian Basilosaurus exist - at least not to my knowledge.

However, in 1845, an American fossil collector and showman huckster named Albert Koch used pieces of at least six Basilosaurus skeletons, as well as remains of other animals, to create a 100-foot-long “sea serpent” he dubbed Hydrarchos.  Koch and Hydrarchos toured the United States and Europe throughout the late 1840s and 1850s, astounding paying customers and irritating scientists the world over.

In 1840, fossil showman Albert Koch bought up all the mastodon bones in one Missouri farmer's field and built them into a fearsome, exaggerated specimen called a "Missourium". Again in 1845, he bought up bones of the prehistoric whale Basilosaurus cetoides. Bones of the whale were often turned up by slaves working the fields in the south and were sometimes used to make furniture or the foundations of houses.  He built parts of six different whales into a massive sea serpent he called "Hydrargos sillimani", or Hydrarchos, that was first exhibited in a New York salon.