差分

According to art historian [[Rudolf Wittkower]], the idea of the roc had its origins in the story of the fight between the Indian solar bird [[Garuda]]<ref>Wittkower noted the identification of the roc and Garuda made in Kalipadra Mitra, "The bird and serpent myth", ''The Quarterly Journal of the Mythic Society'' (Bangalore) '''16''' 1925–26:189.</ref> and the [[chthonic]] serpent [[Nāga]]. The [[mytheme]] of Garuda carrying off an elephant that was battling a crocodile appears in two Sanskrit epics, the ''[[Mahabharata]]'' (I.1353) and the ''[[Ramayana]]'' (III.39).

== Western expansion ==

==Rationalized accounts==

The scientific culture of the 19th century introduced some "scientific" rationalizations for the myth's origins, by suggesting that the origin of the [[Mythology|myth]] of the roc may lie in embellishments of the often-witnessed power of the eagle that could carry away a newborn lamb. In 1863, [[Giovanni Giuseppe Bianconi|Bianconi]] suggested the roc was a [[Bird of prey|raptor]] (Hawkins and Goodman, 2003: 1031). Recently a giant [[subfossil]] eagle, the [[Malagasy crowned eagle]], identified from [[Madagascar]] was actually implicated as a top bird [[predator]] of the island, whose [[megafauna]] once included giant [[lemur]]s and [[Malagasy hippopotamus|pygmy hippopotamuses]].<ref>Goodman, 1994</ref>

Another possible origin of the myth is accounts of eggs of another extinct Malagasy bird, the enormous ''[[Aepyornis]]'' [[elephant bird]], hunted to extinction by the 16th century, that was three meters tall and [[flightless bird|flightless]].<ref>{{cite book | title=The Eighth Continent | url=https://archive.org/details/eighthcontinent00pete | url-access=registration | author=Tyson, Peter | year=2000 | location=New York | pages=[https://archive.org/details/eighthcontinent00pete/page/138 138–139]}}</ref> There were reported elephant bird sightings at least in folklore memory as [[Étienne de Flacourt]] wrote in 1658.{{r|ley196608}} Its egg, live or [[Subfossil|subfossilised]], was known as early as 1420, when sailors to the Cape of Good Hope found eggs of the roc, according to a caption in the 1456 [[Fra Mauro map]] of the world, which says that the roc "carries away an elephant or any other great animal".<ref>{{Cite book|title=Science and Civilisation in China|last=Needham|first=Joseph|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1971|isbn=9780521070607|pages=501}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=The Life of Prince Henry of Portugal Surnamed the Navigator, and Its Results, Comprising the Discovery, Within One Century, of Half the World ... from Authentic Contemporary Documents|last=Major|first=Richard Henry|publisher=Biblioteca Nacional de Austria – Asher (Editor)|year=1868|pages=311}}</ref> Between 1830 and 1840 European travelers in Madagascar saw giant eggs and egg shells. English observers were more willing to believe their accounts because they knew of the [[moa]] in New Zealand. In 1851 the [[French Academy of Sciences]] received three eggs. They and later fossils seemingly confirmed to 19th-century Europeans that ''Aepyornis'' was the roc, but the real bird does not resemble an eagle as the roc is said to.{{r|ley196608}}

== See also ==

* [[Eagle (Middle-earth)]], the giant birds of [[J. R. R. Tolkien]]'s tales

* [[List of fictional birds of prey]]

==References==

:For a collection of [[legend]]s about the roc, see [[Edward William Lane|Edward Lane]]'s ''Arabian Nights'', chap; xx. notes 22, 62

* [[Samuel Bochart|Bochart, Samuel]], ''Hierozoicon'', vi.14

* [[Damfri]], I. 414, ii. 177 seq.