Myth & LegendGreek → English
Basilisk
/ˈbæsɪlɪsk/noun
A legendary serpent whose glance kills, and also a crested lizard of Central America.
The Greek roots
βασιλίσκος
basilískos
little king
Literally: “little king”
Follow a root:βασιλίσκος1 word
The story of the word
Pliny describes a small snake carrying a white mark on its head like a diadem, which is why Greeks called it a little βασιλεύς. Medieval bestiaries gave it a cockerel's body and a lethal stare, and the cockatrice grew out of the same animal. Naturalists of the 18th century handed the name to a harmless American lizard with a crest along its back, the one that runs across water.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 14th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
basilicaBasil
In a sentence
He gave her a basilisk look across the table and she stopped talking.