The Goatsucker
Since ancient times, herders said a bird flew down to their goats at night and drank their milk. Its name still says so: goatsucker.
What was reported
Nightjars are birds of the dusk, with huge gaping mouths, soft grey-brown feathers and a long mechanical churring song that can go on for minutes, like a distant motor. They fly low and silently around livestock after dark.
Aristotle wrote that they sucked milk from goats, which then went blind, and the belief spread across Europe. The scientific name for the family, Caprimulgus, means 'goat-milker'.
Explanations offered
Nightjars fly around animals to catch the moths and insects drawn to them, and their wide mouths fuelled the idea. They don't drink milk. Their eerie churring, heard on warm summer nights, kept the legend alive.
- When
- Believed for more than 2,000 years
- Where
- As told since ancient Greece
- Witnesses
- Herders, and Aristotle
- Status
- Explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.
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