History Main / BasiliskAndCockatrice

* ''Art/BeastFables'': Cockatrices and basilisks are types of wyvern that show a greater proportion of saurian traits than normal. Cockatrices, which mostly occur among ground birds such as poultry, have sickle claws and toothed beaks in addition tot he wing claws, stronger legs, and long tails common to all wyverns, and tend to be more carnivorous than their base species. Basilisks, which arise among large, ground-running birds such as ratites and seriemas, are more reptilian still, and tend to have fully reptilian heads, necks, and tails; some are venomous as well, and are among the largest wyverns when in hybrid form -- an ostrich basilisk can tower over an elephant.

* One odd medieval culinary practice was the construction of "cockentrices" - stitched-together entrees combining the upper body of a capon with the hindquarters of a suckling pig or lamb - as entertaining roasts for important banquets. Dinner guests would enjoy watching other diners who weren't in on the gag gawk in bafflement at the MixAndMatchCritter, wondering if an actual cockatrice was being served.

** ''Series/KyoryuSentaiZyuranger'' had Dora Cockatrice, though he was only a cockatrice in appearance. His power was the giant pair of scissors he carried, which allowed him to cut open portals in time and space. Adpated for ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers'' Season 1 as Chunky Chicken.

* ''Literature/TheSpiderwickChronicles'': Cockatrices appear in the field guide as creatures resembling chickens with large spurs on their feet, lizard-like tails, forked tongues and frills around their necks like that of a frilled lizard, which they can extend in a warning display. They are born when a seven-year-old cockerel's egg laid during the full moon is brooded for nine years by a serpent or toad. Their gaze petrifies and their saliva is extremely poisonous. They are also the mortal enemies of weasels, and will go into violent fits and die if they hear a rooster crow. The book also makes mention of "false cockatrices", which, similarly to how many animals [[MimicSpecies imitate more dangerous creatures as defense from predators]], resemble cockatrices but lack the venom and petrifying gaze.

* "The Sight of the Basilisk", a short story by Lois Tilton collected in a Creator/BruceCoville anthology, depicts the basilisk as a white snake with a red crest on its head and fatal gaze, which was placed as an egg in an ancient tomb to protect against tomb robbers. It befriends a blind slave who is sent into the tomb, and leaves with him, to the doom of his captors.

* ''Franchise/{{Digimon}}'': Cockatrimon/[[SpellMyNameWithAnS Kokatorimon]], a [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin cockatrice Digimon]] complete with the usual stone-turning glare. It also has a PaletteSwap called Akatorimon.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer}}'':
** Basilisks are six-legged, brightly colored lizards so poisonous that vegetation withers and dies at their mere presence, and which can swiftly turn a fertile land into a barren waste. They can concentrate their poisonous aura in their gaze, causing creatures they fix their sight upon to swiftly sicken and die. They originated in the Chaos wastes and migrated south over time, although their preference for deserts and volcanic caves makes them rare in most human nations. Basilisk bones can be used to create blades that retain their former owners' toxic natures, making exceptionally deadly weapons that can prove equally dangerous to their wielders.

* The second boss of ''VideoGame/BalaceraBrothers'' is a green-feathered cockatrice which attacks the players while they're atop a train, which they'll need to take out in a TraintopBattle. Said cocatrice can breathe fire has a Prehensile Tail which it will use to TailSlap the brothers to their deaths.

* The ''Franchise/{{Digimon}}'' franchise has Cockatrimon/[[SpellMyNameWithAnS Kokatorimon,]] a [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin cockatrice Digimon]] complete with the usual stone-turning glare. It also has a PaletteSwap called Akatorimon.

* Averted in ''VideoGame/{{Terraria}}''. There is a type of enemy called the Basilisk in the game, but they are large ceratopsian lizards that attack by charging at you, instead of the traditional serpentine creatures. Basilisks in ''Terraria'' also cannot petrify anything.

Whether these are two distinct creatures or whether they’re interchangeable names for the same thing is something of a CyclicTrope. Originally (i.e., in the Roman Empire and the early Middle Ages), the basilisk was depicted as a horribly venomous snake, while the cockatrice, which first shows up in medieval England, was a chicken-reptile chimera that turned people to stone with its gaze. Eventually, the two creatures blended into a single myth for a number of reasons, and became synonymous terms for a single monster. In more recent times, some (although not all) works of fiction (possibly inspired by ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'') have come to once again set them apart. The basilisk tends to be shown as a more distinctly reptilian snakelike or lizardlike animal, and usually maintains a deadly petrifying gaze. By contrast, the cockatrice tends to be portrayed as more distinctly avian, with a largely birdlike body bearing a snake tail, bird legs, and wings capable of flight.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Godforsaken}}'': A basilisk is a magical kind of serpent that resembles a cobra, has a series of scales on its head like a crown, crawls upright instead of slithering on its belly, and can turn enemies into stone.

* In ''Manga/DeliciousInDungeon'':

* In ''TabletopGame/{{Ironsworn}}'', the Flooded Lands are home to the beastly basilisks. Mercifully, they don't have the petrification powers that basilisk in other settings have, but they do have a "mesmerizing gaze." And they eat people.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV'': Both the Basilisk and Cockatrice are encounterable enemies by the Vesperpool area of the main open world map. They are depicted as overgrown (the size of a large emu) roosters with dragon tails and feet. The Cockatrice, as the slightly harder version to fight, has more dragon-like features (more scales and horns) than the Basilisk, but not enough to warrant thinking of them as wholly separate entities. Apart from physical damage, they spit balls of poison into the air that can both poison and confuse your characters.

* ''Fanfic/PastSins'': From "Everfree Discovery": Cockatrices are mentioned, with the power of petrification:
--> “Everypony else is busy, especially after taking time to come and see me. Besides, I’ve been to the Everfree Forest before, Spike; I know how to keep myself out of trouble.”\\
“Says the pony that got turned to stone by a cockatrice,” Spike pointed out.

* ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'': Basilisks are common monsters, who are, however, more generally reptilian than strictly serpentine in appearance. Basically, they look like Labrador-sized short-tailed lizards with giant eyes (even though those aren't really eyes). They do, however, share the most important attribute with classical basilisks -- turning people into stone. Thankfully, petrification occurs not through their stare, but through giant clouds of poisonous gas they exhale when attacked.

* Some small dinosaurs fit the imagery of this concept, being creatures with features of both birds and reptiles--most notably, we have ''Velociraptor'' and ''Yi qi'' (the latter fits even better, as it may have had batlike wings). The recently discovered Ambopteryx also had bat-like wings.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': A cockatrice ([[MixAndMatchCritter having the head and feet of a chicken, lizard body, and bat wings]]) that can petrify with its gaze is the main threat of the episode "[[Recap/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicS1E17StareMaster Stare Master]]". Its petrification can be reversed, however, such as when Fluttershy stares one in the eye and threatens to tell its mother about its actions.

** Cockatrices appear in the games. If you hear the cockatrice's hiss or are touched by a living cockatrice there's a chance that you'll slowing start [[TakenForGranite turning to stone]]; this can be cancelled by [[spoiler:eating a lizard corpse or eating/drinking something acid]]. Touching a cockatrice (living or dead) with your bare skin will ''[[OneHitKill instantly]]'' turn you to stone. Gloved characters can take advantage of this by picking up a cockatrice corpse [[ImprovisedWeapon and using it to bash monsters]]. But keep in mind that gloved monsters can ''also'' pick up a cockatrice corpse and use it against you. And if you trip while wielding a cockatrice corpse, you ''will'' [[YetAnotherStupidDeath accidentally touch it and die of stoning]].

* In ''Literature/TheHeroesOfOlympus'', basilisks are among the monsters in Gaea's army that attacks Camp Jupiter in ''The Son of Neptune'', appearing in much the same way they did in Roman myth. They look like short, stout snakes with a crest of white spikes on their heads resembling a crown, and are so poisonous that they kill and wither any plants they touch. Weasels are their mortal enemies, something that [[{{Animorphism}} Frank]] exploits by turning into a weasel and giving chase. At least those in the battle were created by the giant Polybotes, who has living snakes braided into and constantly slithering out of his hair, and simply shook out some basilisks when he needed them.

* In ''Literature/TheSpiderwickChronicles'', cockatrices appear in the field guide as creatures resembling chickens with large spurs on their feet, lizard-like tails, forked tongues and frills around their necks like that of a frilled lizard, which they can extend in a warning display. They are born when a seven-year-old cockerel's egg laid during the full moon is brooded for nine years by a serpent or toad. Their gaze petrifies and their saliva is extremely poisonous. They are also the mortal enemies of weasels, and will go into violent fits and die if they hear a rooster crow. The book also makes mention of "False Cockatrices", which similar to how many animals imitate more dangerous creatures as defense from predators, resemble cockatrices but lack the venom and petrifying gaze.

* In ''Literature/TheWitcher'' cycle, these are two separate creatures. A basilisk is a venomous reptile with an extremely potent neurotoxin, while a cockatrice is an avian-reptile hybrid (the description brings to mind an evolutionary missing link) that hunts by [[StealthExpert stalking]] its prey and attacking a weak point. Basilisk leather and cockatrice feathers are considered prime quality by, respectively, fashionistas and scribes. Also, both can be killed with a mirror -- if hit square in the head, of course.
* ''Literature/TheLaundryFiles'': Basilisks, cockatrices and gorgons are lizard, birds and humans, respectively, who have a rare form of cancer in their visual cortex. The cancer causes an opening to a parallel dimension, and the energy brought through transmutes the carbon atoms in whatever the sufferer looks at into silicon, giving the effect of petrification. The cancer's structure can also be emulated by modern computers, meaning that a firmware update can turn any mobile phone or CCTV camera into a highly destructive weapon.
* In the third ''Literature/DanShambleZombiePI'' novel, Rusty the werewolf operates a cockatrice-fighting ring for Unnatural BeastlyBloodsports buffs. His cockatrices' ability to petrify has been suppressed, so the gamblers watching the fights won't get TakenForGranite. [[spoiler: He secretly keeps some full-strength cockatrices too, which turn out to be a useful (albeit ''very'' double-edged) weapon against the novel's villains.]]

* ''Series/{{Merlin|2008}}'' has a cockatrice that attacks Arthur and is killed by him to save Nimueh. Whether she was actually controlling it is unknown. The cockatrice looks more like a snake with legs and two sails on its back than the chicken-headed depiction, though.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': A cockatrice ([[MixAndMatchCritter having the head and feet of a chicken, lizard body, and bat wings]]) that can petrify with its gaze is the main threat of the episode "[[Recap/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicS1E17StareMaster Stare Master]]". Its petrification can be reversed, however.

* ''Series/TheWitcher'' episode [[Recap/TheWitcher2019S01E06RareSpecies "Rare Species"]] begins with Geralt killing a basilisk, although we only see its [[DecapitationPresentation severed head]]. The season two finale [[Recap/TheWitcher2019S02E08Family "Family"]] has two very different looking ones [[spoiler: (because they're summoned from AnotherDimension)]] that attack the witchers at Kaer Morhen.

** In a later chapter they encountered a cockatrice, which looks like a cross between the earlier basilisk and an [[StockDinosaurs archaeopteryx]] - bigger, leaner, more aggressive, and with nasty claws. Also, getting bitten by the snake tail causes the victim to [[TakenForGranite be petrified]].

* ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'': [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1013 SCP-1013]] (Cockatrice) is a long-tailed reptile with the head of a chicken and a frill around its neck. Eye contact with it induces total paralysis, at which point it bites the victim, which causes their outer tissues (except for the mucous membranes around the mouth and other orifices) to completely calcify, leaving the victim trapped in a three-centimeter thick shell of marble-like stone. Once this has happened, SCP-1013 either pecks a hole though the other shell or wriggles in through an orifice and proceeds to [[EatenAlive eat its helpless victim alive]].