HOMO CAUDATUS

The idea that there have been populations of men with tails has surfaced from time to time in zoological lore.  It has entered fantasy literature where, in Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan the Terrible, tailed men are to be found in the land of Pal-ul-don.

In earlier days, it was believed in parts of Europe that Englishmen had tails.  In England itself, people living in other counties ascribed tails to the inhabitants of Kent, Cornwall and Dorset.  People didn't get about much in those days.

At a more exotic level, a Dutchman named Struys found himself in Taiwan, where he encountered a prisoner waiting for execution.  This prisoner, assured Struys, had a tail over a foot in length.  Those of his tribe, the prisoner is said to have averred, also possessed tails.

The United States too was supposed to harbor Tailed Men.  This was told to the Reverend A.R. Wright in Alaska, in the early part of the 20th Century.  They were supposed to be extinct in Wright's time.  According to the legend, they had killed an Indian.  The Indians besieged them in a cave, stopping up the entrance with brands and brushwood and apparently killing all within.  The same sort of legend seems to be told in various parts of the world about the extermination of racial groups.

This does not exhaust the number of places where tailed men were reputed to live and even today the Orang Ekor of Malaysia and other such tailed humans are said to exist.  The legends of the Kiowa Indians included creatures called Tailed Small Men.