World Book Trivia Quiz For Kids--12/24-mythical Creatures

Mermaids drew human men to them with their beauty and their singing. The mermaids would sit and comb their long golden hair. A magic cap lay beside them. They would slip the cap on the head of the man they wanted and take him away with them. Wearing the magic cap, a human being could live in the sea. There were also mermen, who captured human women.

A vampire is a dead person who is said to come to life to suck people's blood at night. Vampires are not real, but some people believe in them. There are many stories and folk tales about vampires. Some stories tell about vampires biting the necks of sleeping people and sucking their blood.

According to folklore, leprechauns keep a pot of gold hidden at the end of a rainbow. A person who captures a leprechaun can force the leprechaun to give up his treasure. But a leprechaun usually tricks his captor into looking away and thus escapes.

In Egypt, most statues of sphinxes had a man's head and a lion's body. They often honored a king or queen. In ancient Greece, the sphinx had a woman's head, a lion's body, and a snake's tail.

The unicorn is a make-believe one-horned animal that appears in ancient stories. Many people believed they were real. Long ago, a Greek physician named Ctesias wrote about a strange animal from India. It had a white body, blue eyes, and a single horn on its forehead. In early Christian stories, the unicorn was the size of a goat.

Uranus was a god of the sky in Greek mythology. Uranus and his mother Gaea produced a number of gigantic offspring, including 3 one-eyed giants called Cyclopes and the 12 Titans, the first race of gods.

The hydra was a many-headed serpent of Greek mythology. One of the hydra's heads could not die. The rest grew back as soon as they were cut off. But Hercules and his nephew Iolaus killed the monster. They first cut off all the mortal heads, sealing each neck with fire. Hercules then cut off the immortal head of the hydra.

Bigfoot is a humanlike creature that may or may not exist. It is said to live in mountains in the northwest United States and Canada. Many people claim to have seen Bigfoot or its footprints.

Dragons look something like lizards but are bigger. They breathe fire and have long, scaly tails. In tales from Europe, dragons are usually fierce and evil. But Asian dragons are usually friendly and bring good luck and wealth.

Different methods can return a werewolf to human form. These methods include removing the wolf skin, speaking the werewolf's human name, hitting the werewolf on the head, and making the sign of the cross.