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The xizi (席子; Chinese: "mat") or xixuetan (吸血毯; "blood-sucking blanket") is a cryptid reported from China, described as a blood-sucking creature resembling a mat or a blanket, but covered in suckers.[1] It is very similar to the Argentine-Chilean cuero, which is reported from the opposite side of the Pacific Ocean, and one of its variant names, dipijuan (地皮卷; "ground-leather roll") has the same meaning as cuero (Spanish: "leather hide").
Description[]
The xizi is a flattened creature usually said to resemble a woolen blanket or a mat, though other shapes are sometimes described. Descriptions of its size range from 13'' wide to about 6'6'' square, and it has been described as reddish in colour, or covered in soft, fuzzy, greenish fur which may be a covering of moss. A sighting from 2000 describes small eyes and "wing-like appendages". Its ventral surface is covered in sharp suckers, and it is alleged to suck the blood of humans and animals. It is reported from rivers, estuaries, and water-filled depressions and crevices, and can move on land.[1]
Sightings[]
Undated[]
The 9th Century work Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang (酉阳杂俎) by Duan Chengshi describes an attack by an animal resembling the xizi. According to this account, a fisherman in Jiangzhou (now Jiangxi Province) was attacked by a large leaf-like animal, 13'' wide and covered in circular, sharp suckers. The fisherman died, apparently of blood loss, shortly after the attack.[1]
Modern accounts have been collected from Yunnan, especially Xishuangbanna Autonomous Prefecture, where it is called dipijuan. One is alleged to have been killed by a female elephant (Elephas maximus) when it attacked her calf during a river crossing, resulting in the mother pulling her calf away, pulling up the dipijuan with her trunk, and trampling it to death. A hunter who saw the incident saw the carcass, and found it to have a greenish dorsal surface covered in moss, and a ventral surface covered in octopus-like suckers the size of rice bowls.[1]
1771[]
The 1788 work What the Master Would Not Discuss (子不語), a collection of supposedly true stories collected over many years by scholar Yuan Mei, claims that in Spring 1771 an underwater diver was "tightly wrapped by a reddish, large dustpan-like animal equipped with many suckers" in a river in Zhengjiang, Jiangsu.[1]
1976 or 1977[]
In Summer 1976 or 1977, a young girl swimming in a pond in Yunnan's Ruili County was allegedly attacked by a xizi, which wrapped itself around her arm so tightly that her father was obliged to cut her arm off. Some weeks later, a "floating shadow" seized a man swimming in the same pool, prompting the locals to drain it. Supposedly, they subsequently found the man's body, "still wrapped tight by the moss-covered creatures suckers".[1]
1993[]
In Autumn 1993, two brothers searching for frogs in a grotto near the Daluo River in Mengla County stumbled over a "greenish woolen blanket" on the ground. The "blanket" immediately rose up and wrapped itself around one of the brother's legs, but released him and fled into a deep pool when the other brother burned it with his torch.[1]
2000[]
A fisherman named Lamaoli claimed to have observed a xizi attacking a dog on 15 March 2000, in Daluo Township, Xishuangbanna. According to Lamaoli, he was fishing by the river when he saw "a dark, woolen blanket-like object surfacing and moving towards him. It had two small, glistening eyes, as well as a pair of wing-like appendages". The animal submerged and disappeared when he threw a rock at it, but during the night, Lamaoli awoke to find it attacking a puppy while a mother dog bit at it. Although it eventually gave up and left, the puppy later died of blood loss, and was covered in bowl-sized welts.[1]
Theories[]
- See also: Cuero§Theories
The giant freshwater stingray (Himantura polylepis), or a relative, has been suggested as an explanation for the xizi (Source).
The xizi is often thought of as a sort of giant freshwater ray. David C. Xu suggests that a stray Southeast Asian giant freshwater stingray (Himantura polylepis), or an unknown Chinese species similar to it, might have given rise to stories of the xizi.[1]
Alternatively, it has been speculated to be a type of freshwater cephalopod, which have been reported as cryptids in their own right in Africa and North America. No known cephalopod is adapted to live in fresh water, but some species have extensive webbing, like the vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis) and the blanket octopuses (Tremoctopus spp.), which might disguise their arms.[1]