Rat king

Not all urban legends start with a couple of unsuspecting teenagers necking in a car at the edge of the woods. Some take place in the grit of the city, close to the slime and grime of fast-paced life. One example is that of the rat king. It's not just something the writers of “30 Rock” invented. The rat king has existed in the minds of many for centuries. A rat king is a cluster of rats whose tails have tangled together to form one large knot bound by blood, fecal matter, or other filth. They're said to become intertwined in cramped underground spaces, like sewers. The number of rats can vary from as few as three to as many as 30-something. If that weren't repulsive enough, the rats' tails are said to continue growing after the rats become entangled, adding to the mass' sheer size. The rats in rat kings are normally identified as black rats ( R. rattus), yet 'kings' made up of mice and squirrels have also been reported. According to legend, somehow the rats survive in their grotesque interlacing until a predator, such as a disgusted human, kills them. As for the origin of the rat king's name, the website of New Zealand's Otago Museum says it “may come from the old superstition that an aged wise rat sat on the entangled tails of rats and was treated as royalty by the pack. Alternatively it could derive from an early belief that the...rats were one organism...” In Altenburg, Germany, the Maritianum Museum has a mummified specimen of 32 entangled rats on display. This specime...

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Why subscribe? • The ultimate action-packed science and technology magazine bursting with exciting information about the universe • Subscribe today and save an extra 5% with checkout code 'LOVE5' • Engaging articles, amazing illustrations & exclusive interviews • Issues delivered straight to your door or device This grandiose term describes a group of rats whose tails become knotted together so that the rats can't free themselves — a rare (and horrific) phenomenon that has inspired myths and legends for centuries. Alibulat Rasulov, a landowner in the Stavropol region in southwestern Russia, found one such rat king in his field. On Aug. 21, Rasulov shared two videos on Instagram that showed five small, bedraggled rats with their tails hopelessly tangled. He titled them (in Russian) " The Rat King is found alive. Part one" and " The Rat King was found alive for the first time. Part two" in the Instagram posts, which have since collected more than 30,000 views. In the first video, which is just under 3 minutes long, Rasulov aims the camera at a flooded patch of land, where something is wriggling under the leaves at the edge of the water. He moves some vegetation to reveal two holes in the bank, which could be burrows dug by small animals. Near one of the holes is a cluster of five small, soaking wet rats with their knotted tails wrapped around a plant stem. Rasulov lifts them out of the water, removes the plant and places the rats on dry land, but though they scramble to esca...

A chilling “ The “extremely rare” phenomenon occurs when Footage captured by Johan Uibopuu shows the moment he walked into his mum’s chicken coop in Tartu, Estonia and was confronted by the haunting sight. More than a dozen of the rodents are seen crawling over each other’s bodies trying to escape. But their efforts are futile and are unable to untie themselves. “I was making the most of a quiet morning in Tartu when my mother phoned me, sounding quite upset,” Johan explained. The cluster of rats found in the chicken coop (Image: Pen News/Andrei Miljutin) Read More Related Articles • Read More Related Articles • “She had gone to feed the birds at the chicken coop when she saw a bundle of rats right at the entrance as she opened the door. “When the shock wore off, she went to investigate and tried to remove them from her way, but they were firmly stuck to the ground.” According to superstition, their occurrence is a sign an imminent plague. And Johan’s mother had found 13 of the rodents tangled up – an ominous number. But the sight is even more ominous for the poor rats stuck together. Andrei Miljutin, whose Natural History Museum at the University of Tartu agreed to take them away, said rodents are “sentenced to death” when they get caught in a rat king. He said two of the 13 rats were already dead. “Even if they manage to escape from the narrow burrow, they can’t move around normally, can’t move to find food, and are completely unprotected,” Andrei continued. “Their survi...

Many people have a very real fear of rats. Whether you’ve ever seen one in person or not, you’re probably grossed out by the idea of a hairy little monster running around and nibbling on everything that you hold precious. But what if we told you that right now there’s a mass of rats tied together by their tails crawling underground and looking for anything they can use to survive? That’s right, we’re talking about rat kings. Maybe you’ve hit up the rat king Wikipedia, but what can you really learn there? We’re here to answer your most pertinent rat king questions, like "Where do rat kings live?" And are there rat kings in New York? Answers: Under your bathroom, and yes yes yes. Keep reading to learn everything there is to know about rat kings, from where the concept originated to where the next rat king is probably going to rear its many heads. So what are rat kings, other than a nightmarish abomination created to haunt your dreams? A rat king occurs when you have a mass of rodents whose tails become stuck together either by a strong adhesive or by becoming so knotted that the animals can’t escape. Once the rats are knotted together they begin to try to furiously escape and a rat king is born. Have you ever seen a rat king? If so how did you handle it? Did you run away in terror, or are you now the proud owner of an embalmed rat king sculpture? Tell us about it in the comments. Photo: **tWo pInK pOSsuMs** / The guys over at LazerHorse bring up an interesting point when say...

Back then, when weapon quests used to take up an actual inventory slot (oh god, do you remember?) I ended up deleting the Rat King quest on all three of my characters because I figured I’d never bother with it and it was just taking up space. As a solo player, the quest revolved around doing things in a group with other Rat King quest-havers, so that seemed like it was just never going to happen for me. Then it was: • Do three patrols with someone using Rat King. • Do two public events with someone using Rat King • Do two Crucible matches with someone using Rat King (Scorch matches don’t count, which I tried). • Do any Nightfall with someone using Rat King (this used to be do a Nightfall with 5 minutes left back when they were on a timer, now you just have to beat it). The first is how much Destiny has changed for me once I opened up to the possibility of moving beyond my solo playstyle. Pretty much my philosophy before this was that I played by myself, and that was it. I would rarely raid or do Nightfalls or really do anything at all that required finding a team on my own. A few things changed for me: The Bungie.net app, which makes it beyond easy to find fireteams for most activities, with dozens of Nightfall/Raid/etc listings every hour. Getting a few IRL friends into Destiny 2 for the first time, and playing some of the more challenging activities with them (before this, no IRL friends had played Destiny since like, The Dark Below). My growing platform as a sort of Des...

Atlas Obscura on Slate is a blog about the world’s hidden wonders. Like us on What comes to mind when you hear the phrase “rat king”? Perhaps a sniffy-nosed rodent scampering about in a crown? Or maybe a ballet dancer in a rat costume, a la the Mouse King in Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker? Well, take those innocent visions, dash them, and report to A rat king, or roi-de-rats if you want to get all classy and French about it, is a pack of rodents whose tails have become entwined. The adhesive for this rat tangle may be dirt, blood, or feces, or the tails may simply be knotted together. The number of rats in a rat king varies wildly — two rats can make a rat king, albeit a pretty pathetic one.

Fast-talking wheeler-dealer Corporal King is stuck in a Malaysian P.O.W. camp during World War II and uses bribery and larceny to take de-facto control of the camp. Fast-talking wheeler-dealer Corporal King is stuck in a Malaysian P.O.W. camp during World War II and uses bribery and larceny to take de-facto control of the camp. Fast-talking wheeler-dealer Corporal King is stuck in a Malaysian P.O.W. camp during World War II and uses bribery and larceny to take de-facto control of the camp.

About 200 years ago, the German town of Altenburg was an important hub for natural history, zoology, paleontology, and botany. Since its foundation in 1817, the Mauritianum has played an important role as a local and international exhibition center. Today, it houses about 40,000 specimens, among them the iconic “rat king of Altenburg,” a conglomerate of some 32 mummified rats. The Altenburg Nature Research Society, which founded the museum, took advantage of the region’s richness of wildlife diversity and fossils. The society had members who worked in then-new science of wildlife zoology who joined global expeditions to expand the collection. The local farmers played an important role in growing the museum’s collection. Since there was a longstanding tradition of catching and breeding wild birds for aviaries and dining tables at royal courts, from early 19th century, the farmers of Thuringia and Saxony learned to take care of sensitive tropical and exotic birds that were introduced from colonized regions. The bird taxidermies were sold to natural history museums and private collections all over Europe. As a result, the Mauritianum’s collection has a large focus on taxidermy birds, but the exhibition also gives interesting insights into the tremendous ecological changes the region and its landscape went through during industrialization, urbanization, and climate change. The Mauritianum also hosts a number of curiosities. The “rat king of Altenburg” is known as one of the wo...

Back then, when weapon quests used to take up an actual inventory slot (oh god, do you remember?) I ended up deleting the Rat King quest on all three of my characters because I figured I’d never bother with it and it was just taking up space. As a solo player, the quest revolved around doing things in a group with other Rat King quest-havers, so that seemed like it was just never going to happen for me. Then it was: • Do three patrols with someone using Rat King. • Do two public events with someone using Rat King • Do two Crucible matches with someone using Rat King (Scorch matches don’t count, which I tried). • Do any Nightfall with someone using Rat King (this used to be do a Nightfall with 5 minutes left back when they were on a timer, now you just have to beat it). The first is how much Destiny has changed for me once I opened up to the possibility of moving beyond my solo playstyle. Pretty much my philosophy before this was that I played by myself, and that was it. I would rarely raid or do Nightfalls or really do anything at all that required finding a team on my own. A few things changed for me: The Bungie.net app, which makes it beyond easy to find fireteams for most activities, with dozens of Nightfall/Raid/etc listings every hour. Getting a few IRL friends into Destiny 2 for the first time, and playing some of the more challenging activities with them (before this, no IRL friends had played Destiny since like, The Dark Below). My growing platform as a sort of Des...