10 Terrifying Monsters That (We Hope!) Don't Exist

6. Hell Hounds

€œI got to keep moving, I got to keep moving/Blues falling down like hail, blues falling down like hail/And the day keeps on remindin€™ me, there€™s a Hellhound on my trail, Hellhound on my trail€ €“ Robert Johnson, Hellhound on my trail (1937). We all know the story of Robert Johnson, the famed American Blues musician who sold his soul to the Devil (or was it the African trickster God Legba?) in order to achieve musical success and ultimately become the inaugural member of €˜The 27 Club€™. Johnson defined the image of his dread and fear as a Hellhound, a mythic, ghostly dog from Hell itself, following those wretched earthbound souls that are doomed to join its dark master someday... However, Hellhounds appear in all sorts of mythologies, folk tales and well-travelled stories from around the world, as well. Of course there was Cerberus, the three-headed Hellhound from Greek mythology, but there are also a great many other ghostly, hellish dog myths native to Britain and Europe, such as the legend of €˜Old Shuck€™ a ghastly dog that reportedly haunts areas of Norfolk, Essex and Suffolk. Shuck is considered to be an omen of death and some stories go as far as to state that, if you tell anyone of a Shuck sighting, then somebody close to you will die not long after you do. In the 14th century, one story even claimed that Shuck was an incarnation of The Devil himself. Ghost dog stories are told throughout the British Isles, especially in Wales (but there€™s a terrific one from Peel castle on The Isle of Man which concerns a guard going in search of - and then being horribly mauled by - the spectral hound, before dying of fright a few days later). In addition to Shuck, England is also home to stories of The Gytrash, The Yeth Hound (a headless variety) and the Barghest (which has been reported to lead a canine funeral procession upon the occasion of a notable person€™s death). Similar €˜ghost dog€™ or €˜Hellhound€™ stories can also be found right across the continent, as well as into folklore and fiction from America and, more recently, Japan. Now, the big question here is, if the legends warn witnesses not to speak of it, or else they risk bringing death upon their own household, how do we know that people aren€™t seeing these monsters all the time and simply refusing to mention it? We could reassure you that we€™ve never actually seen Old Shuck. But then again, we could easily be lying...