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So . . . The Grootslang is a thing.  It’s definitely . . . A sight to behold.  Also, I’m fairly certain at least one person’s mind went to a talking alien tree that I think talks about the power of family or something?  I don’t know.  Let’s move on.

The Grootslang supposedly lives in a deep cave in South Africa.  This creature is primordial, which means it has been around for as long as the world has existed.  It was one of the gods’ earliest creations when they were still learning their trade.  So, they made this guy by accident and have regretted it ever since.  The Grootslang is strong, cunning, smart, and vicious.  To fix this mistake, they split all of the Grootslang in half to create the first elephant and first snake.  Of course, one managed to escape and managed to reproduce enough that it’s still a threat.

As you can tell, the Grootslang is a combination of an elephant and a serpent.  Although, I also found sites saying it was originally just a giant, cow-eating snake with diamonds in its eye sockets.  The elephant features were added later when getting mixed up with other local legends.  Another legend had it as a hippo instead of an elephant, but I only ran into that one once.  It was typically a black-scaled giant snake or a black-scaled elephant/snake hybrid.  Choose whichever one you want at this point.  Both seem to be terrifying and enjoying swallowing large animals (cows and elephants) whole.

Now, the Grootslang lives in a cave called the ‘Wonder Hole’ or ‘Bottomless Pit’.  This lair was connected to the distant ocean, which allowed the creature to escape for food.  It even went into rivers at times.  The cave was also filled with diamonds, which connects to the various that has the gems for eyes.  Of course, this added to some legends where the Grootslang loves gems so much that they can be bargained with.  Not that people have diamonds in their pocket all the time, but it’s a nice escape if you can swing it.

Direct stories didn’t really turn up.  There was one about an English businessman disappearing after his group got attacked by lions.  People said the Grootslang got him instead of the lions.  The second had a prospector going into the ‘Wonder Hole’ until he reached a ledge.  He saw all these tunnels, smelled sulfur or pure evil, and then scrambled back up the winch when bats caused him to drop his lantern.  Not sure about that one since the Grootslang didn’t actually make an appearance.

In terms of real-world origins, the simplest explanation is the local fauna.  Pythons in the area could grow to 25 feet long, so a person running into one might be frightened enough to exaggerate it in their mind.  The elephant part could have been added through repeating the story and making it scarier.  Although, I do like the origin tale where they were split into the two separate animals.  Really had an odd ‘Just So Stories’ by Kipling vibe to it.