A Brief History
The Rake is a fictional cryptid resembling a humanoid creature that infrequently stalks people, sometimes appearing at the foot of the victim’s bed, and has been alleged to mutilate and abduct children. According to Paul Tamburro, The Rake originated as a creepypasta created by an anonymous poster on 4chan’s/b/ imageboard in late 2005. The creature is depicted as a crouching humanoid that is around 6 feet tall, with pale, grey-colored skin. Its eyes are slightly larger than a human’s eyes, and they glow, which is the sign of a tissue in its eyes known as ”tapetum lucidum”. It lacks a nose and its mouth is smaller than a human’s, but when attacked or provoked, it opens freely on a hinge down to its neckline, showing hundreds of dull yet sharp teeth.
Digging Deeper
The Rake originated on 4chan’s /b/ board in late 2005. An anonymous poster started a thread with the post “hey /b/ lets make a new monster”. Many ideas spawned from the post, but the idea concerning a creature called “The Rake” stood out. Soon, another poster created a new thread based on this idea. The thread started with this post: “Alright, this is for the people who like the three-eyes, no apparent mouth, pale skin one. Here’s what we’ve got so far: Humanoid, about six feet tall when standing, but usually crouches and walks on all fours. It has pale skin. The face is blank. As in, no nose, no mouth; however, it has three solid green eyes, one in the middle of its forehead, and the other two on either side of its head, towards the back. Usually seen in front yards in suburban areas. Usually just watches the observer, but will stand up and attack if approached. When it attacks, a mouth opens up, as if a hinged skull that opens at the chin. Reveals many tiny, but dull teeth.”
The Rake is described as tall but crouching, most often seen with wide, glowing eyes in suburban areas. It opens its mouth and widens its eyes when provoked and attacks when approached. If not provoked or approached, it just stares at you ominously. It is alleged to maul humans in their sleep or drive people to commit suicide.
The Rake was considered by some to be the precursor to the Slender Man. While almost everybody involved with the creature understands that it is not real, the Internet allows others to build on the established theories, and thus lend an air of authenticity to the cryptid. So, the creators and others have hoaxed pictures and similar forms of proof to justify the Rake’s existence. Many believed a mysterious sighting of a humanoid creature shown on the news in Berwick, Pennsylvania to be evidence of the Rake, but when exactly the same picture was taken in Louisiana, people realized that the two photos were the same and thus, probably not real.
The sighting was actually a video hoax marketing promo for the video game Resistance 3 (2011).
The Rake became inspiration for hoax videos and FPS Creator games. Most notable of these games were created by the same person. The games are entitled Rake: Back to Asylum, The Rake: Hostel, and The Rake: Dark Path.
The Rake is also featured in the YouTube alternate reality game called EverymanHYBIRD. The series also includes The Slender Man.
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Historical Evidence
Some content in this article is adapted from this article on Wikipedia . It is reproduced here per the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike License. For more art by the artist of the image used in this article, please visit here.
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