Claudius Aelianus
According to Claudius Aelianus in "De Natura Animalium", and Gaius Julius Solinus, both quoting much earlier but now lost authors, the sacred ibis procreates with its bill, and thus the bird is always a virgin. Aristotle, writing some 500 years earlier, also mentions this theory, but repudiates it. Picrius mentions how the venomous basilisk is hatched from the eggs of ibis, nurtured from the poisons of all the serpents the birds devour. These authors and many others also mention how crocodiles and snakes are rendered motionless after being touched by the feather of an ibis. Claudius Aelianus also says the ibis is consecrated to the moon.