Animal euphemisms: Snakes, wolves and terrifying insects as "Sons of the Land"

Folk-culture euphemisms are often used to allude to animals that are – or appear to be – noxious. This paper presents three independent instances of a circumlocution which translates as "son of the land/earth/country." The examples span some four millennia, three continents and three biological classes. The first is an expression for the snake used in ancient Egypt; the second is a euphemism for the wolf used in Irish since medieval times; and the third is a circumlocution for the Jerusalem cricket which is still used by Spanish speakers in the Americas.