This thing looks like a cross between a chicken and a peacock. My whole group saw the thing at about the same time and collectively said, "What the heck."
It could be that this is a beast that is loosely based on the god of Mexican lore, Quetzalcoatl - a half-chicken, half-snake. I can't remember what he's supposedly the god of, but who cares. Will it help resolve the mystery of the feather? Probably not. Or it could be based on the theory that birds evolved from a form of lizards with elongated scales. But more likely than any of that, it was probably pretty damn close to 5 o'clock on a Friday when Verant came up with the whole chicken-lizard idea.
quetzalcoatl was not the winged snake that was his companion the naqual. quetzalcoatl was described as a man with pale skin, and he was the enimy of tezcatploca the sun god. every year the aztecs would paint a war prisoner white and sacrifice him to the sun god.
lol, prolly was...and when i saw this picture, i started to crack up like you wouldnt believe, and then i noticed the snake tail thing, and i laughed even harder=P