INTRODUCTION 



Single species bibliographies have been relatively rare, and largely restricted to 

 dramatic species such as carnivorous mammals and large birds that are ol" conservation 

 importance Using this argument, a bibliography to the literature on the world's largest 

 venomous snake, the king cobra (Ophiophagus hunnah) is highly desirable Not only is 

 this large species becoming increasingly rare as a result of habitat alteration and capture 

 for zoos and even for food, but may be. in many ecosystems, the top predator and its 

 presence thus indicative of environmental health. 



While preparing for a study of the autecology of the king cobra, we prepared a 

 bibliography A total of 3Q7 references were obtained, initially using on-line computer 

 search and finally a manual search of the herpetological library of the Centre for 

 Herpetology, Madras, the Sarawak Museum, Kuching, the Bombay Natural History 

 Society, Bombay and the Musee National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris, and from the authors' 

 personal libraries and that of Anslem De Silva of the Faculty of Medicine, University of 

 Peradeniya The search concluded May 7, 1995 



As in other similar lists, we recognize twelve broad subject categories (Index) A 

 reference may appear in more than one category The bibliography is alphabetically by 

 author 



