anteglacial

I saw a caique, with high, sharp prow and stem, and a bellying sail, making south with the dark current; and against my will I followed it for a time - to the delta and the swamps, and at last to the flashing sea where that great beast Abaia, carried from the farther shores of the universe in anteglacial days, wallows until the moment comes for him and his kind to devour the continents.

The Shadow of the Torturer Wolfe, Gene 1980