In the 1908 illustration by William Heinemann on the right, Jonathan Swift's traveler, Gulliver, battles the Brobdingnabian wasps which tried to steal his breakfast sweetcake. Swift may have had in mind the European hornet, Vespa crabro, when he invoked the image of a large, aggressive wasp. Fortunately, cicada-killers are quite docile and, like the biggest guy in the bar, they will rarely bother you if not provoked.